I really like Plants vs. Zombies but I've basically finished it. I really liked the game Build-a-Lot but it seems to be gone now.

NOTE THIS ARTICLE IS SLIGHTLY DATED. I MADE A NEW UPDATED POST - VERSION 1.1 OF THIS SAME ARTICLE. THE INFORMATION IS BASICALLY THE SAME - JUST MORE CURRENT link here: https://www.reddit.com/dogecoin/comments/lfhomy/misconceptions_regarding_dogecoin_revised_version/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
Misconceptions regarding Dogecoin. This information below is important. I ask that you please take the time to read this entire post before making judgment or commenting. My discord group of over 100 people have grouped together the majority of the most asked questioned and misunderstandings regarding Dogecoin, into the following 22 key points. Please read them below.
1) What is Dogecoin? Dogecoin (/ˈdoʊdʒkɔɪn/ DOHJ-koyn, code: DOGE, symbol: Ð) is a cryptocurrency invented by software engineers Billy Markus and Jackson Palmer, who decided to create a payment system that is instant, fun, and free from traditional banking fees. Dogecoin features the face of the Shiba Inu dog from the popular "Doge" meme as its logo and namesake. It was introduced on December 6, 2013, and quickly developed its own online community reaching a market capitalization of US $5,382,875,000 on January 28, 2021. [Wikipedia, 20210203]
2) Why Dogecoin? For the Lolz. Well, not quite. Initially as a purely meme-driven alternative to the likes of Bitcoin and Litecoin, Dogecoin in-fact boasts very low transaction fees and fast transaction times, very little network congestion, and most importantly, is designed to be used as a daily means of exchange, like your morning cup of coffee. Also, it is really fun, and who doesn't like the Dog ?!
1/2) What Is Dogecoin? And why Dogecoin? Back a few years ago, some crazy people banded together in support of a cryptocurrency known as Dogecoin. Similar to other cryptocurrencies, Dogecoin, the people's crypto, finds itself with the support of hundreds if not thousands of individuals pushing for this currency to succeed. But what is that?

 Unless you have been absent from every social bubble, you may have heard of Bitcoin. For the purpose of this explanation, you will find that Bitcoin is not exactly an easy thing to equate to Dogecoin, but lets think about the criteria of a Cryptocurrency. Bitcoin did not find its foothold overnight. In fact, it took several years. A lot of people fought tooth and nail for their belief in the coin. Crypto, in a nutshell, is a decentralized form of currency that finds its value in a combination of individual asset involvement, ease or difficulty in security of an exchange, creating a method of reliable, secure, trustworthy exchange, and other reasons. Think of it like this: to exchange goods and services without currency, one must barter. I can barter a service (a haircut, for example) towards someone who needs a haircut, and in exchange they can barter a good or service to me. Currency then becomes an "IOU" (I Owe yoU) so that, if somebody needs me to cut their hair, they can give me an IOU for a good or service they control. When enough people begin adopting this, a centralized currency eventually takes hold. Crypto seeks to take this a step further and, insteal of relying on building up a centalization in terms of valuable metals or debt, it is built up solely on the exchange of goods and services. Dogecoin, compared to other cryptocurrencies, finds itself in a strange position where the origins did NOT see it soaring to the moon in any situation. Funny how things can change in time. Dogecoin has pros and cons to it. Comparing it to other cryptos, it does not face a supply cap like Bitcoin does. It is not a directly equated asset, such as how Bitcoin can be attributed as a digital gold asset. Mining dogecoin is also much simpler (comparitively) and does not face difficulty spikes, a source of Bitcoin slow-down. In essence, in 50 years, Dogecoin will still be around, still be mined, still be traded. Bitcoin will cease to be created, hoarded, and become the digital currency of the affluent. 

Step 3) Places to buy dogecoin places where you can spend Dogecoin?
Refer to dogecoin posts by the moderators
4) Cryptocurrencies vs stocks. The main differences between them. When comparing crypto to stocks, the main thing to keep in mind is that cryptocurrencies have few if any regulations applied to them. It is still the "wild west" of trading. You can be scammed, skimmed, pumped-dumped, as so forth, much more often and more easily than with stocks. Terminology is similar to exact between the two, but both require a certain mindset. Crypto is almost always a long-haul game, where stocks can be short play or long haul.
5) Dogecoin vs Bitcoin - their competitive advantages and disadvantages. Many cryptocurrencies have a higher degree of scarcity in comparison with FIAT (e.g. the US Dollar). For example Bitcoin / BTC has a strictly limited supply. And even though Dogecoin is not strictly limited, it is still a lot more scare in terms of supply than the US dollar. This simply means that if more people want to hold BTC or Doge versus the limited supply of the respective coin, the value of the cryptocurrency increases.
6) Is Dogecoin a meme or should it be taken seriously? We have all witnessed the power of a meme, the depths it can reach in society, especially in recent years. We have seen it many times before with video games, consoles, Oreos, or as of late even toilet paper... A meme has inherent value in the form of “widespread information”. A meme can spread an idea across diverse communities, and even entire countries literally overnight. This can bring about lasting effects on culture and society. If correctly taken advantage of, Doge can become the dominant meme currency of the internet, and amass real-world value just by being a popular, recognisable meme itself. This is where the saying “Dogecoin is the people’s coin” comes from.
7) Mining Dogecoin and the history of Dogecoin). How a new currency entered the market.
mining is the process of creating new cryptocurrency by solving a computational puzzle. mining is necessary to maintain the ledger of transactions upon which cryptocurrency is based. Miners have become very sophisticated over the last several years using complex machinery to speed up mining operations. Approximately 600,000 dogecoins are produced per hour and 5,256,000,000 per year,
8) Circulation of currencies. The importance of buying, selling, and holding - and the differences between them. To briefly explain this, a lot of people have been saying “buy and hold” or “I’m never selling!” - which in itself is great start. But there remains a lot of misinformation around the topic, for example that simply "buying and holding Doge" will drive up the price indefinitely. Unfortunately, that is just not true. Buying, holding, and selling are all intricately connected with each other. ALL of those three states are essential for a (digital) currency to flourish. Holding does neither hurt or raise the value of the asset, but rather it helps to establish a baseline, which is also called "setting a floor". Those who have diligently kept on holding their coins, have allowed Dogecoin to stabilize at roughly 0.03 USD cents for the past few days. Remember, this remains a huge gain from where Dogecoin has been just weeks ago. The reason the price is not changing much from this baseline right now is because few are buying and few are selling their Dogecoin, specifically due to topics which will be covered in other sections here. However, an active circulation of a currency is critical to establishing it as an effective means of exchanging goods and setting it up for long term growth. The best way to increase the overall value of the currency in the long run is by eventually by exchanging your coins for goods, services, or just by tipping and trading with other Dogecoin holders. The value of any means of exchange is fundamentally driven by supply and demand. If two parties agree that X amount of asset A is roughly worth the same as Y amount of asset B, you effectively have established a market.
9) Establishing a floor or a baseline. Due to other current issues, such as "RH" and other platforms artificially delaying FIAT-to-Crypto exchanges, these trends may appear strange at first sight, but those who continue holding onto their Doge are affecting or rather creating the floor. The floor is essentially the lowest value Dogecoin will drop to at current market conditions. The floor is currently 0.03 USD cents. Which is up from 0.008 USD cents just a few months ago.
10) Inflation and deflation Infinite supply / no cap vs cap in regarding to cryptocurrency

 Inflation and deflation are common economic terms used to explain the change in the inherent value of a currency. This means that that 1 US Dollar today does not have the same value or “worth” as it did, for example, in 1950. Inflation is a situation of rising prices in the economy. A more exact definition of inflation is a sustained increase in the general price level in an economy. Deflation on the other hand occurs when the inflation rate falls below 0%, that is a negative inflation rate. While inflation reduces the value of a currency over time, a sudden deflation of a currency increases its relative value. This would allow more goods and services to be bought than before with the same amount of currency. Deflation can be a factor in leading to a recession and also result in a deflationary spiral. 

10a) What does all this mean with regards to cryptocurrency, specifically Bitcoin versus Dogecoin?

 Well - Bitcoin is stagnant or deflationary over time, while Dogecoin is inflationary overtime. This is due to the way they are architected and mined, and how new coins are added into their respective markets - covered in other section. What gets misunderstood is which one is “better” or rather "the lesser evil". Since Dogecoin has an “infinite supply”, how can it maintain value? 

10b) You may have read things like: "You're stupid if you buy Dogecoin. It has no value. It has unlimited supply. It's just a stupid meme." Let's look at the US dollar (or essentially any major FIAT currency of your choice). FIAT currency is created out of thin air. It is backed by large sums of debt, and in the normal course of the economy it is inflating endlessly. But FIAT currency does have value. It's a value assigned to it by governments and people, a commonly accepted means for exchange. Again, FIAT does not have a limited supply. In fact, the supply of the US dollar is a lot more inflationary than Doge would ever be. Please think about that for a moment and make up your own mind.
10c) Yes, Dogecoin has a supply growth of about 5 billion coins (that's about 4-5% right now) per year, but why is that a problem, practically speaking? The growth is there to keep transaction fees to a minimum and allow a small, but healthy inflationary tendency, rather than the opposite.
10d) Dogecoin doesn't need a supply limit like Bitcoin, because in the long run it will be much easier to exchange Dogecoin for goods and services, than with other crypto currencies or regular currencies for that matter.

 If Bitcoin wants to become a real global currency with buying power, not just a speculation tool to exchange it for a few thousand debt based USD, when it hits a new record high every few months or years, its supply will have to grow inevitably. We have to see the bigger picture! Dogecoin may well climb to one US dollar, but why stop and sell there? Instead, we could build a new, fair, balanced monetary ecosystem based on Dogecoin, not to make a quick profit, but to change the whole world. Our current money is backed by signatures on debt contracts, not on real values. But it works, because we believe in it, even if it will be our downfall if it continues like this. Dogecoin is different. Dogecoin has a set amount of coins entering the market by the minute. There are plenty of spreadsheets out there showcasing exactly how much many Dogecoin will be in circulation at any given moment of time. People get confused because they think inflation is a bad thing, when in fact it is actually beneficial in small quantities and beneficial to the longevity of a currency. Dogecoin doesn't need a supply limit like Bitcoin, because in the long run it will be much easier to exchange Dogecoin for goods and services, than with other crypto currencies or regular currencies for that matter. If Bitcoin wants to become a real global currency with buying power, not just a speculation tool to exchange it for a few thousand debt based USD when it hits a new record high every few months or years, it's supply will have to grow inevitably. 

11) Financial aspects of Dogecoin. Who will profit from it? What will happen if Dogecoin has exponential growth? A zero-sum game. Explaining that you only realize a loss or profit at then time of sell.

 To clear things up - cryptocurrency is essentially what economist call a Zero Sum Game. A zero-sum game is a mathematical representation of a situation in which each participant's gain or loss of utility is exactly balanced by the losses or gains of the utility of the other participants. What this means is that across a group of people who engage in selling and buying Dogecoin, if one person gains another person loses. For example if you bought at 0.08 and sold at 0.03 someone made a profit of 0.05 cents per Dogecoin while you lost 0.05 cents per Dogecoin. The important thing to understand is that in these situations the only way you truly lose or gain anything is when you sell. You don’t realize your gains or losses until you complete that transaction. What this means is that if Dogecoin does increase exponentially the people who have been holding since the price has been low will gain astronomical returns on their investment, while others who joined late will not. 

12) Stability vs Volatility This describes basically how stable something is over a set period of time. Volatility is how much prices change over time. Stabilization of Dogecoin is important for the overall health, however, cryptocurrencies are known to and will likely remain very volatile for the foreseeable future.
13) Pump and dump vs long term growth. "Pump and dump" is a form of securities fraud that involves artificially inflating the price of an owned stock through false and misleading positive statements, in order to sell the cheaply purchased stock at a higher price. Pump and dumps are consider illegal. While a subset of people are trying to pump and dump Dogecoin the legitimate community is focused its long term growth and stability which is achieved through the rest of the topics addressed here
14) Difference between cold storage, internet wallets and Robinhood
Coldstorage - in the cryptocurrency world cold storage refers to physical objects/devices that contain your cryptocurrency.
Wallets are an electronic program of service that stores your cryptocurrency
Robhinhood- as of right now robinhood does not actually give you cryptocurrency when purchased through them. From Robhinhood’s cryptocurrency page: “We don’t currently provide you with access to your wallet or your wallet address. You own the cryptocurrency assets in your account, and you can buy or sell them at any time. We’re evaluating features to allow you to safely transfer coins to and from Robinhood, and we’ll update you when these features are available.” Robhinhood will be addressed in another section.
15) Elon Musk - Is he important for Dogecoin? The impact of celebrities and big business supporting Dogecoin Big business allowing Dogecoin to be supported as means of exchanging goods, and people like Elon musk supporting and backing this cryptocurrency are important to proving its value and legitimacy.
16) Is getting Dogecoin to increase to the equivalent of one US dollar possible? Can and will it really happen? What will change if it does happen? Yes, despite not having a fixed or capped supply, the value of the currency can rise based on its relative value against other currencies in the market. You can find examples of this in the FOREX market where currency pairs are traded, like Euro against US dollar, or US Dollar against Japanese Yen. As the value of Dogecoin rises, more and more businesses will recognise its potential and importance, and subsequently begin to accept it in exchange for goods and services. This will also help to grow the developer community around Dogecoin. In summary, Dogecoin has a way to go and can be improved from its current state, but the potential for greatness is there already today. NEEDS MORE INFORMATION
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18) Is Dogecoin a product of the Wallstreet Bets movement? What differentiates dogecoin from GME/AMC? Just like some other investment opportunities (Nokia, Blackberry), DOGE was brought into the spotlight amidst the whole GME situation during the previous week. Unlike those stock, however, Doge is not another short squeeze, it is not a stock. It is a cryptocurrency / asset that many people think has potential, despite its Meme origins. Many who feel that they were late for embarking on the GME hype or the Bitcoin train in 2013 respectively, are now looking towards Doge, one of the early alternatives to the original cryptocurrency, Bitcoin. Doge got a lot of interest recently, for example with the Elon Musk tweeting the same week.
19) The situation with Robinhood - Changes in terms and conditions. Disclaimer, it is important to read through Robhinhoods entire terms and conditions to fully under what happened. The information below is just a summary and is not Robhinhoods terms and conditions but an explanation of what happened and why it happened Robhinhood has received high profile backlash in the media recently for their involvement with GME/Wallstreetbets. A lot of the cryptocurrency and Dogecoin community were outraged when they found out that about one week ago Robhinhood stopped allowed instant transfers for their cryptocurrency. Unfortunately, while we may not agree with what happened there they do have a reason for this. Over the past week the sheer amount of people trying to buy cryptocurrency skyrocketed at one instant. When robinhood allowed for instant transfers what they were really doing is essentially “loaning” you money to make trades or purchase cryptocurrency before the funds actually hit Robhinhoods business account. This caused a huge liquidity issue and Robhinhood could not meet the demand. That is why you had to wait 5 business days for your funds to be approved. This is standard practice across multiple brokerage firms before Robhinhood pioneered the instant transfer option. Whether we like it or not, Robhinhood is a power house in their industry and not going away. Robhinhood is one of the most mainstream ways to purchase and sell cryptocurrency and if everyone pulled their money out of Robhinhood the entire cryptocurrency market would collapse which I believe we can all agree no one wants to happen.
20) Feb 4th - Feb 8th Well unfortunately we wanted to get this post out before Robhinhood’s clearance of funds. Went through, but now that they did, you can see what happened. The price immediately skyrocketed. This happened due to the topics we covered above. Now what’s going to happen is the people who are pumping and dumping know that this is coming and will be immediately prepared to sell. This will cause huge volatility with dramatic swings up and down. Nobody knows exactly what’s going to happen this week, but we do know it’s going to be crazy. That is where the diamonds holders come into play. We need to set a new floor after this swing to show the rest of the world that dogecoin is legitimate and can weather extreme volatility.
Thank you for reading this post in its entirety. It took a large amount of collective effort of people in my discord. I appreciate them to no end. We have over 100 people in that discord and we are here to stay. We are interested in explaining Dogecoin, reducing the scare factor and backing up Dogecoin through economic, social, financial, mathematical theory, etc. Per Dogecoin rules I cannot give out this discord, but if you are interested message me. It goes into greater detail on every one of these topics, with resources, links, articles etc. thank you and above all else remember that at the end of the day this is a meme cryptocurrency from 2013. But the people have spoken, and this is now official the people’s currency as well. Dogecoin🚀🪐🚀

Ticketing for BTS is a bloodbath, not gonna lie. Especially with the influx of a lot of fans who will want to see them live post-quarantine. I was able to get my hands on some twice, although it was a very intense and fast paced process. Keep in mind, I am writing this from the perspective of someone who has only seen BTS in the US. I think a lot of the advice is still applicable internationally, but I can’t provide detail on that.
Cost
BTS tickets, in comparison to the other artists who are in their caliber of popularity, actually aren’t hugely expensive. You can get nosebleed seats at around 60-80 USD a pop. BTS tickets range from $60 to $300 USD face value per person (not including fees) at first sale value depending on where you sit. The average price of a ticket according to Ticketmaster is $299 (with fees). The only official initial ticketing site for BTS is TicketMaster. Don’t forget about the cost of transportation, food, lodging, and merch! If you’re gonna buy merch, you will probably spend a few hundred. Allocate $50 dollars per person for food/drink. Transportation and lodging heavily depend on your proximity to a venue, but it will probably be a few hundred for a hotel room. Transportation heavily depends.
Seats
It really depends on the venue. Being close without actually being on the floor is probably your best bet. To prevent mobbing, all of the floor seats have actual chairs, but it can get quite intense down there and the tickets are more expensive. Lower 1st level seats close to the stage are what I consider to be the optimum. However, if you want the chance of getting to see BTS really close up, then you’ll wanna look for floor seats, but those can range from 300-500 USD at face value. The only VIP experience is soundcheck. These tickets are more expensive, but you’ll be let in with a small group of fans for floor seats and get to see BTS do their mic checks. There’s a higher chance of interaction with them there, but it is more expensive. Hi-touch and meet and greets aren’t something that BTS do now.
Even if you don’t get your ideal seats, there are huge screens and the staff do live camerawork and follow BTS around so you’ll have a good view. The show itself is very immersive, around three hours with no opening acts, and the production value is quite literally insane. If you want a taste, look up the concert performances of Anpanman, Euphoria, Dionysus, and Mikrokosmos of YouTube. Your seats won’t matter much when you get there. The vibe of being in a concert, enjoying music with your fellow ARMY, and getting to see BTS is magical.
Safety
BTS concerts in comparison to others that I have attended tend to be quite safe. ARMY as a fandom are pretty respectful and security guards have even said that they were blown away by how polite and well-mannered most fans are. However, there are always exceptions and it’s better to be safe than sorry. The times I felt most unsafe were trying to leave the concert because it was late at night and there’s so many people, but if you plan right, you’ll be fine. I recommend not attending alone if you can, but I wouldn’t be worried if that isn’t a possibility. For context, my first BTS concert I was with a friend and both of us were just sixteen with no adult chaperone and we never felt scared in the venue once.
The vibe on the floor can be more aggressive as people are moving around. Some may get pushy. It gets hot and there is always the risk of fainting. Also, you have to line up beforehand which is a whole ordeal and fairly time consuming. There are pros and cons to floor seats, but it may be a touch more dangerous if you have any of these concerns.
Preparation
Last time ticketing happened, there were three separate rounds of ticketing. An ARMY membership presale which happened first, then a lottery-draw fan presale that you had to register for, and then finally a regular ticket sale. All of these happened on different dates in successive order. Theoretically, to optimize your chances, you should purchase an ARMY membership which will give you the best chance of snagging a ticket if they go about ticketing in this manner again.
Make a TicketMaster account beforehand and enter all of your information including payment. Make sure you have enough money in your account for the transaction to go through without issue. Look at the venue map beforehand for your ideal section. There will be extra fees tacked onto the ticket price such as taxes and processing fees so account for that when you’re putting money in your account. Last time they offered pre-registration which was selected lottery style. It’s worth it to register in case you get picked. Be wary of ticketing on multiple devices, as the similarity in IP address may make TicketMaster suspicious. However, you can ask your friends and family to help you out by ticketing too. Beyond ticketing, you should also book your lodging and transportation if relevant in advance.
The Final Hour
Make sure that you clear your schedule for a few hours when ticketing happens. You will want to be somewhere where you won’t be distracted and the wifi is high speed which you can test through googling “internet speed test”.
The specific time tickets go on sale will be announced and you want to log on about 15-30 minutes before. DO NOT REFRESH UNLESS YOUR PAGE CRASHES. Once you enter the ticketing queue (the dreaded purple walking man) if you refresh, you will go to the back of the line. Keep an eye the whole time. It will tell you that there are 2,000+ people in front of you, but just hold faith and eventually the screen to select tickets will appear.
You gotta move fast. Tickets will blip out of existence in seconds. Being extremely picky will not benefit you. Know sections that you would be okay with getting tickets in and keep those in the back of your head if you don’t get your first choice selection. Where you sit doesn’t matter that much and you’ll come to understand that when you actually get to the venue.
Once you have the tickets in your cart, check out ASAP. Don’t give up during the process, even if it seems crazy as hell. Once you’ve gotten it all confirmed, take a deep breath, and get excited! You’re gonna see BTS! Congrats!
So, you don’t get a ticket. What do?
Hope is not lost. Trades and resells. There are Facebook groups exclusively dedicated to selling/trading tickets, so check that out. Just be wary of scammers. You can also get resold tickets which tend to be more expensive. That’s how I got the tickets to my first BTS concert. They were $255 each for seats on the first level, but the subtotals added around another $50. StubHub is a good site for that.
Notes

• There are specific guidelines for the bags you can bring into the stadium. Please look at the venue’s rules beforehand. I just recommend that in general.
• BTS concerts are a full day/two day experience. Take time off of school or work for it if you can because it’s pretty time consuming.
• Plan for the weather! The Chicago concerts were super cold and rainy and the New Jersey concerts were quite hot. Dress appropriately for the weather and bring relevant layers as needed.
• Having an ARMY Twitter account will be helpful. Look for social media projects related to your venue. You should be able to find them through searching Twitter. This may be a special fancant or something else.
• My personal advice: pre book Ubers/Lyfts and set a designated meeting spot. Trying to get one after the show is hellish.
• There is no bad seat in the house. Just different perspectives. See here, here, here, here, and here.
• If you have close ARMY social media friends who are attending and want to meet up, make plans to meet at a designated place. Also, some of the local fan bases will set up seat buddy google forms so that people can get to know the people they’re sitting next to beforehand.
• Official song fanchants are put out on BigHit’s website. Try and familiarize yourself with them beforehand.
  • The standard name fanchant goes as follows. “Kim Namjoon, Kim Seokjin, Min Yoongi, Jung Hoseok, Park Jimin, Kim Taehyung, Jeon Jeongguk, BTS!” Here’s a good example.
• Some ARMY are known to give out freebies at concerts, so don’t be worried if someone asks you if you want some.
• Don’t call ARMY bombs, ARMY bombs around security or outside the venue. Locals will not know what you mean and it can get you in some hot water. Instead, call it a lightstick.
• People dress up for BTS concerts like they’re gonna walk a fashion runway. It can be fun to plan a cool outfit, so if you’re gonna do that, but things beforehand. Nobody’s gonna judge you if you don’t, but as an ARMY culture thing it’s pretty common.
• If you have medical issues, I recommend contacting the venue beforehand to make a plan of action and figuring out specifics. Will save you time and trouble at the venue.
• Most people arrive at the concert 3-4 hours early to hang out, get freebies, meet new ARMY friends, meet up with social media friends, and buy merch. You can always show up an hour or so beforehand, but that bonding time is a lot of fun! Plus, merch lines are very long so you’ll need to have time for that.
• Besides your phone/wallet/essentials, don't bring anything you don't want taken away. Although unlikely, it could be lost or stolen.
• If you’re driving, figure out your parking plans in advance by looking at the venue website. Some have special parking passes.
• Wear decently comfy shoes! Although there are seats at all the venues, you will be standing for the majority of three hours and you will feel as if you have just gone through an intense workout between the jumping around and the screaming.
• Security can make your life bothersome if you bring prohibited items into the venue so do your research beforehand on what is allowed and what isn’t.
• Make a safety backup plan in terms of people you can call for help or stay with in case anything goes south. Police and security guards are always around in case you need help, so don’t be afraid to ask. There are also first aid stations should you need medical assistance.
• You will probably be given a slogan (paper sign). Keep it for posterity!
• I had a folder on my phone with screenshots of my ticket’s barcode, fanchants, confirmation emails for my transportation/lodging just in case I couldn’t access the internet.
• Cameras other than your phone and small lenses that attach to it are not allowed. This is a BigHit policy to combat fansites and also ensure that you are getting the most out of your experience.
• Here’s a comment with some very good advice about concert etiquette
• The entire experience of a BTS concert is magical. Your seats or how much merch you could afford don’t matter. It’s a once in a lifetime experience and you will never regret it. I can’t even properly describe it, but seeing BTS live was one of the highlights of my life.

Things to Bring

• Clear backpack/bag that meets stadium guidelines
• Charged portable charger with cable (two if you’re feeling fancy)
• Earbuds!
• Small wallet. I don't recommend bringing your entire wallet in case it gets stolen. A mini wallet with your ID, a credit/debit card, and cash will suffice.
• Tickets! If you have a digital ticket, bring print-outs as well just in case. I would also bring printouts of the tickets/conformations you will need for your transportation and lodging for the night.
• ARMY bomb and batteries. These can be officially bought through Weverse Shop although they are sold in other places. Ebay and Depop are good bets, but you can’t guarantee they are official.
• Venue map
• Chapstick, deodorant, hand sanitizer, sunscreen stick, wipes, gum, OTC or your personal PRN prescription drugs (if needed), earplugs, and period products if relevant.
• Water bottle and a granola bar. Sometimes security will let you keep them, sometimes they won’t, but it can’t hurt to try. Bring an empty, reusable bottle to fill up once you’re in the venue.
• If you want, add some BTS themed decorations like pins or keychains. There are a lot of fanmade ones on Etsy. BT21 keychains are always cute. Here are some examples.
• Something to do while waiting in line. There are lots of people to chat with, but it may not hurt to bring a game of something like BTS UNO or a slim paperback if you get tired of being social.
• A paper fan if it’s gonna be hot
• A jacket or rain slicker if it’s gonna be cold or rainy
• Here’s an ARMY nurse’s tips on what to bring to keep your health in tip top condition while concertgoing
• Binoculars (not a necessity, but may be nice if you’re in high up seats)

Eli here, yada yada, you know the drill.
Great, now that we’ve got that out of the way, I’d like to start with: holy shit. Holy shit, y’all. Holy fucking shit.
Let me elaborate. Right after I wrote up my last story, I posted it, and then I opened up a new document in Microsoft Word. Mostly because I like to leave a document open all the time and type my thoughts into it. A virtual journal, of sorts. It helps me process things and think through my feelings; I like to imagine it as self-led therapy. (Considering my fragile mental state, it clearly doesn’t solve everything, but it certainly doesn’t make things any worse).
Anyway, all this to say that I had a Word document open, like I usually do. And like I often do, I left the room before typing anything to get a snack, and when I returned, that’s where the holy shit comes in. Because, guys: there was writing on the page.
It said this: sorry can’t talk. might be noticed. would be taken away. can type. don’t say anything.
And no, it wasn’t a ghost or an invisible monster or something. Because guess who was sitting right next to the keyboard, his fluffy tail curled around his feet, staring at me with his intelligent eyes?
If you guessed Mr. Bailey, well, first of all, it wasn’t that hard based on my last sentence. But also, you’d be right. That’s correct, friends: holy shit, because Mr. B apparently 1) understood me when I tried to set up a communication system, 2) can, in fact, communicate, but won’t do it verbally because it “might be noticed,” 3) knows something about us being listened to and/or watched, and 4) to reiterate, can basically fucking talk.
Now, his words on the document said not to say anything in response, and damn, I can’t tell you how hard I had to bite my tongue to keep from saying that string of holy shits out loud. I think I’ll have a dent in my tongue for the rest of my life.
Somehow I managed, and I sat down at my computer, and I typed back. It took him longer to respond since he essentially walked across the keyboard to type, stepping precisely on certain keys. And then I had to wait for him to finish, letter by letter, until I could respond. It only took a few back-and-forths for me to realize that this was wildly inefficient, so I gestured for him to wait. Then we ventured out to that utterly decimated Best Buy and scavenged in the broken glass and bodies until we found another keyboard.
Did you guys know that you can hook up two keyboards into one computer, and once it calibrates, the computer can accept input from both of them, nearly simultaneously? Well, you can. And that’s what I did. So now Mr. Bailey has his own keyboard, and we can type back and forth with less waiting and transition time.
Now, I bet you’re all wondering what he said. I have his permission to post part of our conversation here (I saved the Word document, obviously, because it’s not every freaking day your cat begins to talk to you). So I’ll post some direct fragments. I’m also going to relay a story he typed out for me, but I’m going to edit and dramatize it, because it took him forever to type it out, and even then he only used sentence fragments and I pieced the details together. I think he’d like a more polished version of that part. (He meowed in agreement as he read that over my shoulder).
A few things before I continue my Mr. Bailey extravaganza post. First of all, isn’t my cat the coolest thing in existence? Like seriously. I thought he was the best before, but now I’m pretty damn sure there’s no animal cooler than him in the entire world. Can your pet talk and use a computer? No? Didn’t think so. Guess Mr. B is cooler. Sorry, I don’t make the rules.
Second, he knows surprisingly good English. I assume from reading over my shoulder as I write journal entries to myself or stories to share with you guys, and from listening to me talk. (I know you didn’t hear that, but he meowed in agreement to that too). But he doesn’t really use capital letters or punctuation other than periods, except when Word edits stuff automatically, so don’t criticize his grammar when I include direct quotes, okay? I mean, he’s pretty self-confident with a healthy ego, but no one likes unhelpful criticism over the internet. And he’s a motherfucking cat who can type, so give him a break.
Third, I think this ties in well to Rule #10. If you guessed that’s another general rule rather than a specific monster-oriented one, you’d be correct.
Rule #10: Not everything is as it seems. Don’t trust everything you see or hear, and don’t judge a book by its cover.
Yes, I know, a tired cliché. And you’re also probably like, Eli, isn’t that rule covered in the Ashley rule, or the MJ rule? Well, both yes and no, and also, shut up. Those rules deal specifically with the food created by Ashleys or the humans imitated by MJs; Rule #10 is simply a more general version with a broader scope, and it encompasses a lot more things. For instance, screams in the distance? Could be human, but probably not. Probably monsters fighting and/or trying to draw people out. So don’t trust it. Dead bodies in the street? Probably human corpses, but if they’re not pretty rotten by now, maybe not. MJs have been known to play dead to get you to come closer to them. So don’t trust them. Purple flowers in the ground? Might be actual flowers, but might be the eyes of a Sandra. (No, seriously. I almost stepped on one once because it was camouflaged, laying on the ground. I barely got my earplugs before it was on its feet and singing. That was a close call). Don’t trust them.
And yes, a cat that seems smarter and acts not quite like a cat? Maybe not 100% a normal cat. Still a cat, not a monster…but not a normal cat.
So without further ado, here’s the first part of our conversation, directly from that document, with minor edits for clarity.
Mr. Bailey: sorry can’t talk. might be noticed. would be taken away. can type. don’t say anything.
Eli (after freaking out silently for several minutes): So you can talk? You understand me?
Mr. Bailey: yes.
Eli: But you waited this long to talk to me?
Mr. Bailey: didn’t always know how. learned from listening and watching you.
Eli: Cool, cool. But you don’t want a system of meowing because you “might be noticed”?
Mr. Bailey: yes.
Eli: Well, that’s great. Who might notice and why would they take you away?
Mr. Bailey: don’t know who. but they always listen. sometimes watch too.
Eli: What do you mean? How? Are they watching now?
Mr. Bailey: listening devices in dome. can hear everything. cameras in monsters and some buildings. not this building. always listen, sometimes watch.
Eli: How do you know that??
Mr. Bailey: can hear them whirring and clicking. hear them transmit in dome, hear them under monster skin.
At this point I told him he was a badass, and then asked for significantly more clarification and details, because as you can imagine, my head was fucking spinning so hard it was in going into orbit. I won’t directly relay the rest of the somewhat repetitive conversation, but here’s the gist: Mr. B thinks there are audio transmitters all over the dome, too tiny to see, that relay any noise in the entire dome back to whoever is running this shitshow. There aren’t cameras in the dome, at least as far as he can tell, but there are cameras spread out around the city, and in almost every monster. He first noticed something weird pretty early on, when he heard clicking – like a camera shutter opening and closing – in a dead monster body, and some investigation and focused listening led him to hear the same sound in almost every monster we’ve ever come across. Which is a really comforting realization.
Once he realized the sound their cameras make, he listened for it everywhere. The house I was staying in before this one had cameras, and he wanted me to leave. Looking back, it makes sense; we only stayed there for two weeks because he was constantly freaking out and driving me crazy. At the time I thought he didn’t like a smell or something, but I guess he was acting like a psycho on purpose to get me out of there. When we got to this neighborhood, he thoroughly examined every inch of the house before settling in, and I thought that was just him doing his normal cat thing, but no. He was checking for cameras. What a little goddamn genius.
That’s why typing is safer than some kind of meowing system. He’s worried if they know he’s onto them, they’ll come after him, or maybe both of us. Maybe they’ll decide whatever sick game they’re playing should come to an end and just fucking apocalypse us. He just doesn’t know, so he figured he should play it safe. I support that, because I too would like to make it out of here alive. That was my New Year’s resolution, after all, and I intend to keep it. I’d love to go to a functioning restaurant again before I die, if nothing else.
And before you panic about my posts being monitored too, don’t worry. I hide my IP address and use different VPNs. I figured out how to do all that before I even started posting, because I had theories about being watched and didn’t want to risk my stories being seen by the assholes controlling all this. Not to mention that internet and cell service are so shitty that maybe it hasn’t even occurred to them that I’m trying to communicate outside the dome, and maybe they’re not checking. Who knows? Depends how dumb they are. I hope they’re dumb. All this to say that posting here should be pretty safe. But thanks for your concern.
There was also a lot of conversation about how he came to be…well, a little more than your average cat. Now is the time for me to relay that story.
Just like with my own stories, let me take you back. This time, all the way back, to the very first day this all happened, aka the day I saw my family torn apart in front of me, aka the day I don’t want to relive, but am okay with reliving from Mr. Bailey’s view. This part of his story all took place before we crossed paths anyway. It probably happened while I was seeing my family torn apart in front of me, come to think of it. But I’m not going to think of that little detail.
You may remember that I fled to the pet store and found Mr. Bailey the night this all started. That leaves about ten hours between the descent of the monsters and our meeting. During those ten hours, a lot of shit went down. I mean, seriously. I know I’ve used the term “all hell broke loose” several times, but this was the original hell breaking loose. The big one, the one where hell may as well have actually opened up all its doors and let out its demons, because things went south about as quickly as I imagine they would with demons running around.
It was about noon when the dome appeared. I don’t know if it descended or rose from the ground or fucking shimmered into existence, because I didn’t see it happen, and whatever it did, it did fast. Mr. Bailey doesn’t know either; like any normal weekday, he was inside the pet store, dozing on a cat bed up on a shelf.
Then the monsters appeared. No one knows where exactly they came from, either. But it was chaos. Bloody, horrific chaos. None of us had ever seen any of these monsters before, obviously, so none of us knew how to fight them. Hell, I’m pretty sure most of the population didn’t believe in monsters until they were being eaten by them.
I’m not going into detail right now about the terrors I witnessed, because this isn’t my story. Also because I don’t want to. My self-therapy isn’t good enough to make me want to discuss my family’s death or Rule #1 yet. (Stay tuned to see if my mental health improves or plummets! Only time will tell).
Mr. Bailey remembers vague bits and pieces of the first few minutes. People running by the store screaming; unfamiliar creatures that smelled like death chasing them; sounds of bones crunching and claws ripping into flesh. The store owner panicked when he saw what was happening. Who wouldn’t? But instead of trying to hide – he hadn’t been noticed in the empty little store yet – he decided to make a run for it. His car was right out front, after all. Literally ten steps from the door.
He called Mr. Bailey to come, and though he was scared and confused, Mr. B listened. This was his owner; the man had raised and cared for Mr. Bailey since he was a kitten. And Mr. B loved him. He wasn’t about to abandon him now.
The store owner grabbed his keys and raced for his car, Mr. B at his side. They made it inside, but not much further. As the owner put his keys in the ignition, the car shook and an awful half-growl, half-screech that would come to be recognizable as the distinctive sound of a Caleb surrounded them.
A Caleb appeared at the driver’s side, and neither of them had time to react before it smashed its fist through the window. The owner tried to shove it away, but if that tactic worked, well, there’d be a lot more people still alive.
The Caleb started scratching and clawing at anything it could reach, which happened to be the owner’s chest and arms. Long slashes blossomed across his torso and blood flew as both the owner and the Caleb flailed, painting the windshield red.
And Mr. B couldn’t stand by and watch. He always was braver than most cats, and at that moment he was pissed off, scared, and threatened by the monster attacking the person he loved. That was enough for him to leap across his owner and latch himself onto the Caleb, digging his claws in.
The Caleb shrieked, probably more surprised than hurt, and stumbled backwards. As it swung its long arms, trying to grab Mr. B, he clawed his way up the Caleb’s chest to its head. And then he just started scratching and biting any piece of the Caleb near him: skull, arms, face. The Caleb almost got ahold of him a couple times, but Mr. B held on for dear life and clawed its hands enough to make it temporarily draw back. Then Mr. B, mostly by chance, struck gold: in his flurry of teeth and claws, he happened to stick a paw in one of the Caleb’s eye sockets, and since it was already there, he started scratching the ever-living shit out of that empty hole where an eye should be.
Maybe not quite as good as a laser, but it was effective enough. Smoke began to exude from the eyehole. The Caleb shrieked and flailed wildly, apparently so distraught by the pain that its swinging arms now didn’t even come close to knocking Mr. B off.
It seemed to be working, and Mr. B’s paw was twisted at a weird angle and hard to pull out anyway, so he just kept scratching around in the eye socket. Thank God he did. The Caleb staggered backwards, still shrieking, until its heels hit the curb and it fell hard onto its back, Mr. B still holding on tight.
Luckily, he was more on its face than the back of its head by this point. I say luckily, because when the Caleb hit the concrete, it hit hard enough to crack its skull open. Mr. B was splashed with thick purple Caleb blood and little bits and chunks of Caleb brain. (Yes, they apparently do have a brain, but let’s not dwell on that surprise). He finally withdrew his claws and stepped off the dead Caleb, giving himself several quick licks to smooth his fur and remove at least a little of the mess.
He looked over to his owner, who was still sitting in the car, bleeding profusely but alive. He had been watching, and when Mr. B emerged victorious, his terrified and pained expression turned to a smile. He looked at Mr. Bailey and said, “You saved my life, Mr. B! You’re the best goddamn cat there ever was. Come on, get back here, we gotta get out of here!”
And Mr. Bailey understood him for the first time. He stood there on the curb for a second, trying to make sense of how he knew what a human was saying…and he stood there a second too long. Suddenly, another Caleb was leaping over the car from its passenger side. Mr. Bailey let out a yowl, but he was too late. The Caleb was already at the broken driver’s side window, and Mr. B’s owner was caught off-guard; Mr. B was still much too far away to help when he heard the scream and a horrible ripping noise. He couldn’t see what had happened with the Caleb in between him and the car, but he saw more blood spray across the windshield, and he listened to the scream cut off, and he knew it was over.
He kept going, though, because he was hoping to get revenge. He took a flying leap and landed on the Caleb’s back, clawing it and yowling in fury as he tried to reach its head, since he had now put together that the eye was a weak point (he wasn’t sure why he was thinking so much more distinctly than he ever had, but now wasn’t the time to question it). Unfortunately, this Caleb was apparently more flexible, because it managed to reach its long arms around, grab him, and fling him off before he ever got to the top of that nasty Caleb summit.
He landed on the curb near the dead Caleb, and the alive Caleb started to walk over to him, making its awful noise. Mr. B thought he was done for. He probably would have been, except there was a scream from the street; both Mr. Bailey and the Caleb turned to see a woman, fleeing from what would eventually come to be known as a Brent.
Luckily for Mr. Bailey but not so luckily for the woman, the Caleb decided she was more appealing, and it turned and sprinted after her, leaving Mr. Bailey lying on the curb, out of breath but unwounded. The only evidence that Mr. B had tried to get his revenge were a series of crazed claw marks down its back.
Mr. Bailey made himself go look at his owner briefly; his head had been torn off and was sitting on the passenger’s seat. He sat there for a moment and paid his respects, but then he couldn’t bear to look at it anymore, and he went back inside.
At this point, Mr. Bailey was devastated, but he was also confused and intrigued, because he was suddenly seeing everything differently than he ever had before. He was thinking in a way that he assumed humans usually thought, and he swore he could read a few of the words printed on food bags and toys around the shop. His empty food bowl was printed with, “MR. BAILEY” and he was pretty sure that was his name.
It was a “weird process” (his words) that he doesn’t think he can adequately explain to humans who have always had that capacity for thought and logic. But he would like to emphasize that it was very strange, and very confusing; yet it also provided a distraction from the fact that he had just failed to save his owner.
So he thought about it, and looked down at his brain- and blood-covered fur, and came up with his theory. He swallowed Caleb flesh and blood while attacking it; he knows he did, because he bit it anywhere he could reach, and he was in too much of a frenzy to worry about spitting anything out. Then, he was splashed with its brains, and during his quick wash, he suspects he ingested more blood and at least a few small pieces of the brain.
It’s all only his theory, of course. But it’s the best one he has, and I sure don’t have anything better, so I’m on board. It seems like something he swallowed – the flesh, the blood, the brains, or some combination of the three – made him more than your average cat.
He says he was thrilled when I got there a couple hours later. He remembered me from my visits to the store when I was younger. He was scared and lonely, too, and he wasn’t sure what he was going to do in the following days; me walking in changed that. I told him how much he comforted me that first night, and he said I comforted him too. I guess I never realized that we’d both lost our families that day.
As for the Caleb that killed his owner? Don’t worry. Apparently it stuck around the area, because it was the same Caleb that attacked me in the pet shop the very next morning…and therefore the same one I killed by discovering the magic of laser pointers. Mr. B recognized it when it charged at me; he saw the claw marks on its back. And you know the rest. He helped me take it down, and it was not only his revenge, but the start of a beautiful monster-killing partnership.
Anyway, Rule #10. Things aren’t always what they seem. He may not just be a cat, but he sure is pretty great. I have a conversation partner now too, kind of, as long as we’re careful. Beats writing a journal to myself.
I’m worried about all the monitoring shit, obviously, but that’s a problem for after I share this post. To end the Mr. Bailey extravaganza, I will say this: I love him. I’m glad we have each other. He’s a badass. I’ll let him reply to strangers on the internet if he really wants to, because he deserves it.
…And yes, I may really feel all those things, but you can bet your ass he encouraged me to type them .

The nominations and votes are in, and the results and prizes are here! The community has spoken on the best of the best, and we present to you the victors, those who will go down in community history as having truly ascended to the heights of their echeladders. Winners, give your acceptance speeches in the comments! Fellow community-members, congratulate our illustrious victors in the comments too! Be sure to check out the Best of Althomestuck winners too.
Without further ado, BEHOLD
joeypose

Best Fanproject

Receiving BY FAR the most votes of any nomination in any category in the entire contest (and thus also receiving our ultimate grand prize) is the Unofficial Homestuck Collection, created by Wafflehead_Man (aka Bambosh). The collection is an offline browsedatabase that

contains the other MS Paint Adventures, official Homestuck side-stories, and a garguantuan array of goodies for the enquiring reader. Seriously, there is SO MUCH CONTENT in this thing. It's totally ridiculous.

It includes flashes (which work in the browser through fancy majyyks even though Flash is deprecated now), bandcamp archives and much more. Thank you for all your hard work on this project for the community, and congratulations!
We also have RPGStuck, which even in second place here received more votes than any nomination in any other category! RPGStuck is a tabletop roleplaying community with a home-built RPG system based on SBURB. Developed and grown over years, the latest edition of the system was released in 2020, helping scores of players whip up plenty of fun and shenanigans. Check out the subreddit and the Discord server to join the community and start making your SBURB session dreams a reality!
We’re looking forward to all the new projects this coming year. :)
roxyswoon

Funniest Humor

The winner in this categroy is ThatJellyfish12 and their rating of HS media! Truly a refined artform. With an honorable mention, we have the final stage of descent into madness penned by harryhinderson. Thanks for making us ell em ay friggin OH. Congratulations!
sbahjhehehe

Best Fanventure

The winner of Best Fanventure in 2020 is Sburb Done Quick! Not only is the comic a fantastic story about playing SBURB in a speedrun, the fanventure itself was published in its entirety in less than a month (one week, if you don’t count the first page). Clocking in at a 82 pages total and highly recommended by plenty in the community, we totally recommend you check it out! An honorable mention fanventure is Karkat Goes to a Convention by swiftkick_intheballs (aka Cole) which has been updating throughout the entire year of 2020. A long-standing fixture in the community since 2018 (and winner in this category in 2019’s Best Of awards), if you haven’t read it already you should definitely check it out and catch up! Congrats on some great fanventures this year!
adventuretime

Best Discussion or Theory

The first place award in this category goes to CANWC Classpect by JudgeBastiat! Described as “godly analysis” and “so high effort for something that clearly literally had no thought put into it” and deserving of a “formal thank you” by our community’s press corps, you will have a hard time finding a better theory and analysis out there. ;) The honorable mention here goes to MisirterE‘s critique and analysis of Narrative Collapse Theory (or dissipation). There’s a lot of meat in there (pun completely intended) on the Candy timeline, writing style, canonicity, and how it could all fit (or not fit) together in explaining the happenings and writing in that timeline. Check it out! Thank you both, and congrats!
storytime

Best Character Analysis/Discussion

There is much to be said of the many complex characters that make up the case of Homestuck. With all the controversy and debate around some characters, there are plenty of analyses out there for why and how characters are the way they are. The analysis that rose to the top this year is THE VRISKOMNIBUS, a full feature-length documentary about the one and only, Vriska. Created by Funk McLovin, it was presented in conjunction with SAHcon so go check it out!
sbahjhehehe

Most Friendly Person on the Sub

We get to thank the great people around here again this year for all they do to help be the foundation of the sub. The winner of this year’s award (by a landslide, I might add) is DrewLinky, the community helmsman throughout all that 2020 had in store. According to your nominators, the immense amount of time and effort you’ve put into serving and maintaining the community this year deserves far more than a gold internet point prize, but we want to make sure to recognize all you’ve done how we can. Thank you for your service and for your kindness and care for such a wacky internet community through such a tumultuous year!
saccharinedisposition

Most Beautiful Fanart

Moving into the collection of art categories, we start with a bang in the Most Beautiful Fanart category. We had a lot of great nominations here and we want to call out a few of the community artists who received the most votes! In first place is sometipsygnostalgic‘s comic Homestuck 2nd: Beyond Reason. Congratulations for your solid victory and thank you for creating and sharing your art! Coming in a near three-way tie for second place are u/R_Ih_Ni24 for their 3D character renders (including of particular note Terezi, Mindfang, Kanaya, and Dave), purnya232’s Equius and Nepeta at the mall camera, and Zack_The_Nerd for their Midnight Crew XCOM game render. Awesome job, folks, and thanks for your many great contributions to the community! Keep the awesome artworking coming this year, everyone. :)

Best Hiveswap Act 2 Fanart

Given the mightily anticipated release of Hiveswap Act 2 that took place this year, we have a special category for Hiveswap Act 2 Fanart. The winner is Patstar54 for their sprite reconstruction of Joey! Thank you for your arduous pixel-by-pixel reconstruction from the trailer, and congratulations!
cracker

Best Cosplay

The best cosplay of 2020 award goes to Ten_Ketsu for their Rose and Jade cosplays! The cosplay artwork was a joint effort between cosplayers TenKetsu and sweetcat_hd and photographer nitelpaz_photoart. Fantastic cosplays and beautiful visuals! The honorable mention in this category is ha2ne’s Terezi 50s stuck. Congratulations to both of you, and here’s to hoping we see plenty more creations from the community in the coming year. People be lookin’ fabulous!
animekat

Best Fanmusic

The next art category is fanmusic. There’s been a great deal of music composed by the community, and the winner of this category created quite a musical project! Tee-veeTerminal is the winner with their 11th Anniversary Homestuck Mega-medley! Check out the YouTube video for a smashing mix of progressive rock and metal, filling almost an hour. Fantastic work! The second place winner comes from the Unofficial MSPA Fans Epilogues album itself: it’s Kamina Burana by Grace Medley, composed around the dramatic Epilogues scene of Dirk ascending to the highest point of the building. Check it (and the rest of the album) out if you haven’t already! There’s some serious bangers in the community this year.
airguitar

Best Animation

Wrapping up the community audio and visual arts categories is one that uses both! Animations can take a ton of work to make, and that’s no more evident in the fact that both the winner and runner up came from the Homestuck Reanimated team! Composed of upwards of 40 different community artists, the team created both the masterpieces Game Over Reanimated, which won the category, and the honorable mention Collide Reanimated. Fantastic teamwork and artwork on these ambitious projects!
hussiedance

Best Subreddit Comment

Wrapping up the community awards categories is the best subreddit comment. As we found last year, this category has transcended from mundane text to the masterpiece of artistic composition. Solidly in line with that, this year’s winner is Crpal on Hussie’s double ascension. Not much more needs to be said about how fucking deserving this award is for this masterpiece. Cheers, fine friend.

Best Homestuck² Update

To close out our awards, we have a few categories to recognize some of the community’s favorite official content from Homestuck^2, Pesterquest, and the like. For Homestuck² and its various updates this past year, the winner by a wide margin for favorite update goes to Chapter 6 (cw: suicide), containing the dramatic confrontation between Calliope and Jade. From the writing to the visuals, this chapter is clearly a community favorite. In second place is an update in Chapter 8 where the kids and Vriska have a ruckus while Jade & Rose explain everything. With things being on hiatus now the exact details of future updates remains unclear, but we hope for more great content in the coming year!

Best Pesterquest Route from 2020

In 2020, we received the final 8 Pesterquest routes, and it was a close contest for the community’s favorite. The final episodes take the cake, with Roxy’s route (Volume 13) in first place and Dirk’s (Volume 14) in second. Third place went to none other than Nepeta in Volume 9. If you’re still working your way through the game or haven’t played yet, now you know some routes (along with Jade’s and Aradia’s from Vols. 4 and 8 that won last year’s contest) to keep an eye out for!

Best Character from Hiveswap Act 2

Finally, we have the best character from Hiveswap Act 2. After the anticipated release of the game, we got to see some more character development beyond what we got in Hiveswap Friendsim back in 2018 (wow that’s a long time ago now). After playing through Act 2, the community’s favorite character is Tyzias! Marvus came in second. Keep up all the Hiveswap discussion and art sharing this coming year!

Final Notes

Aaaand, that’s a wrap!
gamzeewave
Awards will be distributed shortly, and where possible/relevant, awards will be given to the original creator of the content that won. Thank you to everyone who submitted category ideas, award nominations, and votes! If a redditor got missed in tagging all the users here, let me know. Join us in thanking and congratulating all our winners!

I started using SmartThings when I set up my Konnected.io alarm boards the first time, and everything was so simple, straightforward and easy that it honestly seemed magic. All my Shelly devices just popped up. Everything just magically worked and did the right thing at the first time.
I want to spend a second describing how rare this situation is, especially in the life of a high-performance software professional. My life is at work is constantly concerned with stuff that doesn't work the way it should, or does not perform as well as we would want it. We constantly troubleshoot and bughunt to fix things, and as soon as we are done with one issue, another is awaiting, in an interminable list. Except for research spaces that we defend with nails and teeth, the daily experience is trouble after trouble after trouble.
SmartThings was not like that. It's been a joy from start to end. Samsung easily made an ecosystem that was well thought, simple to operate, cleanly designed, and interoperable.
... but most importantly FUN!
I'll remember it with the kind of fondness of the 1990s DOS games I played as a teenager. Using SmartThings gives me kind of a Commander Keen vibe.
Now, I converted everything to HomeAssistant: Lighting, Intrusion, Fire, CO, HVAC. The primary reason is the guarantee of local execution, which is very important to me when designing a security system. In my opinion it makes no sense for a door sensor not to be able to trigger a siren that is 20 feet away without contacting via wi-fi a cloud server that might be 1500 miles away. In the best possible scenario, any of the three clouds involved could be experiencing an outage, plus my wi-fi could be experiencing an outage. In worse scenarios, burglars could cut the internet coax if they know where it is, and take a wi-fi jammer. With a pair of scissors and a $60 device, they would inhibit my entire setup.
So, I slowly migrated to a solution (almost finished) that is immune to internet outage, to power loss and to wi-fi interference, and its execution is entirely local.
All konnected sensors and actuators are hardwired, and the konnected boards talk to Home Assistant via wired ethernet, through a switch that is also under battery power.
I'm very happy about HomeAssistant. I have been able to build dashboards and automations that are frankly awesome: practical, sophisticated and professional looking.
The only downside: it feels like work. Install the service, enable this feature, download this custom component from github, enable it, configure it, verify the syntax, fix the errors, restart the server, it doesn't do what you want, turn on logging, examine the logs, diagnose the issue, install the missing dependency that nobody marked as needed, find the error, fix it, try again, rinse, repeat...
Thanks to HomeAssistant, I built enormously more than SmartThings could give me, but it feels like work, not like fun.

Hello and welcome! You might've just gotten your Quest 2 and are probably very excited.
First off; whether you're a new user or a VOG Quest veteran, we welcome you to the community and hope you enjoy your stay. If you'd like to chat live on Discord you can join us at the VR Discord. Feel free to post your box-photos and first impressions in this thread. Thanks and have fun!
​
If the guide leaves any of your questions unanswered, please write in detail the question you have in the comments.

• Anything that's not in here you might find on our updated Quest wiki
• Sometimes, you can find an answer to your question with a Google search. Not all questions require assistance from community members.
• If you need SideQuest assistance, check out the SideQuest support portal, or click here for setup info.

Now, let's get into the guide.

The Unboxing Experience

The box includes 2 AA batteries, so you don't need to worry about batteries right away (Make sure to remove the battery-tabs from the controllers to start using them, though!).
However, we do recommend you get rechargeable batteries down the line for the benefit of your wallet and the environment. The included glasses spacer we recommend using if you want to wear glasses in the headset.
The box also includes a regional charging brick and a 1m charging cable. This cable is quite short; so not really sufficient for Oculus Link. We recommend getting a different, longer cable for that purpose. You can check out our guide on good Oculus Link cables here.
Alternatively, you can play PCVR games/content with Virtual Desktop. If you need assistance with Virtual Desktop, we recommend visiting their Discord.
​

Setting Up

Once you have unboxed the Quest, we recommend checking out this guide by Oculus on how to setup your device.
In short;

• Install the Oculus app from the App Store/Google Play Store.
• Login with your Facebook account or create one if you don't have one already.
  • Games and apps are linked to your account.
• If you don't have one already, the app will ask you to set up your VR profile with a username & profile picture.
• After that you will be asked to configure your privacy settings, add a payment method and set a pin code. The pin-code is used for verifying purchases of apps and games.
• Turn on the headset and make sure it's nearby. Enable your phone's bluetooth and the app will prompt you to pair the devices.
  • If you are not automatically prompted to pair, look in the headset for a 5 digit code to insert into the mobile app.
  • Do not to close or switch apps until the setup process (in VR) is complete.
• Adjust the distance between the lenses by grabbing them and moving them in/outward to find the setting that's right for you. It's important to use the best setting that's closest to how far your eyes are apart to get the best clarity.
• Put on the headset, adjust the rear strap and then adjust the top strap.
• You know it's the right fit when the image is clear, the headset is snug but there isn't a lot of pressure on your face. If you have a hard time getting the default strap to be comfortable; it is recommended to get the Elite strap.

​
Some things to keep in mind:

• Keep direct sunlight away from the lenses. Do not store the headset with the lenses facing the sun, as this can damage the lenses and screens.
• Clear your playspace and ensure there are no tripping hazards, pets, young children or things that you could break, hurt, or hurt yourself with.
• To clean the lenses, use a dry optical lens microfiber cloth. Do not use liquid or chemical cleaners and avoid using any rough or dirty cloths.
• Do not use alcohol or an abrasive cleaning solution to clean the straps. Oculus recommends using anti-bacterial wipes for this purpose (Not for the lenses!)
• If you want to wear glasses, take off the face gasket, install the glasses spacer and then install the face gasket on top. Glasses narrower than 142 mm and under 50 mm in height should fit.

​

FAQ

• Can I play my Quest 1 games on Quest 2?

Yes. Virtually all Quest 1 games are compatible with Quest 2 and games are linked to your account, not your device. Some games will receive updates to improve graphics to take advantage of the Quest 2's improved processing power.

• Should I get the Quest 64GB or 256 GB?

If you plan on using it for mostly PCVR, 64gb is fine, if you plan on storing only a few games (20 or so), little bits of content, etc - 64gb is fine. However, if you plan on storing large movies, 50+ games, etc then you may want to look into 256.

• What cable should I use for Oculus Link?

Please check our spreadsheet on common cables (and their effectiveness) by the community.

• Do Virtual Desktop and Sidequest still work?

Yes. You can join the Virtual Desktop discord here for real-time chatting and support. Check out the SideQuest support portal for support, or click here for setup info.

• What router should I use for Virtual Desktop? Is this/my router good enough?

Please note that your speed to the internet (the speed that speedtest.net shows for example) is irrelevant to how good your Virtual Desktop streaming experience will be. That being said, you can use Virtual Desktop on any modern AC or AX router, but experiences will vary depending on network setup, distance and speed. You can ask more question in the Virtual Desktop Discord or in the comments below.

• Can I run SteamVR games without a PC?

No.

• How long does the Quest 2's battery last?

Between 2 and 2,5 hours roughly, from a full charge.

• Is Quest 2's (hand)tracking better, worse, or the same?

It seems the common consensus is that it is the same or better. Hand-tracking is uncertain.

• Should I get the elite or the elite battery strap? Is comfort on the default strap bad?

It seems as if the Quest 2 is more comfortable out of the box than the original Quest; but not by much. For the best possible comfort, it is recommended to get the Elite strap or otherwise mod the headset strap. However: Comfort is dependent on your face shape, adjustments, etc. The default strap could be fine for you. The elite battery strap will get you more than the 2 hour battery life at a time; but you could also get your own (bigger) power bank to fulfill this purpose.

• Will Quest 1 prescription lenses fit on the Quest 2 lenses?

Yes, they are the same shape and therefore fit just fine.

• Can the Quest 2 run at 90Hz?

It will not be enabled at launch due to a bug with the guardian system; but will be enabled in a future patch.

• Is my IPD supported?

As long as you are within 2.5mm of 58mm, 63mm, or 68mm you should be able to use it fine. To check your IPD, follow this guide or use the EyeMeasure app on iOS

Hi everyone!
I‘m currently working on a side project and I would love to get your feedback :)
I‘m a Web developer and always wanted to to something with IoT. ESP32’s are perfect to get into the game but one thing was bothering me all the time: It‘s complicated. I lost days setting up my Environment (wrong python version, esp idf didn‘t compile, aand much more). After that it was very time consuming to get the I2C sensor to run and if that‘s not enough, streaming it into the cloud was complex too (mqtt with tls, latency, data aggregation and so on).
I got everything running, but I was asking myself: What if people without the coding experience want to connect something with the internet? Does it have to be that complex?
I‘m having a strong background in UX design and wanted to find out if there is a way of doing that more easier to get more people into IoT (students, data scientists, other web devs,...)
My first prototype is now ready and I would be really curious what you guys think :)
It‘s basically split up into 3 areas:
1: Flash your esp with my firmware. I made a tool that does all that completely automagically). You enter your credentials of my platform and your wifi credentials and you are done :)
https://youtu.be/d6CXFYNJtoo
2: once connected, the esp is communicating with my cloud. The firmware itself is abstracting protocols and with my platform you can configure sensors (currently GPIO and I2C, but I plan to support more like SPI and one Wire) over the cloud without any coding skills. I‘m also trying to build a sensor database. If one sensor is created there, you can just use it and don‘t even have to bother with the protocol. I can also display you which pins you have to connect.
https://youtu.be/MtH-aVeKCJo
Here are some mockups of how sensor configuration will look like: Go to gallery
3: Afterwards the data is sent to the cloud and can be viewed and exported. If wanted you can also create thresholds to get informed if something isn‘t right. And of course you can use all the data over an API. I‘m also planning to integrate „projects“: you can create a project (eg weatherstation) and combine data from different sensors and esp‘s in there. You can also make your data public and enable other people to use it in their projects)
I know I‘m quite at the beginning, but I build this the last years and would love to hear your feedback if you think this is a useful tool or if it is completely useless. I know this won‘t replace coding, and I don‘t want to either but I think it could be a great way to get people interested into this topic and maybe motivate them to dig deeper into that. I was also thinking of providing a C SDK for developers to use only the cloud without my firmware.
If the feedback is positive I would love to open this for everyone interested to find bugs and building the sensor database :)
Have a nice day. Best, Florian

HI THERE! I’ve re-created this list, cleaned up some mess and placed many links to their respective sections. This list contains only FOSS apps and most of the links provided here will take you to GITHUB, GITLAB, F-DROID and PLAYSTORE.
I'll be adding some hearts beside each application
💖--App is active and is being updated frequently
💚--App is active but updates are a little slow. (Not THAT slow and definitely not dead)
💔--App is abandoned/dead. (Why are dead apps here? Answer: There are some humans out there who love to dig out a corpse and examine it😸)
💛--This link will take you to Playstore
💜--This app...is...uhhh...its either abandoned or the updates are slow as a sloth. IDK what's happing with these apps. (Sometimes its hard for me to point out the app if its abandoned because of the updates....some apps receive updates after a very long time and are not dead. The devs should archive the repo if they're not gonna continue developing it further)
These hearts will be added beside each username
💙--The user who suggested that particular app
❤--The DEV of that particular app
🌟SUGGESTIONS TO MORE FOSS APPS ARE WELCOME, when sharing the link for a FOSS app, place the colored heart beside it. I don’t wanna end up placing the wrong colored heart🌟
🌟If any application has a wrong heart beside it OR any link is incorrect OR any app is placed at the wrong section OR if any app goes closed source or turns shady then please do let me know. I'll fix/remove/correct it asap🌟
🌟One more thing...the apps under the sections are listed randomly. Neither of the apps in these sections are ranked from best to worst🌟
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆
BROWSERS

1. BROMITE💖
   
2. CHROMIUM💖---u/BreakingGilead 💙
   
3. ICE RAVEN💚, this is a fork of the firefox browser with extra ad-ons
   
4. FENIX💖, Fenix is the all-new Firefox for Android browser, based on GeckoView and Mozilla Android Components.
   
5. FOSS BROWSER💜
   
6. SMART COOKIE WEB💖
   
7. DUCKDUCKGO💖
   
8. UN GOOGLED CHROMIUM💖
   
9. KIWI BROWSER💖 ---u/thebottle 💙
   
10. PRIVACY BROWSER💚---u/Sirbesto 💙
    
11. TOR BROWSER💖💛--- u/yaboyjb311 💙
    
12. LIGHTNING BROWSER💔---u/dtoxic 💙
    

APP STORES

1. F-DROID💚, and its clients. Like FOXY DROID💚
   
2. AURORA STORE and AURORA DROID💚, this link will take you to auroraoss download section from where you can download both Aurora store(Playstore client without google tracking) and aurora droid(F-droid client).
   

F-DROID REPO

1. IzzyOnDroid- u/nlygamz 💙

FIREWALL AND AD BLOCKERS

1. NETGUARD💖
   
2. ADAWAY💖
   
3. BLOKADA💖
   
4. AFWall +💚
   
5. RETHINK DNS+FIREWALL💚,
   
6. DNS66💚 ---u/Jac0b_0 💙
   
7. PERSONAL DNS FILTER💖---u/Infinityseeker 💙
   

AUTOMATION

1. EASER💜

CALCULATORS

1. NCALC+💔, this calculator has everything, from a scientific calculator to converters. Also a simple dark and light mode
   
2. CALCULATOR ++💔
   
3. NCALC LIBRE💔, open source calculator with various functions---u/644c656f6e 💙
   
4. MICRO MATHEMATICS💖, Extended visual calculator---u/realmain 💙
   

CALENDARS and CAMERA

1. ETAR💚
   
2. SIMPLE CALENDAR💚
   
3. OPEN CAMERA💚
   
4. SIMPLE CAMERA💚
   
5. HEDGECAM 2💜💛
   
6. FREEDCAM💚, camera app which try to enable stuff that is forgotten by the manufacturers---u/sawgrim 💙
   

SOCIAL MEDIA CLIENTS

1. SLIDE FOR REDDIT💚
   
2. INFINITY FOR REDDIT💚 - u/Hostilenemy ❤️
   
3. TWIDERE FOR TWITTER💚
   
4. BARINSTA FOR INSTAGRAM💚, previously known as Instagrabber ---u/austinhuang ❤
   
5. FROST FOR FACEBOOK💚
   
6. REDDITORIA FOR REDDIT💚💛
   
7. TUSKY💚, an android client for Mastodon
   
8. RED READER💚 for reddit---u/Kangburra 💙
   
9. DAWN FOR REDDIT 💚---u/felixalguzman 💙
   
10. TWIRE💖, open source twitch client---u/winterberryco 💙
    
11. SHITTER💚, twitter client---u/sawgrim 💙
    
12. FEDILAB💚, Fedilab is a multi-accounts client for Mastodon, Pleroma, Peertube, GNU Social, Friendica and Pixelfed---u/sawgrim 💙
    

DOCUMENT READERS AND EDITORS

1. LIBRERA READER 💜
   
2. MuPDF VIEWER💜
   
3. COLLABORA OFFICE 💖💛
   
4. BOOK READER💖
   
5. ONLY OFFICE, a free and open source office and productiviy suite- u/uaos 💙
   
6. PDF VIEWER💚, a secure pdf viewer that does not require any permissions---u/sawgrim 💙
   
7. KOREADER💖, an ebook reader supporting pdf, epub, fb2 and many other formats--- u/emacsomancer 💙
   
8. FB READER💖💛 an E-Book reader---u/BreakingGilead💙
   

FILE MANAGERS

1. AMAZE💚
   
2. DIR💔
   
3. MATERIAL FILES💚
   
4. GHOST COMMANDER💚💛
   

OFFLINE FILE SHARING
TREBLE SHOT💔
FLASHLIGHTS
SIMPLE FLASHLIGHT💚
FLASHY💜
Dont worry, these flashlights dont ask or seek for funny permissions
GALLERY

1. LEAFPIC💔
   
2. SIMPLE GALLERY💖
   
3. CAMERA ROLL💔
   
4. STINGLE PHOTOS💚💛, a gallery which can store your images and videos on cloud. Yep, somewhat like google photos
   
5. PHIMP ME💜💛, a gallery with some advanced photo editing features, careful...this app can be unstable at times--- u/Petomeansfart 💙
   

KEYBOARDS

1. HACKER’S KEYBOARD💔
   
2. BEHE KEYBOARD💔, this one is good for programmers
   
3. SIMPLE KEYBOARD💚
   
4. OPEN BOARD💚
   
5. ANYSOFT KEYBOARD playstore link💚💛
   
6. IRREGULAR EXPRESSIONS💚 ---u/mfllc ❤
   
7. FLORIS KEYBOARD💖, Its in its alpha stage and has a lot of customizations--- u/sawgrim 💙
   

LAUNCHERS

1. LAUNCHAIR💔
   
2. KISS LAUNCHER💚
   
3. PAPER LAUNCHER💔
   
4. OPEN LAUNCHER💜
   
5. ROOTLESS PIXEL LAUNCHER💔
   
6. POSIDON LAUNCHER💚
   
7. BLISS LAUNCHER💜
   
8. EMERALD LAUNCHER💚
   
9. ESSENTIAL LAUNCHER💔
   
10. OLAUNCHER💖---u/AimHrimKleem
    
11. SHADE LAUNCHER💚💛---u/AimHrimKleem
    
12. SLIM LAUNCHER💚 ---u/cameos 💙
    
13. BALD PHONE💚, this launcher is for elderly people ---u/cameos 💙
    
14. LIBRECHAIR💔, launchair fork with non-foss part removed (alpha)---u/krypt8x 💙
    
15. TINY BIT LAUNCHER💖 a kiss launcher fork---u/Sirbesto 💙
    
16. LAWNDESK💜, a launcher without an app drawer based on Launchair---u/Blackberry_Brave 💙
    
17. BIT LAUNCHER💜---u/binarydiary 💙
    
18. SENTIEN LAUNCHER💖, a minimal fork of kiss launcher---u/ndeaaaaaaa💙
    

MAILS

1. K-9 MAIL💚
   
2. FAIR EMAIL💖
   
3. PROTON MAIL💚💛
   
4. TUTANOTA💚--- u/Kosty4
   
5. CRIPTEXT💚💛---u/prvnpete 💙
   
6. CTEMPLAR💚💛---u/prvnpete 💙
   
7. SIMPLE LOGIN💚💛, This is an anti-spam Email Hero. ---u/MAXIMUS-1 💙
   

MAPS AND NAVIGATION

1. OSMAND💚
   
2. TRANSPORTR💚
   
3. PRIVATE LOCATION💔
   
4. POSITIONAL💖, a gps and a time information app with some fluid animations and a minimal UI--- u/Hamza417 ❤
   
5. OPEN MULTIMAPS💚, a simple client to view maps from OpenStreetMaps---u/sawgrim. 💙
   
6. TRIAL SENSE💖, navigation app with unique survival toolkits---u/_Abesti_ 💙
   

MEDIA FRONTENDS

1. NEWPIPE💖
   
2. SKY TUBE💜
   
3. SONG TUBE💖, an App made in Flutter to Download Media from YouTube--- u/sawgrim 💙
   

MEDIA

1. TUBELAB💖, a peertube client---u/sawgrim💙
   
2. THORIUM💚, a peertube client---u/sawgrim💙
   
3. KODI💚---u/MuntasimF💙
   
4. STREMIO💖, Stremio💛---u/prvnpete💙
   
5. JELLYFIN---u/krypt8x💙
   
6. MPV💚, a video player
   
7. VLC💖, its a media player
   
8. SHOWLY💖, is modern, slick, open-sourced Android TV Shows Tracker---u/Some012345💙
   

MESSAGING

1. CONVERSATIONS💚
   
2. PIX ART MESSENGER💚
   
3. TELEGRAM💚💛
   
4. WIRE💚
   
5. SIGNAL💖💛
   
6. TELEGRAM FOSS💚, an unoffical FOSS version of telegram with those proprietary garbage removed---u/samyak039💙
   
7. FORKGRAM💖, a telegram client with some extra features and google stuffs removed
   
8. SESSION MESSENGER💚, is an end-to-end encrypted messenger that removes sensitive metadata collection.---u/sawgrim💙
   

SMS

1. SILENCE💔, a fork of signal
   
2. QK SMS💚
   
3. SIMPLE SMS💚
   

MUSIC PLAYERS

1. ODYSSEY💚
   
2. VANILLA MUSIC💜
   
3. PHONOGRAPH💚
   
4. VINYL MUSIC PLAYER💚
   
5. MUSIC PLAYER GO💖 --- u/enricodortenzio ❤️
   
6. METRO💚, this is the fork of Retro music player with the pro versions unlocked ---u/MuntasimF ❤️
   
7. TIMBER💔 ---u/Confident_Love 💙
   
8. TIMBER X💜---u/Confident_Love 💙
   
9. CANAREE💜---u/Confident_Love 💙
   
10. SHUTTLE💜---u/Confident_Love 💙
    
11. PULSE MUSIC💚---u/WhiCCX5
    

PODCAST

1. ANTENNA POD💚
   
2. AUDIO ANCHOR💚
   
3. ESCAPE POD💚
   
4. TSACDOP💚💛---u/MarblesinthePan 💙
   

NOTE TAKING APPS

1. OMNI NOTES💔
   
2. SCARLET NOTES💜
   
3. CARNET💚
   
4. SIMPLE NOTES💚
   
5. NOTEBUDDY💔
   
6. MARKOR💚
   
7. UNOTE💔
   
8. JOPLIN💖---u/thebottle 💙 and u/IAMAHobbitAMA 💙
   
9. STANDARD NOTES💖---u/krypt8x 💙
   
10. SILENT NOTES💛💚---u/ychtyandr💙
    

TO-DO LISTS

1. MINIMAL TODO💔
   
2. TO DO LIST💔
   
3. OPEN TASKS💔
   
4. TASK. ORG💖
   
5. 1LIST💚
   

PASSWORD MANAGERS

1. KEEPASS DX💚
   
2. BIT WARDEN💚💛
   
3. KEEPASS2 ANDROID💚---u/_Samii_ 💙
   
4. MASTER PASSWORD💔--- u/masterblaster0 💙
   

PASSWORD AUTHENTICATOR

1. FREE OTP💔
   
2. AEGIS💚
   
3. andOTP💚---u/superpippo17 💙
   

GAMES

1. SOLITAIRE💖---u/urcosmo 💙
   
2. OPEN GEMMY💔💛---u/urcosmo 💙
   
3. XEONJIA💚---u/sawgrim 💙
   
4. LEMUDROID💖💛, Lemuroid is an open-source emulator based on Libretro---u/sawgrim 💙
   
5. LICHESS💖---Deuzivaldo 💙
   
6. MOONLIGHT💖 Game streaming client for pcs with Nvidia GPU---u/ReenigneArcher💙
   

WALLPAPER

1. MUZEI💚, A live wallpaper app for android
   
2. VECTORIFY DA HOME💖💛, a very minimal wallpaper app to customize your homescreen. u/enricodortenzio ❤️
   
3. RYWALL💚---u/t-ryder203x ❤️
   
4. GALLERYWALL💚 is for refreshing wallpaper with random pictures from the free Pixabay service with a scheduled period---u/01egme💙
   

WEATHER

1. FORCASTIE💚
   
2. GEOMETRIC WEATHER💛💜 ---u/xenyz 💙
   

VPN

1. PROTON VPN💛💖
   
2. WIREGUARD💚, an open source vpn ---u/thebottle 💙
   
3. MULLAD VPN💖 ---u/BreakingGilead 💙
   
4. OPEN VPN💚---u/BreakingGilead 💙
   

SCANNER

1. BINARY EYE💚, its an open source barcode scanner
   
2. QR and BARCODE SCANNER💚
   
3. QR SCANNER💚---u/Boob_Preski 💙
   
4. CLEAR SCAN💛---u/zcraber💙
   
5. OPEN SCAN💛💖---u/zcraber💙
   
6. OPEN NOTE SCANNER💚---u/zcraber
   

APPS THAT SAVE BATTERY, ENCRYPTS, HIDES AND LOCKS PERSONAL STUFFS OR EVEN INFORM/ALERT THE USER ABOUT IN-APP TRACKERS OR OTHER FISHY STUFFS COMES HERE 👇

1. RUN IN BACKGROUND PERMISSION SETTER💔, to stop background apps from running. REQUIRES ROOT
   
2. SUPERFREEZZ💚, to freeze apps from running in background. NO NEED ROOT
   
3. APP LOCK💔
   
4. WARDEN💚 it helps detect in app trackers--- u/rak-rak 💙
   
5. APP MANAGER💚, an app for managing other downloaded apps. Also it detects in app trackers.
   
6. CRYPTEE💚, encrypted storage for photos, files etc---u/krypt8x 💙
   
7. DROWSER💚, app killer, Requires ROOT---u/sawgrim 💙
   
8. VIGILANTE💖, Android security (camera/microphone indicator dots)---u/FunkyMuse ❤️
   
9. TRUSTNOTIFY💛💔, this app will hide the notifications on the lockscreen. Source---u/sawgrim 💙
   
10. PHOTOK💚,a free photo-safe vault---u/sawgrim💙
    
11. OBSCURA CAM💔, metadata remover and media face-scrubber---u/_Abesti_ 💙
    
12. EDS LITE💔 creates encrypted containers that compatible with Veracrypt, LUKS, EncFs---u/_Abesti_ 💙
    
13. PIXELKNOT💔, is a steganography app---u/_Abesti_ 💙
    
14. LOCKER💔 to control the numbers of time you need for failed unlock and wipe system---u/_Abesti_ 💙
    
15. ORBOT💖💛 is a free proxy app that empowers other apps to use the internet more securely ---u/zmoliu 💙
    
16. URL SANITIZER💜Just an easy tool to remove those tracking GET queries for a little more privacy---u/Some012345💙
    

DOWNLOAD MANAGERS AND TORRENTS

1. DOWNLOAD NAVI💚, this is a download manager
   
2. ARIA2 APP💛💚, this too is an open source download manager
   
3. LIBRETORRENT 💛💜, for torrenting
   
4. TRANSDROID💜, a torrent client---u/thebottle 💙
   

RSS

1. SPARSS💚, to sync RSS without a server using DecSync---u/rat_tat_2_e 💙
   
2. FEED READER💔, Modern desktop application designed to complement existing web-based RSS accounts---u/rat_tat_2_e 💙
   
3. FLYM💚, Flym News Reader is a light Android feed reader (RSS/Atom) ---u/Born_Science 💙
   
4. FEEDER💖 is a no-nonsense RSS/Atom/JSON feed reader app for Android---u/Some012345💙
   
5. READROPS💚 is a multi-services RSS client for Android. Its name is composed of "Read" and "drops", where drops are information drops in an ocean of news---u/Some012345💙
   
6. HANDY NEWS READER 💚 is a light and modern Android feed reader, based on Flym News Reader---u/Some012345💙
   

REMINDERS AND TRACKERS

1. LOOP HABIT TRACKER💖, for creating and maintaining long-term positive habits ---u/winterberryco 💙
   
2. RxDROID💜, reminds you of your medication schedules---u/winterberryco 💙
   
3. PERIODICAL💚, period calendar for ladies---u/winterberryco 💙
   
4. DRIP💜, period tracker with password protection---u/winterberryco 💙
   
5. LOG28💚, a simple no-frills period tracker---u/winterberryco 💙
   
6. FITO TRACK💚, a fitness tracker for android---u/sawgrim 💙
   
7. MONEY WALLET💚, to help you track your expenses---u/ORO8ORO 💙
   
8. OPEN TRACKER💖, a sports tracker that completely respects your privacy---u/struds 💙
   
9. TRINSPECT💜,app to help you be organized, develop new habits and see the time left for your life---u/sawgrim💙
   
10. GO TO SLEEP💜 it will remind you to go to sleep....until you do so
    

CONVERTERS

1. UNIT CONVERTER ULTIMATE💔, A simple and easy to use unit converter---u/Turbo7890 💙
   
2. IMAGES-TO-PDF💔, this app can convert images to a pdf file---u/sawgrim 💙
   

ANDROID OPEN SOURCE PROJECT (AOSP)

1. AOSP DIALER site: cs android---u/LuckyLeague💙
   
2. AOSP CONTACTS site: cs android---u/LuckyLeague💙
   
3. AOSP GALLERY site: cs android---u/LuckyLeague💙
   
4. AOSP MESSAGING site: cs android---u/LuckyLeague💙
   
5. AOSP LAUNCHER 3 site: cs android---u/LuckyLeague💙
   

COMICS

1. TACHIYOMI💚, an open source manga and comics reader
   
2. TACHIYOMI J2K💚, a fork of tachiyomi with extra features and enhancements---u/sawgrim 💙
   

RELATED TO NOTIFICATIONS

1. MINDFUL NOTIFIER💖 displays a notification reminder at user configurable intervals
   
2. PINNIT💚, P!N 💔, NOTIFICATION NOTES 💔, create notes and pin them as notifications.
   
3. NOTIFICATION LOG💚, logs system notifications
   
4. FIT NOTIFICATIONS💚, Enable all notifications for fitbit devices
   
5. NOTIFICATION CRON💚, scheduling recurring notifications on your phone
   
6. SPEEDOMETER💚, display your current speed as a notification in your status bar
   
7. CALENDAR NOTIFICATION💔, advanced calendar notifications
   
8. HEADS UP NOTIFICATIONS 💜, heads up notifications for your device
   
9. AC DISPLAY💔, handle new notifications with ease
   
10. HEADS UP💔, floating notifications
    
11. QUICK TILES💚, enable some extra stuffs/tiles in the notification tray
    

MISCELLANEOUS

1. NEXT CLOUD💚, its an android client to access the next cloud server
   
2. SHELTER💚, This helps in isolating big brother apps, using multiple accounts.
   
3. SNIPPET💔💛, its like an auto-text app
   
4. KDE CONNECT💚, to connect and share files, clipboard, etc between pc and android---u/thebottle 💙
   
5. WALLABAG💚, save web pages and read them later offline---u/thebottle 💙
   
6. TERMUX💚, android terminal---u/thebottle💙
   
7. VOICE💜, a minimal audio book player ---u/celiomsj💙
   
8. DEC SYNC💚, It lets you create local CalDAV and CardDav accounts (for Calendar and Contacts) and sync them to a local directory.---u/rat_tat_2_e💙
   
9. RADICALE💜, storage plug-in for DecSync---u/rat_tat_2_e💙
   
10. EVOLUTION💜 plugin for DecSync---u/rat_tat_2_e💙
    
11. DSUB💜---u/ladfrombrad💙
    
12. JITSI MEET💚, a zoom alternative---u/krypt8x💙
    
13. SYNCTHING💚, p2p encrypted cross-device file sync service ---u/krypt8x💙
    
14. YET ANOTHER CALL BLOCKER💚---u/sawgrim💙
    
15. OandBackupX💚, a backup manager for android---u/sawgrim💙
    
16. PRIMITIVE FTPD💖, open source ftp server---u/ThrowAway237s💙
    
17. TESSERCUBE💜, Communicate via OpenPGP in any app--- u/NormieMcNormerson💙
    
18. TEXTFAIRY💚, an OCR app---u/sawgrim💙
    
19. FEED WATCHER💖, a feed scanner app for android---u/sawgrim💙
    
20. GADGET BRIDGE💚, A free and cloudless replacement for your gadget vendors' closed source Android applications---u/sawgrim💙
    
21. IMAGEPIPE💚, Reduces image size and removes exif-tags when sharing images on android devices---u/sawgrim💙
    
22. EASYOPENLINK💚, Android app which makes it easy to open links from text documents via the share function---u/sawgrim💙
    
23. TAPTAP💚, Port of the double tap on back of device feature from Android 11 to any Android 7.0+ device---u/sawgrim💙
    
24. ISLAND💚---u/Zzappazz💙
    
25. TAILSCALE💚,Tailscale is a WireGuard-based app that makes secure, private networks easy for teams of any scale---u/sawgrim💙
    
26. SCALEWAY MANAGER💚, Scaleway Manager is an IONIC application that use Scaleway API to manage your servers---u/sawgrim💙
    
27. ISMYWEBSITEUP💚,Handy tool to make sure your website is up, and alert you whenever it is down---u/sawgrim💙
    
28. AUDIO HEADQUARTER💖, is a tool to control Android application volume individually---u/sawgrim💙
    
29. INTRA💜, An experimental tool that allows you to test new DNS-over-HTTPS services on Android---u/binarydiary💙
    
30. HOMEBERRY💜, is an Android remote control app for your Raspberry PI---u/sawgrim💙
    
31. ANONADDY💚, is a free and unlimited Email alias app---u/_Abesti_💙
    
32. SURVIVAL MANUAL💜, Survival Manual based on the Army Field Manual---u/Turbo7890💙
    
33. VANCED💖, VANCED MANAGER AND MICROG REPO---u/PugLife43vr 💙 (note: Youtube Vanced itself isnt an open source project)
    
34. WLAN SCANNER💚 is an Android App for analysing the WiFi networks in range---u/fitcfitcfatc 💙
    
35. KEYBOARD BUTTON MAPPER 💖💛 app that can map a single or multiple key events to a custom action.---u/das-dude ❤
    

🔴🔵⚫⚪🔴🔵⚫⚪🔴🔵⚫⚪🔴🔵⚫⚪🔴🔵⚫⚪🔴⚫
SIMPLE MOBILE TOOLS💖💛-- Tibbbi❤️ almost all the mostly used applications ranging from Dialer to Gallery is available, they’re all available for free in Fdroid . The playstore version unlocks more and also supports the dev---u/kobeislegend 💙
A friend of mine made a list as well that contains open source applications, there are some apps here in his list which isn’t available in my post. And instead of listing them one by one here’s the LINK to his list, it will lead you to github. This is him: u/Petomeansfart

INTRODUCTION
I have successfully rooted the Lenovo Tab M8. I would like to document this root, how I did it, and what I learned from it on this subreddit in order to give back to you folks for helping me in the past. This is going to be an in-depth guide which will hopefully help you understand the rooting process better, and help you troubleshoot if things go wrong. This guide is very detailed and overwhelming, but if you pay attention and read through it, I guarantee you'll be satisfied because you'll be able to not only root, but know what you're doing. This way, you don't have to go making all the mistakes yourself like I did.
Before you begin, I hope you have at least some experience with Linux, and the more general computer knowledge you have, the better. I try to make this guide n00b friendly, but it goes into a lot of nerdy detail. I also hope you're comfortable with command-line utilities and paths. If you don't know something, I have a list of helpful resources in the appendix. I was a n00b once too, and I can honestly say that this experience has turned me from a novice rooter to an actual rooter.
​
The Tablet
My device is a Lenovo Tab M8. More specifically it's a TB 8505fs I got at Walmart for 100 bucks. Pretty sure this is the identical model right here: https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/tablets/android-tablets/lenovo-tab-series/Lenovo-TB-8505/p/ZZITZTATB58
This thing is a pretty good buy. It's the perfect size for E-books, can still fit in a large pocket, has good stats for its price, and has a great battery life. Here are some of the stats you can obtain from the above link:
CPU: MediaTek Helio A22 Tab, Quad-Core, 2.0 GHz
32 Gigs storage, 2GB RAM. The stats are decent, especially considering the thing doesn't come with too much bloatware, so it's not weighed down very much. Nevertheless, I wanted to root it primarily for the educational experience, but also in order to De-Google this device.
Android OS: 10, upgraded from 9 against my will before I could root it. Upon doing some research I believe the root process is the same, although your stock ROM might be different.
The OS I was using was Linux Mint, although the process is the same on Windows except for how you download ADB.
​
PREPARATIONS
This tablet is great cuz you don't need to do anything special to root it. Its bootloader is unlockable by default. It's the usual process to unlock: just tap your build number to unlock manufacturer options and then make sure you enable USB debugging and OEM unlocking. Now, you can use adb to get into the bootloader, or you can use the hardware shortcut to enter the bootloader which is the usual power button + volume down key hold. You don't have to actually unlock the bootloader with fastboot yet, because I'll explain that later.
First, make sure you have ADB and fastboot installed. If you're on Windows you have to download it, so here's an official updated link for Windows, as suggested by comments: https://developer.android.com/studio/releases/platform-tools
A better alternative is to use Linux; I did this entirely on Linux Mint. If you are on Linux, you can use your distro's package manager (in this case apt since Mint is Debian based, use sudo apt-get install adb and sudo apt-get install fastboot to download your tools from verified repos.
Next, get on your Lenovo tablet and download Magisk Manager. Here's a link to it, complete with downloads and information. I recommend reading it.The official GH link is https://topjohnwu.github.io/Magisk/
IF YOU ARE DOING THE "NO PHONE HOME GOOGLE" CHALLENGE WHERE YOU WANT TO KEEP YOUR LENOVO OFFLINE THROUGHOUT THE ENTIRE ROOT PROCESS, YOU CAN INSTALL ANY apk VIA YOUR COMPUTER BY USING THE COMMAND adb -d install [package_name.apk] (the -d flag is for direct USB connection, refer to fastboot and adb guide posted at the appendix)
NOTE ABOUT SP FLASH TOOL: There is another way to root devices such as this one with MediaTek (MTK) chipsets using SP Flash Tool. Here is a link to it if you need, but we won't be using this method, as it's mainly useful if you cannot unlock/enter fastboot, which does not apply to the Lenovo M8. https://spflashtool.com/ Also in order to use this tool, you need the stock ROM and the scatter file for the device.
​
THE STOCK ROM
Anyway, the most important thing you'll need in order to root your tablet is a stock ROM. You can find a variety of stock ROMs right here, but make sure it matches your build number: https://firmwarefile.com/lenovo-tab-m8-tb-8505f
NOTE: MAKE SURE YOU DOWNLOAD YOUR STOCK ROM FOLDER ONTO YOUR ANDROID DEVICE FIRST, not onto your computer. If you download it onto your computer, transfer it to the device.
Alternatively, you may google your build number and try to locate your stock ROM that way. The stock ROM is the most important thing. It should contain boot.img, system.img, recovery.img, user-data.img, vbmeta.img, and a scatter file as well as a whole bunch of other things. Make sure your stock ROM directory has all that, and that it has your build number in there somewhere.
"What are the .img 'image files'?" you may ask. Those are partitions that you can flash with fastboot. For this guide you'll only need boot.img and vbmeta.img, but in the highly likely event that you end up in a bootloop, having these partitions can help you get OUT of a bootloop.
​
THE ROOT PROCESS
I chose the Magisk Manager patched boot image root method. It's pretty simple actually. Before proceeding, make sure you are all set with the preparation step. The general idea behind this root is that Magisk patches a boot image, which you flash to the boot partition. This custom Magisk image contains your su binary and custom kernel. If you haven't installed Magisk Manager yet, you should do it on your device. You should know how to install an apk file. At this point, you should also have your stock rom downloaded on your device, preferably placed somewhere you can easily access it like the Downloads directory.
"What is the su binary?" you may ask...
su is the switch user binary in Linux, which allows you to take actions as the root account. Getting "su" on Android is the same as rooting. On an unrooted Android, it's not that you don't have permission to use the "su" binary; the su binary doesn't exist at all! Thus, if you want root, you gotta add it.
"What is Magisk?" a n00b might ask...
Magisk is a lot of things, but in this context it is a way to root your device without alerting the fascist Google safety net which will discriminate against your device just because it was rooted. Additionally, Magisk Manager will control which apps can use root once you have the su binary added. Indeed, Magisk was made by ingenious Russian hackers. :)
​
Patching your boot.img with Magisk
This part's simple. On your tablet, enter Magisk Manager and click Magisk, install, select and patch a file, then navigate to wherever your stock ROM directory is that you should have saved in Downloads probably, and find boot.img. This will make Magisk Manager patch boot.img, and create a custom boot.img that is named something along the lines of magisk_patched_boot.img. IT DOES NOT OVERWRITE YOUR STOCK BOOT.IMG, AND THAT'S A GOOD THING. I'LL EXPLAIN WHY IN THE RECOVERY/RESCUE SECTION. At any rate, if this is successful, your patched boot image is now in the same directory as the rest of your images. If you would like to know exactly what it's called, check the Magisk logs. If you're asking what the patched boot image is, you should read about how the boot image loads the kernel and the ramdisk. This patched one loads the su binary. If that doesn't make sense to you, don't worry about it.
​
Extracting your ROM directory
Now that you have your stock ROM directory, with the patched magisk boot.img in it, you need to transfer it to your computer. This is because fastboot works with image files which are on your PC, and not on your Android. There are a lot of ways as I'm sure you know to transfer a file from Android to PC: you can use Google Drive for instance, or a standard USB media connection. Unfortunately, Linux doesn't usually support direct USB communication for media transfer, so I recommend doing this using adb if you're on Linux. This is how you'd do it with ADB:

1. Connect your Lenovo to your computer with a microUSB cable
2. Ensure USB debugging is turned on in dev. settings, and that your device appears when you use the command adb devices -l . It will probably say "unauthorized" and that's OK. If it says that, just open up your Lenovo and hit "accept this computer's RSA key"
3. Open up a shell using the command adb -d shell this is a Linux shell by the way, so I hope you know some basic Linux commands. If you don't you shouldn't be rooting. See appendix for a small guide. If you're too scared to use Linux, use a different method to transfer your stock ROM directory to your computer.
4. Find your downloads directory, or wherever your stock ROM folder is. It should be inside your sdcard directory. Once you have the directory filepath, use adb -d pull [path-to-directory] to copy the directory to your current working directory in Linux.
5. None of these steps are necessary if you're on Windows where you can just enable USB file transfer, or if you transfer the directory some other way like via internet or SD card. You can get creative here, it doesn't really matter. The end result must be that you have your stock ROM directory, together with the patched boot image, on your computer disk somewhere.

NOTE: to use adb or fastboot on Windows, you must open CMD in the directory where you have them installed. This is probably where your stock ROM image is going to be pulled.
​
Unlocking your bootloader
This step is pretty straightforward, and can be done at any point once you get into developer mode and hit "enable OEM unlock." This must be done before flashing your patched image, however. At this point you probably have your patched boot.img together with your stock images inside your stock ROM directory, on your computer's hard drive. If you don't, refer to the guide above. Alternatively, you can unlock your bootloader first. It doesn't matter.
In order to unlock the bootloader, you need to get into fastboot mode. For a reference of fastboot commands, check the appendix. You can get into fastboot either by powering the device off and using the hardware key shortcut (power+vol down hold) or by connecting your tablet via USB and using the adb -d reboot fastboot command.
At this point, your Lenovo's screen should be black, and it should say FASTBOOT MODE at the bottom. This is good. You can use the fastboot devices command to see if your device is being seen. If not, you might need drivers, but I didn't have to install drivers on my Linux Mint machine. In order to unlock your bootloader, you must now use this command: fastboot flashing unlock. Your tablet will prompt you for confirmation. Accept it and wait for the success message. When you reboot your device again, for instance with the command fastboot reboot , you should see the message "ORANGE STATE, YOUR DEVICE HAS BEEN UNLOCKED AND CANNOT BE TRUSTED." That's a good thing, it means progress.
​
Flashing the patched boot.img
This is the part where you actually overwrite your boot partition on your tablet. Beware, this is also the part where you're most likely to enter a bootloop, although I will explain how to get out of said bootloop in the rescue/recovery section. So, get your device into fastboot mode again. This can be done with adb -d reboot fastboot or through the hardware shortcut.
Once your device is in fastboot mode, navigate your computer to your stock ROM directory. If you're on Windows, I suggest putting your stock ROM directory into the same directory as your ADB and fastboot. Fastboot flash syntax is: fastboot flash [partition_name] [path_to_image_file_on_local_machine]
In order to flash our custom patched boot.img, we must first disable the verified boot verification. IF YOU DON'T DO THIS, YOU'LL END UP IN A BOOTLOOP! If you forget the --disable-verification flag, you will end up in a bootloop! I warned you! More info on VBMeta here: https://source.android.com/security/verifiedboot
Disable verified boot by using this command: fastboot flash vbmeta --disable-verification ./vbmeta.img where ./vbmeta.img is the path to your vbmeta.img file. It may be a little different, for instance if you're on Windows you use backslashes \ and not forward slashes / to separate directories, so if you're in your fastboot folder it would be something more like fastboot flash vbmeta --disable-verification .\stock_rom_folder\vbmeta.img. Seriously though, I hope you know how relative and absolute paths work, for your own good. From here on out, I will assume you know how to use paths. If you don't, you should brush up on the basics before rooting.
Now that you've flashed vbmeta with the --disable-verification flag, you can flash your boot partition. Use this command: fastboot flash boot ./magisk_patched_boot.img where ./boot.img is the path to your PATCHED boot.img. Watch out, you have a plain boot.img which is stock, and you don't want to flash that one, even though if you do it's no big deal; you just have to flash your custom boot.img afterwards. Also, if for some reason this doesn't work, the original post I read actually flashed the patched_boot.img twice: once BEFORE flashing vbmeta.img with --disable-verification, and once AFTER. However, they said that only flashing it AFTER is required. I flashed it twice, once before and once after, and it worked. The key is that you flash your custom boot image AFTER you flash vbmeta.img with --disable-verification. This is because Android Verified Boot (AVB) will not allow you to boot from your patched boot image if you allow it to verify it cryptographically, as it lacks the key. Check the verified boot link above for more info on that.
At this point, if everything went well, you can use fastboot reboot to boot your Android. It might take a while longer than usual, but once you boot, you should be rooted.
NOTE: Both adb and fastboot are tab-friendly. If you know how to use tab-autocomplete, it can help a lot as you're doing all this.
​
I HAVE ROOT, WHAT SHOULD I DO NOW?
If you followed the above guide, you should be able to give and revoke application root permissions using the Magisk Manager app you installed earlier. Google Play Store should still be usable. At this point, I would check if you actually have root on your device. There are a lot of ways to do this, but a safe one would be to connect your tablet via USB to your computer and open a shell with adb -d shell, and try to use the command su to switch user. It should lag a little and not let you, but you should get a pop-up question on your tablet asking if you want to grant the program "Shell" root permissions. Go ahead and do it, this is a safe program. It's your Android's internal shell. Now you have root privileges when you connect an ADB shell. Try using su again, and it should work. Alternatively, download any app that asks for root permissions and see if it works. Careful though, giving any app root permissions is a good way to get into all kinds of trouble. Many times you think you're the one hacking, but you end up being the one who gets hacked.
Now that you have root, you can go wild. The limits are up to your imagination and skill. I went about getting rid of every piece of Google spyware and adware on my tablet. I also installed hardware-identifier spoofing apps which allow me to change my MAC, my bluetooth MAC, and my IMEI. These are powerful privacy measures; so powerful that the mods of this subreddit might not even like that I mentioned them. It's not illegal, and it's fair game, mods! This tablet can't accept a SIM card!
BEFORE YOU GO CRAZY, please read my recovery section. For the love of god, back up your data before you proceed with doing anything to the system partition, or giving anything besides Shell root access!
​
​
RESCUE/RECOVERY
I'm stuck in a bootloop!
So you bootlooped. No big deal. I bootlooped multiple times and figured out how to rescue my device, and now I'll pass that knowledge on to you. It's an enriching experience to be honest. Here's the bad news: this Lenovo does not support TWRP custom recovery, and to my knowledge it doesn't actually have a recovery partition that you can access. In other words, adb -d reboot recovery sends you into fastboot mode.
Here's the good news: if you have your stock ROM, then you just have to flash the stock copy of whatever partition you think you messed up. Don't forget, the fastboot flash syntax is: fastboot flash [partition_name] [path_to_image_file_on_local_machine] so for instance in order to reset my system partition to stock, I would do fastboot flash system ./system.img , assuming I'm already in my ROM directory on my PC.
I made this nice mini-guide which tells you which partition you probably messed up, depending on your action, and what resetting said partition will do. When in doubt, you can flash all of the following:
boot partition
If you're flashing the stock boot.img on your device, it's probably because you are in a bootloop that doesn't even get to the lock screen of your device. If something is the matter with your boot partition, you should only see the Red Lenovo Logo, and it should NOT do the normal boot thing it does where it cycles through a bunch of images with random people doing exciting things which have nothing to do at all with the tablet such as BMXing. The major reasons for needing to flash boot.img are:

1. Downloading the stock ROM for the wrong build. In this case, only flashing the boot.img from the correct build will revive your device. I hope you saved or wrote down your build somewhere.
2. Forgetting to flash the vbmeta partition with the --disable-verification flag before flashing your magisk_patched_boot.img will send you into a bootloop, as I warned you before. If you forgot to do this, then you can just flash vbmeta.img with the flag shown above, and then flash your patched boot.img again. You do not need to touch vbmeta if you're flashing the stock boot.img
3. Completely resetting the device. Keep in mind to lock the bootloader again, you must use the command fastboot flashing lock

fastboot flash boot ./boot.img is how you flash stock boot partition
​
system partition
If you're flashing the stock system.img, it means you've irreparably messed up your system partition. This can happen if you remove the wrong system app or package, or if you otherwise mess with the system files. This type of bootloop may appear almost exactly like the bootloop from a bad boot.img, but it can be characterized by your device trying to boot, but then going into fastboot mode.
By the way, system apps/packages are things like Google Play Services; the ones you can't remove on an unrooted Android. Removing these can be good for battery and to remove Google's spying, but it can send you into a bootloop so fast it'll make your head spin. This is why I recommend to back up your system.img (see below) before every attempt of messing with it. One wrong move and you have to start over. In fact, if you're an inexperienced rooter, I don't recommend messing with any system app until you read about the Android system and Google what each app/package you want to mess with does. With that being said, you can make a flashable backup image of your current system.img if you use the dd command. More info on that below in the backup options section.
fastboot flash system ./system.img is how you flash stock system partition. This will restore all system apps and services. It may fail to rescue the device unless you also flash the user-data partition, depending on how badly you messed up.
​
user-data partition
This is probably the most common bootloop. It's usually characterized by getting to your lock screen from boot, and the device shutting off. This happened to me because I installed an app from the Play Store which listed trackers on my device and could uninstall system apps, but people on the comment section were saying it caused bootloops. The device worked fine until I tried to reboot it, lol.
Flashing a stock user-data.img means you lose all your data. However, if your data isn't backed up, it's probably gone already unless you're a digital forensics expert and know secrets that I don't. This is why I advocate backing up your data, and discuss several ways of doing that in the following section:
​
​
[CUSTOM IMAGES AND BACKUPS]
"I have root, but I am afraid of going into a bootloop and losing all my data!"
Smart. If you don't have that concern, you should. I lost all my data a few times because I didn't back it up. Here, I'll discuss backup options so you don't have to start all over from square one. Much like most things in life, serious failure with a rooted device is best addressed BEFORE it actually happens, by using a backup! Here are some viable backup options, together with their use cases and information:

1. Backing up user-data via USB on Windows: If you know how to connect your device to your Windows computer for data transfer, then you can back up the data on your user-data partition without doing anything fancy. This only works for the user-data partition, and does not create a flashable image.
2. Backing up via adb backup is great, and allows restoring with adb restore. I'm not going to post about this in-depth, but if you're interested I suggest looking these commands and their syntax up. It's all in the man pages.
3. Using a partition managebackup app. This is a risky idea because the app itself could have ads, or could bootloop your device. I don't recommend this method very much, especially for noobs. It may seem easy, but it's a good way to eat shit. Normally rooters flash TWRP to their recovery partition to do this, but this device doesn't support TWRP to my knowledge so we have to cope.
4. [EXPERTS ONLY] Use dd to manually back up your partition. Watch out! This is the hardest, most dangerous, but also most rewarding way. They call dd disk destroyer for a reason! One false move and you're going back to square 1! You need to know your partition layout and you may need to unmount your partition! If you know which dev is which partition (there are utilities for this in Linux), you may do something like this: dd if=/dev/mtd/mtd1 of=/sdcard/recovery.img bs=4096 to backup your recovery image, assuming your recovery partition is in /dev/mtd/mtd1

​
"Please help, I messed up so bad I can't even get into fastboot and I have a bootloop!"
This is the point where you have to use SP Flash tool to unfuck your device. I've never fucked it up that bad, but I hear you can still rescue it if you use that tool.
​
That's it! If you enjoyed this, give me a like or something. I'm starting a Youtube channel too where I'll show you how this is all done. Oh, I'm not responsible for you messing your device up. That's on you. Oh, if you want me to do a root guide for your device, I only do MTK (MediaTek) chipsets, and my next guide will be for the Alcatel A30 where I'll be rooting it with the SP flash tool scatter file method. But do feel free to ask me to do some other device, I might just make a guide about it.
​
A little about me
I'm a computer science student with a passion for hacking and Android rooting. I've rooted many devices before, but this was my first one where I actually knew what I was doing. It's one thing to follow instructions or use a one-click-root security exploit app, but it's a whole other thing to do your own research and actually understand the process. One day I hope to work in the mobile security industry, but if I end up somewhere else, I feel like Android will always be a hobby of mine. I feel like rooting sets you free from the tracking device in your pocket. It is a way to keep private information like where you are at all times and what you do on your phone private, and to get rid of the "it's your phone but it's actually ours to do with as we please" mentality of Google. You don't have to agree with me here, but that's what motivates me.
​
appendix
Fastboot and ADB command guide: https://www.androidjungles.com/adb-fastboot-commands/ (keep in mind, on Linux you can just use adb --help and fastboot --help as well as the manpages to see detailed information)
ADB and fastboot download (FOR WINDOWS): https://developer.android.com/studio/releases/platform-tools
Basic Linux commands: https://maker.pro/linux/tutorial/basic-linux-commands-for-beginners
Creating backups of partition images (DO NOT COPY-PASTE DD COMMANDS. IF YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND WHY NOT, THEN DON'T F*CKING USE DD) and read the manpage, please!
https://www.addictivetips.com/mobile/how-to-backup-your-android-phones-boot-recovery-and-system-partition-images/
https://android.stackexchange.com/questions/203891/how-to-take-full-image-backup-of-partitions-or-emmc (pay attention, this is not for the same type of device, though it mentions MTK devices.)
dd syntax: dd if=[path to input file] of=[path to output file]
Verified Boot Information (For those who want to become L33t Haxxors): https://source.android.com/security/verifiedboot
Stock ROM download page (but you can find your own or ask me in comments, but provide build number pls): https://firmwarefile.com/lenovo-tab-m8-tb-8505f
Magisk Manager Download: https://magiskmanager.com/ or on GH https://topjohnwu.github.io/Magisk/