What is this?

See here for full details on the event.

Post Your Update

• How did your week go?
• What books did you get through?
• How did you feel about them?
• What's up next for you?

Also, given that this is the last update thread:

• How was the month overall?
• Did you enjoy the event?
• Any breakthroughs, standouts, or lessons learned?
• If we did something like this again, what would you change or want to see?

What is this?

See here for full details on the event.

Post Your Update

• How did your week go?
• What books did you get through?
• How did you feel about them?
• What's up next for you?

Also, given that this is the last update thread:

• How was the month overall?
• Did you enjoy the event?
• Any breakthroughs, standouts, or lessons learned?
• If we did something like this again, what would you change or want to see?

What is this?

See here for full details on the event.

Post Your Update

• How did your week go?
• What games did you get through?
• How did you feel about them?
• What's up next for you?

(Optional!) Focuses for Week 4 (Last Week!)

• ANYTHING GOES!

Let's burn through these backlogs!

2020 vision: Where will we be within a decade by Telegraph

The world in 2020: A glimpse into the future by Independent

What will life be like 10 years from now by Eric Zorn

10 predictions for the world in january 1st, 2020 by Paul Buchheit

Feel free to put any more predictions you found or comment on these predictions.

What is this?

See here for full details on the event.

Post Your Update

• How did your week go?
• What books did you get through?
• How did you feel about them?
• What's up next for you?

(Optional!) Focuses for Week 4 (Last Week!)

• ANYTHING GOES!

Let's burn through these backlogs!

What is this?

See here for full details on the event.

Post Your Update

• How did your week go?
• What games did you get through?
• How did you feel about them?
• What's up next for you?

(Optional!) Focuses for Week 3

• Games that have a score of less than 80 on any review aggregator
• Games that someone else recommended to you
• Games that are open-ended or story-less

Let's burn through these backlogs!

What is this?

See here for full details on the event.

Post Your Update

• How did your week go?
• What books did you get through?
• How did you feel about them?
• What's up next for you?

(Optional!) Focuses for Week 3

• Books with an aggregate review score of less than 4.0/80% on Goodreads, LibraryThing, or any other review aggregator
• Books that someone else recommended to you
• Non-fiction books

Let's burn through these backlogs!

What is this?

See here for full details on the event.

Post Your Update

• How did your week go?
• What games did you get through?
• How did you feel about them?
• What's up next for you?

Focuses for Week 2

• Games in genres you don't normally play
• Games that take longer than 4 hours to complete
• Story-driven games

Let's burn through these backlogs!

What is this?

See here for full details on the event.

Post Your Update

• How did your week go?
• What books did you get through?
• How did you feel about them?
• What's up next for you?

Focuses for Week 2

• Books in a genre you don't normally read
• Books that you own physical copies of
• Books with more than 400 pages

Let's burn through these backlogs!

What is this?

First off, this is NOT an April Fool (I promise!). I know that many of us will be stuck at home for this month, I know that many of us could likely use something to pull our attention away from the news, and I know that many of us have accumulated quite the to-play list of games. As such, I'm thinking it could be fun for us to tackle those lists together and collectively clean up our clutter! Let's all burn through our backlogs!

The goal isn't necessarily to completely clear them, just to put a dent in them.

How does it work?

Your "backlog" is all those games you've been meaning to play or get around to, but never have yet! For the purposes of this event, an item can be removed from your backlog in one of three ways:

• Finished: you completed the game, or, for open-ended games, reached some level of "done" that you consider satisfactory

• Moved On: you tried it out, but it didn't hold your interest, got repetitive, wasn't for you, or had some other issue (like compatibility problems or glitches)

• Removed: you are choosing to remove this from your backlog without playing it, likely because it no longer interests you, but really for any reason at all.

Use this thread to talk about your backlogs, plan for the month, and once you start playing, inform us of any backlog downsizing and their associated categories. Give us a list of the games you removed. Tell us why you moved on from what you were just playing. Gush about how a particular item held your interest long enough to see it through. The goal of this isn't to beat every game you own; it's to explore what you already have in the way that's best, and most meaningful, for you. If you're not enjoying a game, dump it and move on!

If you're not sure what you might write, take a look at a previous backlog post to get an idea. Also if you want to keep track of statistics or anything else like that, go for it!

What's the timeline?

I will post an update thread weekly, each Wednesday, for the four weeks of April. At the end of the month, I think it would be neat to tally how many collective games we all removed from our backlogs, as well as what the best finds were from our collective digging into our libraries. I expect we'll turn up some good hidden gems, as well as interesting insights.

Each week, I'll also include some "focus" areas which can help narrow down choices for what to play. Those are just recommendations for fun, however. Play whatever you like, whenever you like, however you like! If it's in your backlog, then it's automatically a good choice!

Do I need to sign up?

You don't have to do anything to officially join or participate in the event other than post in these threads! Participate in whatever way works for you. Also, because this is ongoing, it is okay to make more than one top-level post if you're updating the thread with new information.

Focuses for Week 1:

• Games you've been meaning to play for more than a year
• Games you can mod
• "Evening-size" games

Let's burn through these backlogs!

Meta Note: I am also running this same event for ~books as well. I am not active in the other media-focused communities on Tildes, but I encourage someone(s) to pick this up and run it concurrently for ~movies, ~tv, ~anime, and/or ~music (and any other places you think it might fit). I like the idea of it being sitewide, with people participating in their media formats of choice. Any runners for those groups have my full permission to steal this wholesale, tweak it for their target group, and post it there.

What is this?

First off, this is NOT an April Fool (I promise!). I know that many of us will be stuck at home for this month, I know that many of us could likely use something to pull our attention away from the news, and I know that many of us have accumulated quite the to-read list of books. As such, I'm thinking it could be fun for us to tackle those lists together and collectively clean up our clutter! Let's all burn through our backlogs!

The goal isn't necessarily to completely clear them, just to put a dent in them.

How does it work?

Your "backlog" is all those books you've been meaning to get around to read, but never have yet! For the purposes of this event, an item can be removed from your backlog in one of three ways:

• Finished: you completed the book

• Moved On: you tried it out, but it didn't hold your interest or wasn't for you

• Removed: you are choosing to remove this from your backlog without reading it, likely because it no longer interests you, but really for any reason at all

Use this thread to talk about your backlogs, plan for the month, and once you start reading, inform us of any backlog downsizing and their associated categories. Give us a list of the books you removed. Tell us why you moved on from what you were just reading. Gush about how a particular item held your interest long enough to see it through. The goal of this isn't to read every book you own; it's to explore what you already have in the way that's best, and most meaningful, for you. If you're not enjoying a book, dump it and move on!

If you're not sure what you might write, take a look at a previous backlog post for games to get an idea. Also if you want to keep track of statistics or anything else like that, go for it!

What's the timeline?

I will post an update thread weekly, each Wednesday, for the four weeks of April. At the end of the month, I think it would be neat to tally how many collective books we all removed from our backlogs, as well as what the best finds were from our collective digging into our libraries. I expect we'll turn up some good hidden gems, as well as interesting insights.

Each week, I'll also include some "focus" areas which can help narrow down choices for what to read. Those are just recommendations for fun, however. Read whatever you like, whenever you like, however you like! If it's in your backlog, then it's automatically a good choice!

Do I need to sign up?

You don't have to do anything to officially join or participate in the event other than post in these threads! Participate in whatever way works for you. Also, because this is ongoing, it is okay to make more than one top-level post if you're updating the thread with new information.

Focuses for Week 1:

• Books that have been on your to-read list for more than a year
• Books that have single-word titles
• Books that are less than 200 pages

Let's burn through these backlogs!

Meta Note: I am also running this same event for ~games as well. I am not active in the other media-focused communities on Tildes, but I encourage someone(s) to pick this up and run it concurrently for ~movies, ~tv, ~anime, and/or ~music (and any other places you think it might fit). I like the idea of it being sitewide, with people participating in their media format(s) of choice. Any runners for those groups have my full permission to steal this wholesale, tweak it for their target group, and post it there.

Rather than post all of the countries entries as seperate posts in ~music, and give everyone Eurovision fatigue before the event has even kicked off, I have listed them below for your consumption.

I won't write long paragraphs based around my opinon of the differing entries; suffice to say that one act stands out in a sea of mediocrity among the Nordic entries this year. I'll leave you to guess which one that might be...

Sweden
The Mamas – Move

Denmark
Ben & Tan – Yes

Norway
Ulrikke – Attention

Finland
Aksel Kankaanranta – Looking Back

Iceland
Daði & Gagnamagnið – Gagnamagnið (Think About Things)

Tonight ten songs competed to represent Norway in Eurovision.

Akuvi - Som Du Er

Didrik & Emil Solli Tangen - Out of Air

Kristin Husøy – Pray for Me

Liza Vassilieva – I Am Gay

Magnus Bokn - Over the Sea

Raylee - Wild

Rein Alexander - One Last Time

Sondrey - Take My Time

Tone Damli - Hurts Sometimes

Ulrikke - Attention

(I couldn't find tonight's performance for all of these, so some of them are from the semi-finals.)

The winner was Ulrikke with her song Attention, which will go on to represent Norway in Rotterdam. Did we make the right choice? Let's hear your opinions in the comments!

Tonight was the fifth semi-final of the Norwegian Eurovision national selection (Melodi Grand Prix). This year there are 5 semi-finals, one for each region of the country, plus five songs that automatically qualify for the grand final.

Tonight four songs from Northern Norway competed for a spot in the grand final:

Jenny Jenssen - Mr. Hello

Elin & The Woods - We Are One

Kevin Boine - Stem På Mæ

Liza Vassilieva - I Am Gay

The qualifier was Liza Vassilieva with her song I Am Gay, which will face 9 other songs in the grand final on the 15th of February. One of the automatic qualifiers was also presented during the show:

Tone Damli - Hurts Sometimes

Previous semi-finals:

Semi-final 1 (Southern Norway) - songs and results

Semi-final 2 (Eastern Norway) - songs and results

Semi-final 3 (Middle Norway) - songs and results

Semi-final 4 (Western Norway) - songs and results