The Trust and Safety team at Twitch state that they spend their time making sure users are protected and guidelines are followed on the platform in accordance with their terms and conditions. During TwitchCon 2022 at the San Diego Convention Center, the team discussing policy included:
Angela Hession, VP Trust & Safety
Alison Huffman, VP of Product, Community Health
Connie Chung, Head of Global Policy, Trust, and Safety
Doug Scott, Chief Customer Officer
Each gave some insight about what tools and and rules they are implementing to make Twitch a fair and equitable space for users.
According to Hession, “I think because of the ever-evolving nature of life that response time is essential. I think it’s not as acute for static upload video. So our response time is 24 hours, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, and it’s ensuring this admission and how it escalates and prioritizes harm.” With 8 million different communities that are going live every month, at any given moment it’s certain that Twitch has a large scale of users to monitor. There are also two and a half million viewers watching streams live as well.
For the team, prioritizing accuracy and nuance is what comes first in their job to protect users on the platform. Being quick and efficient is their approach to solving these problems. There are adversarial actors, as Hession mentions, and then people whose core beliefs may be bigoted are harmful anyway. Hession groups these users together when filtering out abuse buckets.
Twitch heavily relies on its volunteer-based model of users branded as mods to also assist in this capacity. While many moderators may not have the knowledge base to understand safety and security, Twitch says they are trying programs like Safety Center. They are also growing their moderator program.
According to Huffman, the use of real people is important to the platform: “We can’t do this just through tech because it’s live and we don’t know what’s happening.” Huffman started as a community moderator in 2007. For her, a lot of this has been a training experience on the powers of building an operation.
What makes this particular social network unique compared to others is that static content gets preemptively reviewed and scanned before it is live to the world. According to the policy team, the magic of Twitch happens when the streamer and chat are interacting and any delay breaks. Huffman further went on to say that Twitch relies on partnership with the community to have them help keep the platform and users’ homes safe. “It means we are having streamers and channel moderators who help keep their community safe to their standards.”
Twitch also has made it possible for moderators to report people who are violating community guidelines and for the process to be intuitive and clear so that users are able to file secure reports to the operations team and the offending material is reviewed and taken down as quickly as possible.
“We really needed to find that right connection between the technology that helps scale and then the people who have the right nuance of judgment,” says Huffman.
The company also is thinking about education. “It’s not just about our rules, but it’s why we’re doing this,” says Hession. Twitch has kicked off some programs, giving more information about the underlying logic of community guidelines. The livestream platform is doing that through music, to articulate why they have their policies and how they’re preventing harm. The policy team wants to empower their streamers to help build the communities that are right for them. They realized that they can’t do it all and can’t do it all instantly. Hession says, “The best way to protect our creators is to give them powerful, easy-to-use nuanced tools that let them build the community. We want to be able to have communities that you can set up to tailor that own individual experience which I think is really important.”
Panelist Scott says, “God bless the mods. We love our mods.” When it comes to suspension on Twitch, panelist Chung says, “Suspension rates are the severity; you want to make sure it’s definitely proportional if it’s very low.”
Twitch believes that their user community has been very clear about what they expect based on experience and they want to control that experience. The team is adamant that as the service grows and evolves, the safety experience needs to do so as well. “I think we’re very lucky that we have a very engaged community. They care about safety as much as we do,” says Hession.
As far as operations go, Twitch is proud to share that they have resolved 80% of user reports within 10 minutes, which according to them is industry leading. Chung says she’s amazed at how much the community wants to follow Twitch’s goals. “I think that we’re going to continue to be really excited for that for next year. We’ve got a number of policy options that are going to come deepening our understanding of harassment, sexual harassment, and that is changing in the industry. Twitch is making sure that we stay abreast of the trends so that we can protect our community but also have good listening skills,” she says.
You can learn more about safety practices happening at Twitch here.
The Trust and Safety team at Twitch state that they spend their time making sure users are protected and guidelines are followed on the platform in accordance with their terms and conditions. During TwitchCon 2022 at the San Diego Convention Center, the team discussing policy included:
Angela Hession, VP Trust & Safety
Alison Huffman, VP of Product, Community Health
Connie Chung, Head of Global Policy, Trust, and Safety
Doug Scott, Chief Customer Officer
Each gave some insight about what tools and and rules they are implementing to make Twitch a fair and equitable space for users.
According to Hession, “I think because of the ever-evolving nature of life that response time is essential. I think it’s not as acute for static upload video. So our response time is 24 hours, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, and it’s ensuring this admission and how it escalates and prioritizes harm.” With 8 million different communities that are going live every month, at any given moment it’s certain that Twitch has a large scale of users to monitor. There are also two and a half million viewers watching streams live as well.
For the team, prioritizing accuracy and nuance is what comes first in their job to protect users on the platform. Being quick and efficient is their approach to solving these problems. There are adversarial actors, as Hession mentions, and then people whose core beliefs may be bigoted are harmful anyway. Hession groups these users together when filtering out abuse buckets.
Twitch heavily relies on its volunteer-based model of users branded as mods to also assist in this capacity. While many moderators may not have the knowledge base to understand safety and security, Twitch says they are trying programs like Safety Center. They are also growing their moderator program.
According to Huffman, the use of real people is important to the platform: “We can’t do this just through tech because it’s live and we don’t know what’s happening.” Huffman started as a community moderator in 2007. For her, a lot of this has been a training experience on the powers of building an operation.
What makes this particular social network unique compared to others is that static content gets preemptively reviewed and scanned before it is live to the world. According to the policy team, the magic of Twitch happens when the streamer and chat are interacting and any delay breaks. Huffman further went on to say that Twitch relies on partnership with the community to have them help keep the platform and users’ homes safe. “It means we are having streamers and channel moderators who help keep their community safe to their standards.”
Twitch also has made it possible for moderators to report people who are violating community guidelines and for the process to be intuitive and clear so that users are able to file secure reports to the operations team and the offending material is reviewed and taken down as quickly as possible.
“We really needed to find that right connection between the technology that helps scale and then the people who have the right nuance of judgment,” says Huffman.
The company also is thinking about education. “It’s not just about our rules, but it’s why we’re doing this,” says Hession. Twitch has kicked off some programs, giving more information about the underlying logic of community guidelines. The livestream platform is doing that through music, to articulate why they have their policies and how they’re preventing harm. The policy team wants to empower their streamers to help build the communities that are right for them. They realized that they can’t do it all and can’t do it all instantly. Hession says, “The best way to protect our creators is to give them powerful, easy-to-use nuanced tools that let them build the community. We want to be able to have communities that you can set up to tailor that own individual experience which I think is really important.”
Panelist Scott says, “God bless the mods. We love our mods.” When it comes to suspension on Twitch, panelist Chung says, “Suspension rates are the severity; you want to make sure it’s definitely proportional if it’s very low.”
Twitch believes that their user community has been very clear about what they expect based on experience and they want to control that experience. The team is adamant that as the service grows and evolves, the safety experience needs to do so as well. “I think we’re very lucky that we have a very engaged community. They care about safety as much as we do,” says Hession.
As far as operations go, Twitch is proud to share that they have resolved 80% of user reports within 10 minutes, which according to them is industry leading. Chung says she’s amazed at how much the community wants to follow Twitch’s goals. “I think that we’re going to continue to be really excited for that for next year. We’ve got a number of policy options that are going to come deepening our understanding of harassment, sexual harassment, and that is changing in the industry. Twitch is making sure that we stay abreast of the trends so that we can protect our community but also have good listening skills,” she says.
You can learn more about safety practices happening at Twitch here.
In Episode 8 of House of the Dragon, “The Lord of the Tides,” 6 years have now passed. In that time, Queen Rhaenys Targaryen (Eve Best) has not seen her husband Corlys Velaryon (Steve Toussaint). Sadly Corlys was seriously injured in battle at the Stepstones, and his neck was slashed by an enemy’s dagger. He fell overboard into the sea, and his wound was severe. Corlys is now suffering from a fever, burning within. Ser Vaemond Velaryon (Wil Johnson) suggests the blood fever has killed men half of Corlys’ age and wants to know who will take the Driftwood throne.
Rhaenys insists that Lucerys Velaryon (Harvey Sadler) will be next in line as it was her husband’s desire. However Vaemond says he is of blood and the closest king he has left. Vaemond is concerned if the Velaryon bloodline will be snuffed out by puffs of Strong blood. He finally states that while he appreciates Rhaenys’ support, he does not need it.
Meanwhile, Daemon Targaryen (Matt Smith) unearths a dragon’s egg from Syrax in a warming chamber. He found three and hands one off to one of the dragonkeepers. He in turn, gives Daemon a message from his daughter Baela Velaryon (Bethany Antonia).
A now pregnant Rhaenyra Targaryen (Emma D’Arcy) is teaching her son Jacaerys Velaryon (Harry Collett) to learn to speak high Valerian. Daemon delivers Baela’s message to Rhaenrya, and she believes her succession is now under a great threat. She also believes that Rhaenys thinks they killed Laenor Velaryon (John Macmillan) and she will undermine her power. Daemon suggests they head back to King’s Landing.
Queen Alicent Hightower (Olivia Cooke), now wearing a necklace with a seven pointed star, the symbol of the faith of the seven, is sitting at the Small Council meeting. Rhaenyra and Daemon visit a very ill Viserys Targaryen (Paddy Considine) in his bed. He’s also fighting dementia. As Daemon informs his brother of the news of Corlys’ injury and the threat of the Driftwood throne, Viserys tells him Otto will handle it. Daemon insists that Viserys should affirm his position as king and have Lucerys as successor. Rhaenyra introduces Viserys to his two grandchildren (and grand-nephews): Aegon and Viserys — the children she had with Daemon.
In the next scene, Alicent meets Dianna, a servant girl who describes a sexual assault from Prince Aegon Targaryen (Tom Glynn-Carney). Alicent gaslights the young girl into thinking that she may not be believed by the public and makes her drink moon tea (a drink used to abort pregnancies) just in case.
Rhaenyra and Daemon confront Queen Alicent in the king’s quarters and are infuriated by how the maesters are taking care of him and also how he is ruling the kingdom in his condition.
Luke speaks to his brother Jace and is concerned about his succession. He thinks that because he doesn’t look like Laenor and instead looks like a Strong that his becoming the Lord of Driftwood will always be questioned. Ser Criston Cole (Fabien Frankel) trains with Aemond Targaryen (Ewan Mitchell) — who looks a lot like Matt Smith — in a duel, and Aemond proves he’s a swift fighter. Criston goes on to tell him he will do well in tourneys in no time, to which Aemond says, “I don’t give a sh*t about tourneys.”
Vaemond shows up to King’s Landing and manages to ally with Otto to convince him that he should lead Driftmark. The threat of war looms, and a child should not be in power when the day comes. Rhaenyra confronts Rhaenys and states that this is a play to disinherit her son, and Rhaenys is still angered by what happened to her son Laenor. Rhaenyra explains that she loved Laenor very much and that she was not complicit in his death.
Rhaenyra proposes that Rhaenys should back Luke’s claim and betroth Laena’s children to hers. Baela will be heir of the seven kingdoms. Rhaenys declines her offer and says the Hightowers will land their first blow and she will stand alone. Rhaenyra goes to her sick father and begs him to defend her claim, but sadly he’s so far gone in his illness he can’t comprehend what she’s asking.
Otto sits on behalf of the king on the Iron Throne to discuss the matter of succession at Driftmark. Vaemond petitions himself to be the next in line to inherit the throne since he is of pure Velaryon blood. As Rhaenyra stands before Otto to begin her petition to have Lucerys as heir, Viserys interrupts and walks into the throne room. Wearing a mask over half of his face (probably due to being disfigured from his leprosy), he manages to walk over to the throne in his very weakened condition. As he struggles to get up the steps to the throne, Daemon helps him, which is a full circle moment from Episode 1 when these two had quite the tempestuous relationship.
Viserys says the only person to honor Corlys’ wishes of succession would be that of Rhaenys, his wife. She steps up and says that Lucerys was in fact who Corlys desired as heir. She further goes on to tell Viserys about Rhaenyra’s proposal to betroth her children to theirs and that she heartily agrees.
An infuriated Vaemond stands before the king and is defiant against his ruling. He refuses to accept it, calling Rhaenyra’s kids bastards and her a whore. Daemon suddenly decapitates Vaemond with his sword. Viserys suffers from sudden exhaustion and is escorted out of the room.
Viserys has dinner with the Tararyens and Hightowers. He takes off his mask and exposes his face, and he looks like the Phantom of the Opera. An eye is missing and most of the skin has deteriorated from his face. During this scene, Aegon is still antagonizing Jacaerys, which proves their feud isn’t ending anytime soon.
The families finally have a moment of reconciliation and peace. Viserys has a stunned look on his face at first, but then a look of relief. This is the moment he’s been waiting for all of his life and during his reign as king. Sadly, he cannot enjoy it for very long because he is in pain. However the peace doesn’t last when a roasted pig is placed in front of Aemond and the Velaryon boys laugh, dating back to Episode 6 when the boys teased Aemond with a pig. Aemond makes a toast and refers to the boys as “strong” using emphasis on the last name of Harwin Strong. The conflict between the boys arises again. Rhaenyra tells Alicent that she and her family should head back to Dragonstone.
Putting Viserys to bed, Alicent realizes his dementia has advanced when he tells her that she is the “prince who was promised.” The last shot is of Viserys who breathes slowly and rests in his bed.
Tune in with us every Sunday night at 9pm ET on Twitter using the hashtag #DragonsYall as we live-tweet each episode this season! You can catch the series during the broadcast on HBO or stream it later on HBO Max.
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Good Evening, loyal Afronerd Radio listeners. Wow....we have another difficult show and topics to discuss. Another one of our friends and integral contributors has passed on and regrettably left our mortal plane. Longtime Afronerd Radio supporter, Sergio Mims....notable film critic and film historian from Chicago passed on Tuesday. We will do a more comprehensive retrospective in the forthcoming week but for today's program we will simply give high praise and respect to a friend.
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Once upon a time, I waxed poetically about my love for Josei manga (here and here) and how those stories were just what I needed leaving adolescence and into my grown woman years. Josei is still an underrated genre in manga, and I am here to do my part and evangelize some more about one of my favorite genres that I can never read enough.
Here’s a list that includes Josei titles for you manga readers, and the only guidelines here are that these all are just one single volume and that they are messy as hell for your enjoyment! Up the ante here! From sleeping with around with the guy your stepmother is cheating on your father with to tearfully being unable to wear the cute but expensive maternity underwear, Josei has it all!
Note: As Josei is geared for older audiences as Senien as to Shonen, please note that an age rating of older teen, 16+ years is recommended for the titles on this list.
Love, lust, capitalism, and desire for more all converge in Pink which follows Yumiko, a young woman who is working two jobs. Her nine-to-five job at an office bores her to tears and her side hustle as a call girl at night is just enough to feed her pet Croc. Life is a bit dull until she does a little snooping and finds her stepmother’s sugar baby is the much younger Haruo, a college student and aspiring writer–things liven up for once. Yumi’s never been a kept woman, or someone’s pet, so will she consider a different kind of life with Haruo around? A whole lot of drinking, blackmail, dramatics, and threatening with her pet crocodile means revenge is a dish best served cold and good times are had until they aren’t.
Created by legendary mangaka artist Kyoko Okazaki, Pink is an unapologetic manga about a young woman wanting to color her world and find new thrills to experience. Sure, there’s musing on being young and having thoughts about relationships, but there is so much to love about the complexities of family and finding ways to cherish the good times in this narrative. Yumi’s apartment becomes a home away from home not just for Haruo, but her precocious younger half-sister. Yumi goes through the book musing and pondering about her body, the female body in different places, and the work she has to complete to get the things she needs and wants.
This is a volume of Josei that I will recommend every time because Yumi’s story is so fun and cringeworthy to read. I loved the weirdly endearing dynamic of the relationship that she has with her school-aged half-sister who initially reveals the sugar-baby relationship between the mother and the much younger man. Noted, I haven’t read much manga centering sex workers, so this work was a nuanced manga that thankfully doesn’t villainize her but instead explores her motivations and some of her inner desires in life. Pink is a brilliant, contained volume of manga of a young woman searching for her happiness and of all the many ways to color her life that still feels fresh and relevant even though this work was published at the tail end of the 1980s.
Recommended for: For fans of Unusual Pairings, Stories about Sex Workers, Works with Criticism about Capitalism and Art
Natsumi’s younger sister Haru was her whole world and now she’s gone. After the funeral ceremony, Natsumi reluctantly agrees to date her sister’s fiancé Togo at his request. As time passes, they both come to learn so much about each other and the complicated relationship that they both shared with the now-dead Haru who died young. Haru’s Curse complicates a generous story about falling in love and all the untold expectations we have of ourselves and those we love.
Reading the synopsis alone could turn you away from this manga based on how very soap opera-like the story could venture out to be. Instead, Haru’s Curse turned out to be this haunting but beautiful tale of grief, sisterhood, and the messiness of love, both familial and romantic. Featuring a narrative that centers on two sisters who loved each other the most and two young adults who find themselves navigating murky emotional waters, this English-language debut by mangaka, Asuka Konishi is a searing, heartbreaking read.
Through Natsumi and Togo, there are some intricate narrative threads masterfully sewed together about growing up, finding agency, and standing on your own two feet that are so well executed on the page that I return to reread Haru’s Curse again and again even when I know it will break my heart each time. This is a volume of Josei that I will recommend every time because, on this list, this manga best illustrates that love and the act of loving someone is never always rainbows and sunshine. As romanticized as falling in love is, this manga is a reminder that loving people can be painful, but it can also be the catalyst to taking ownership of your life and what and who you desire to hold dear. I believe that this manga also reminds us of the fragility of life and how suffocating it can be when the people we love leave us behind.
Recommended if you like: Complex Family Situations, Grieving Characters, Love Triangles
I am so glad that in recent years the manga industry has been giving us more and more diverse titles coming into the English language market that includes manga exploring gender and sexuality exploration, autobiographical manga, and–manga about motherhood. I Don’t Know How to Give Birth! is a standout manga as it runs the gauntlet from hilarious to heartwarming to eye-opening on one woman’s journey to motherhood and all the challenges and joys it brings. I love getting to read more autobiographical manga, and this volume caught my eye as it is presented in such a visual and humorous way.
At the end of each chapter, both the mangaka, Kazama, and her husband, Konno Azure, also a manga artist, each have a page where they share a one-panel comic and add commentary from the perspective of the mother’s and father’s experiences. It’s a funny and insightful little piece of commentary that I started to anticipate the pages throughout the book. These endearing pages serve as short bursts of advice, like how to support your pregnant partner’s food cravings and finding ways to best prepare yourself for the challenges of breastfeeding. It will surely ring true for parents at all stages of life: trying, new, and seasoned.
This is a volume of Josei that I will recommend every time because while I was laughing (and cringing) throughout, I loved Kazama’s personal reflections on figuring out why she wanted to be a mother and why this endeavor of childbirth was so important to her. Reading to see her not underestimate herself when it came to the mountain of medical tests and procedures needed to prep her body for not just pregnancy but for birth pulled at my heartstrings. Also noting that while infertility is still very much taboo in some countries and communities, seeing the manga artist move past her embarrassment and shame to get to a place of better understanding and health was super inspiring. Shout out to the mamas and birth givers of the world! I am so much better equipped to understand what hardships y’all go through and what miracle it is to bring another life into this world.
Recommended for: Autobiographical work, Manga about Motherhood, Comedic Manga
Tomoyo Shiino has been the one constant friend and grounding force in her childhood friend Mariko’s life. From an unhappy childhood with an abusive father to deep-seated depression and self-loathing to cancerous relationships, Mariko has survived it all thanks to Tomoyo by her side. She’s bandaged her up and rescued her. She’s gotten angry at her, for her, and on her behalf. When Tomoyo is utterly blindsided by news of her best friend’s death, she is determined to liberate Mariko’s ashes for one final journey together. My Broken Mariko is a tear-jerking, heavy read on friendships and the circumstances that befall young women who never quite make it back whole from being beaten on by the world for so long.
Of all the manga on the list, this one may carry the most trigger warnings as it does explore suicide, suicidal ideation, and a survivor of several types of abuse present in the narrative. This is a volume of Josei that I will recommend every time because it is a daring manga on closure and the failures of friendships: the ones we imagine and the realistic ones that we have no control over. Tomoyo sets out to redeem her dear friend but also herself as someone who could never truly save her destructive friend who moved from one trauma to the other. My Broken Mariko is a beautiful and saddening tale of the great love between friends in a world where one half of the duo experienced more darkness than light.
This manga effectively defines heartbreak, survivor’s guilt, and closure on the page. My Broken Mariko is forever ingrained in my heart as such a messy and heartfelt offering on the purest form of love through friendship and the incredible journey one friend takes to give another a final sendoff deserving of her.
Recommended for: Fans of Manga About Friendships Between Women, Grieving Characters, Psychological Plots
Nagata Kabi, the award-winning creator of such works as My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness and My Alcoholic Escape from Reality, brings us the fire once again with her latest manga titled My Wandering Warrior Existence. This work follows the mangaka when she attends a friend’s wedding and suddenly wants one of her own. Upon further evaluation and soul searching, she realizes that the wedding is just superficial for her. What she truly desires, what she truly longs to love and be loved. So, she sets out on a journey to figure out dating apps, learn about modern romance, and most importantly, move past trauma and self-doubt to come to a place of loving herself.
This is a volume of Josei I will recommend every time because Kabi is a powerhouse whose auto-biographical manga is worth reading, period. Her manga is, at times, hard to read through but always profound and manga that I always find myself reaching for the next book. What makes My Wandering Warrior Existence a standout from Kabi’s other works is that this book builds upon lessons from her previous works. This manga builds upon all the insecurities she has faced before in confronting her ideals and fears on her gender expression, her health issues, and navigating her own sexuality at her own pace.
Here in this book, she is asking herself more monumental questions and working through more complicated feelings. I truly felt so honored to be back along for the ride to read about this latest leg in her journey. Self-love is probably the overarching theme in this manga. Getting to witness Kabi find that place where she is better equipped to define living life more fully is so thrilling and satisfying. This single volume of the manga is an illustrative reminder that while we all have hang-ups and flaws, having agency in the decisions we make in life–and having support is the ultimate gift. More so a greater gift for those warriors weathering out the tougher chapters in their lives which may also include readers who may pick up this book and find pieces of themselves on the page.
Recommended for: Fans of Autobiographical works, Manga Exploring Gender and Relationships, Manga Exploring Mental Health
