Well that's a headline I never thought I'll write. Several posts and comments on the GOG subreddit have noticed a promotional e-mail that contains some... interesting symbols, which I can confirm with my own e-mail. As can be seen from the screenshot below, an e-mail containing a discount code for the game The End of the Sun (nothing out of the ordinary so far) contains 4 symbols that resemble Nazi iconography.

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[–] 155 points 5 months ago (5 children)

I also recognize that placing two such runes next to each other could create an unfortunate association with symbols used by the Nazi regime. This was noticed before distribution, and out of respect for local sensitivities, the material was not sent to the German community.

Zero explanation for why there were two of them, and the thing about Germany makes them look worse.

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  • [+] -22 points 5 months ago (2 children)

    But it's not the same symbol despite being two of them.

    Let's not nazis hijack the letter S and fucking sun now shall we? This is so tiring.

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  • [–] 31 points 5 months ago

    As much as I would like to not let Nazis hijack certain things, the simple fact is they did, they have, and they continue to. If Nazi-ism were gone and a distant memory, which perhaps even a decade ago I might've believed we were nearly at, then we can start working on reclaiming what they have polluted and bringing back its true, full history.

    But that has all changed, the masks are coming off and we are starting to see how far these white supremacists have metastasized and how much power they are beginning to take control of with their fascism. Now is not the time to begin trying to reclaim these symbols, precisely when they are actively using them as dogwhistles and trial balloons, actively spreading their vile ideology and starting to signal to and coordinate with each other to make their ever-so-predictable moves against humanity once again.

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  • [–] 83 points 5 months ago (20 children)

    First of all I love GOG, I love their mission, and I have stood by them since the beginning.

    That being said, why the living fuck did they put 2 of the last symbol? What did that represent!?

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  • [–] 46 points 5 months ago (2 children)

    Did you also stand by them when they started using AI images in the store? Or when they started that patrons thing where they just ask you to donate to a for-profit store?

    GOG has been kind of weird lately, and I can't say I like what I've been seeing.

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  • [–] 90 points 5 months ago* (12 children)

    to me it's pretty clear that it was intentional. like ffs, they explicitly chose to send the email with that title everywhere except germany because it's illegal to have nazi symbolism there. so obviously they knew! they realized what this came across as!

    idk if it's an edgy representative, and now they're defending that rep or something (or maybe the rep is the one writing the shitty non-apologies)... but yea, i'm downloading all my offline installers and if they don't have a real apology and commitment to not fucking do this again then my account is gone.

    fuck gog. the ai shit was bad enough, this is fucking unacceptable. i'd rather put up with steam's drm than give money to neonazis.

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  • [+] -13 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (11 children)

    As an Easterner, I fully agree with that highlighted comment from Polish dude - the symbol you see in the title has nothing to do with Nazis, it is cultural heritage that we still use around.

    For us it's different, but idea is the same - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ugunskrusts

    Better don't go to India

    Let me remind you that this is Polish game and GoG is owned by a Polish company.

    EDIT: I.. don't honestly understand the downvotes. Do you like not believe me and Wikipedia?

    EDIT2: I'm assuming people somehow assumed I'm talking about runes, when in reality I just wanted to elaborate on local cultural heritage (the sun-looking thing in the game's logo, not emails)

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  • [–] 0 points 5 months ago (8 children)

    You still use them around because you have fucking nazis going around. Poland is the ONLY country REQUESTING the military base from the Burger Reich. Makes you think eh, what would they possibly have in common? 🤔🤔🤔

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  • [–] 0 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (7 children)

    Trust me when I say this - many of the folks don't even really understand Nazis. The symbols have nothing to do with them, it's deeply enriched in our cultural heritage way before Nazis stole the symbols. One of the most respectable/known things from history in my country is "Order of Lāčplēsis". Look it up, notice the dates, and then look up when Latvia was founded. The people who held the title were also involved in fighting against Nazis.

    This is all verifiable online. Sometimes the East European history and culture is not what you can assume from GoG emails. We very much hate nazis as they literally brought us into wars and occupations, just like we can assume Poles are not very happy about Nazis attacking them and wrecking their country for decades.

    You know what's really annoying? That we essentially get hated for our cultural heritage because the baddies stole a symbol

    Let me remind you that Nazis saw slavs as subhumans, next in line after Jews. Poles and Latvians are slavs

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  • [–] -1 points 5 months ago (6 children)

    I just want to let you know that on my app you are labelled as Zionist (the coincidence in life eh), as such I have no respect for you or your opinions. With your respectable/known orders and history I wipe my ass and what GOG put was Nazi symbology. :)

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  • [–] -1 points 5 months ago* (5 children)

    Huh? I'm like at the opposite world of Israel and you can probably scan my comments for that stuff, doubt you'll find me showing much support for a genocide.

    EDIT: Actually, read my profile bio. It might have been due to questioning the numbers from early Lemmy days, but that's pretty much history and in no way makes me a zionist, but someone who critically sees information that's hard to believe and I usually need more proof than a reddit/lemmy comment.

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  • [–] 1 point 5 months ago (4 children)

    This you facefuck?

    It took me literally 2 minutes. Ah yes, you are a critical inspector of facts, yes. Would you like me to show you israeli scum RAPING inmates and civilians defending them? Or kids sniped? Or burned? Or Israeli stats on the war? Or hospitals/refugee camps/schools being bombs with thermobaric bombs?

    let me know mr. “you don’t know what Nazi is”.

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  • [–] 4 points 5 months ago* (3 children)

    Are you having comprehension problems? I'm literally speaking against genocide(-s) in my comment. The fact that it got upvotes on Lemmy probably goes to show it. Context matters, yet you jumped to insulting me like a teenager. I'll make my own assumptions about you.

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  • [–] -3 points 5 months ago (2 children)

    I'll make my own assumptions about you.

    Oh no! What would I do now…

    Curious, do you think germany owes israel to the jews, like you wrote? Do you agree?

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  • [–] 1 point 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 child)

    Yes, just like Israelis will own to Palestinians for a long time. Do you disagree? Just because Israelis became evil, does not somehow delete history of Nazis. This is obviously less about Israel and more about holding parties accountable for what they did, instead of forgiving everyone at the first inconvenience or "an enemy of my enemy is my friend"

    EDIT: Of course, just downvote and move on, because you know I'm right and you cannot rationally argue against this, unless you're also ready to forgive Israel as soon as Palestine attacks someone else.

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  • [–] 0 points 5 months ago*

    Because Germany and Europe totally held Nazi accountable for their crimes and totally not put them in positions of power.

    Just like Merz who totally not comes from a Nazi family.

    Or like when Germany gave up their land to build Israel in Europe. That totally happened.

    So, according to you, what country should we ethnically cleanse to make room from Palestine? We own it to them right?

    Additionally, the program was highly unpopular in West Germany, where many Nazis maintained positions of power. Denazification was opposed by the new West German government of Konrad Adenauer,[2] who declared that ending the process was necessary for West German rearmament.

    In contrast, in the Soviet occupation zoneand later East Germany, denazification was considered a critical element of the transformation into a socialist society, and the country was stricter in opposing Nazism than its counterpart.

    Source

    I would stop here if I were you.

    Edit: don’t worry bro I’m here to humiliate you. I got your back!

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  • [–] 33 points 5 months ago (2 children)

    The two together at the end is the ss lightning bolt. Hitlers gestapo.

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  • [–] 26 points 5 months ago

    Yeah, I get that. But my point is, if they say it's not supposed to have been that, when that's what everyone else sees, what were they trying to represent? Like, ok, Nordic runes are touchy because of the nazis, but there are plenty of reasons to use them. But using that rune twice? Why? Why only that rune? How can you say you didn't mean that? What else could you have been trying to represent?

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  • [–] 11 points 5 months ago

    A nitpick but the Gestapo were just a part of the SS.

    The two main constituent groups were the Allgemeine SS (General SS) and Waffen-SS (Armed SS). The Allgemeine SS was responsible for enforcing the racial policy of Nazi Germany and general policing, whereas the Waffen-SS consisted of the combat units of the SS, with a sworn allegiance to Hitler. A third component of the SS, the SS-Totenkopfverbände (SS-TV; "Death's Head Units"[2]), ran the concentration camps and extermination camps. Additional subdivisions of the SS included the Gestapo and the Sicherheitsdienst (SD) organisations. They were tasked with detecting actual or potential enemies of Nazi Germany, neutralizing the opposition, policing the German people for their commitment to Nazi ideology and providing domestic and foreign intelligence.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schutzstaffel

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  • [–] 42 points 5 months ago

    So they knew it was there and decided not to send it to the market where it would be possibly illegal. This is pretty brazen and I cannot imagine what they are thinking would come from this that would make the reputational impact worthwhile.

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  • [+] 31 points 5 months ago (4 children)
  • [–] 37 points 5 months ago (1 child)

    They didn't use the The Schutzstaffel Nazi symbol in the German mailers because they thought it would violate hate speech laws.

    There was no reason to use 2 of those runes together.

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  • [+] 4 points 5 months ago (1 child)
  • [–] 20 points 5 months ago

    Sadly, that's the point of dog whistling, to have some doubt to whether it was actually innocent.

    With how prevalent dog whistles are in neo-Nazism, it's not surprising that people are sceptical. It's a whole thing to send "subtle" Nazi symbology and then deny everything when called out.

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  • [–] 14 points 5 months ago*

    This needs to be properly adressed and whoever did this and whoever greenlighted it should the full feel consequences.

    All that being said I can not see this being a company wide intention. Just from a business point of view this is so stupid that it beggars believe. Even if the entire company are neo nazis they would know that openly espousing those ideas would result in losing customers and losing partners.

    The big game publishers would not want to be associated with Nazis at least publicly so they might pull games from GoG to stop the reputational damage. Anyone that has at least a functioning brain would stop buying from them until there is a full explenation and proper resolution.

    And considering GoG barely keeps their head above water, they can not afford this at all. Unless the new owner wants to tank the company and sell off the assets.

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  • [–] 11 points 5 months ago
    [–] 45 points 5 months ago (1 child)

    Was willing to buy the “oopsie daisy! The symbols displayed incorrectly” defence, but admitting that they KNEW the issue existed, put two of them side by side, and then doubled down by basically saying “one bad egg shouldn’t spoil a perfectly good rune”, then not sending the offending email to German customers is baffling!

    Time to demand a few refunds I think. Can’t support any justification for promoting fascism.

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  • [–] 9 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

    The fact the game has changed logo and gog decided they'd include the old one stinks.

    This makes the runes in the gog mail feel like a reaction to the devs "going back" on their original iconography and an attempt at fixing it.

    "Oh, you changed your symbol because it was too nazi-like? Let us double down on it."

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  • [–] 50 points 5 months ago (6 children)

    Wow... I really don't buy those excuses...

    They literally admit to seeing the problem before distribution, but instead of just deleting them from the email, they decide to just not include the place where it would get them into the most legal trouble instead?

    Uh... No... That's not an accident anymore. There's no oopsie there.

    Then they go and double down on reddit by giving the excuse that the symbol has been around way longer than it's modern historical use, so we shouldn't stop using it because someone corrupted it?

    No, that's not how it works.

    Things get ruined and they take on new meanings, that includes words and symbols. You don't just get to decide that you're going to take back the symbol of some of the worst evil mankind has known just because it had another meaning before that and then expect everyone to be like, "Oh, alright..." It has a new meaning now. One that everyone recognizes... A meaning that it is blatantly apparent they were aware of beforehand and decided to use anyway.

    Anyone buying that bullshit excuse is an idiot.

    Fuck GoG.

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  • [+] -13 points 5 months ago (5 children)

    Some people still keep the old meaninga going.

    The west hates the Swastika for obvious reasons, but whenever I go to an Indian store there are swastika brand products because it still has its old meaning to Indians.

    First time I went to an Indian coworkers house I stopped dead in my tracks when I approached their door, it was a Hindu special time and they had a giant swatika on the door.

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  • [–] 28 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 child)

    I'll give you that, and the swastika and manji came to mind. I'd originally included in my post the suggestion about going and putting up swastikas and was like, "wait... That's still a thing."

    I get that it's a Norse rune and I recognize the history and heritage in the same way, but in that case maybe just one ᛋ would have sufficed. However, considering someone thought enough to say, "Hey, this is going to be problem in Germany." it would have hurt literally no one to just say, "maybe we just shouldn't do it at all." Deleted. Literally no controversy.

    Instead... here we are.

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  • [–] 3 points 5 months ago (2 children)

    Ok but is this an indian game or using a swastika?

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  • [–] 33 points 5 months ago

    Surprising amount of people here seem to believe the PR bullshit non-apology. You probably think Musk just did a Roman salute too. Pathetic.

    Good to know most people have a brain and are capable of critical thinking to easily see through the bullshit.

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  • [–] 7 points 5 months ago

    Any publicity is good publicity, I guess.

    Game looks quite good. No evidence of any Nazi related stuff in the gameplay, Steam forums etc. That seems entirely to be GOG's doing

    Might buy it at on Steam at 45% off as part of their "women-led games" sale.

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  • [–] 10 points 5 months ago

    Good Old Germany

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  • [–] 17 points 5 months ago (2 children)

    One day I wish we as a collective humanity can reclaim these symbols. Growing up in a Chinese household. I've know the manji as symbol associated with the Buddha, not as a symbol of hate and oppression.

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  • [–] 46 points 5 months ago* (1 child)

    Neither the "Doppelrune" (Doublerune) nor the "Siegrune/Sig-Rune" (Victory rune) are historic runes and were created 1929 by Walther Heck. The "Siegrune" itself wasn't even inspired by the germanic "sowilo" rune (ᛋ), Walther Heck himself stated, that he created it, as he disliked the soft form of the "S" in the latin alphabet and wanted to provide an alternative to the "Fraktur" style that was commonly used in germany at that time.

    This ᛋ is "sowilo/sigel/sol", the germanic rune for sun

    This ϟ is the "Siegrune", created 1929 by Walther Heck as an alternative to the letter "S" and was used by the Nazis

    This ϟϟ is the "Doppelrune", also a creation by Walther Heck and used as a symbol for the SS

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  • [–] 18 points 5 months ago (1 child)
  • [–] 2 points 5 months ago

    What's the game btw

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  • [–] [M] 5 points 5 months ago*

    Comments have gone off the rails.

    Locking this down

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  • [–] -2 points 5 months ago (2 children)

    where are all the people that were attacking valve yesterday? c'mon guys! GOG is the best, right??

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  • [–] -1 points 5 months ago* (1 child)

    But on GOG, you actually own your games! Well, you don't, but you can download the files and run the game without the launcher! Well, you also can on Steam and EGS, but... uhhh... whatever, Valve is a monopoly, this is why you should buy from GOG and not any other major competitor to the monopoly like EGS, Ubisoft Connect, BattleNet, itch, Xbox Store, Amazon...

    GOG is a meme service, and its fanboys are even more annoying than Valve's simply because their platform of choice is objectively worse. At least no one defends EGS or Ubisoft Connect.

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  • [–] 3 points 5 months ago

    I for one complain about both platforms for subtly different reasons!

    Now I've got one more with gog, I guess.

    Other than the rare direct purchase, where are folks getting their games anyway? Zoomplatform??

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  • [+] -16 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (7 children)
  • [–] 22 points 5 months ago (6 children)

    Oh look an ml account repeating the Ukraine nazi Russian propaganda talking point. How surprising.

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  • [–] -5 points 5 months ago (5 children)

    Til the new York times is now Russian propaganda...

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  • [–] 3 points 5 months ago (3 children)

    Utterly aside from the general content of this thread.

    I know nothing of the pieces printed or their leanings, nor is it relevant for the purposes of this response.

    That argument is the weakest of sauces, drizzled over a disappointing bad-faith steak.

    A single article doesn't define a whole paper (nor was that claimed).

    A papers' reputation doesn't give them a free pass for printing something outside of their normal editorial quality control.

    Argue the actual claims, this bad faith deflection bullshit is fooling no-one.

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  • [–] 1 point 5 months ago (2 children)

    Oh look an ml account repeating the Ukraine nazi Russian propaganda talking point. How surprising.

    When this is the claim being replied to, forgive me and anyone else from not giving it any graces. Especially when it is starting with as you say

    That argument is the weakest of sauces, drizzled over a disappointing bad-faith steak.

    Especially when a user is literally calling what the leader of Ukraine did last week Russian propaganda.

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  • [–] 0 points 5 months ago (1 child)

    They came in hot, you go at it, zero problems with that from me.

    All I meant is that you should go at it with actual arguments.

    Even if they are objectively incorrect, responding with deflection and fallacy makes your position look weak, like you don't have an actual point.

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  • [–] 2 points 5 months ago

    My point is there isn't an argument to be made. We're in a games thread about how gog is out downplaying nazi symbols just as a Ukrainian nazi collaborator got state honors and that is called Russian propaganda.

    How are we in a place where nazis aren't ostracized

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  • [+] -24 points 5 months ago (6 children)

    I got that email. Symbols verbatim

    𖥞 ꥟ ϟϟ

    Let's look those up.

    • 𖥞

      BAMUM LETTER PHASE-D MVOP

      not a germanic rune

    • ꥟

      REJANG SECTION MARK

      not a germanic rune

    • ϟ

      GREEK SMALL LETTER KOPPA

      not a germanic rune

    0/3 germanic/nazi runes. They resemble if you willfully go there.

    verdict: reaction bait for reddit-grade pearl clutchers

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  • [–] 11 points 5 months ago

    This explanation falls apart when it comes to the SS symbol.

    Gog claims that they were using the sowilo rune, but as you found they were using the lower case koppa letter. The sowilo rune is included in unicode, there was no reason to use the greek letter koppa for it ... unless they wanted to hint at something else. And the elephant in the room: why did they put 2 of the things next to eachother? Gog hasn't found a suitable excuse for that so far.

    It's an obvious dog whistle and it's rightfully being called out.

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  • [+] -8 points 5 months ago (2 children)
  • [+] -31 points 5 months ago (13 children)

    So nobody here wants to actually read the article where it was very clearly explained that this was a rendering error of a different symbol on some devices?

    Y'all just really, really wanna be mad, huh?

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  • [–] [S, A] 39 points 5 months ago* (5 children)

    We all did, we also read the other messages and saw through the flimsy excuse provided.

    Please do tell us why putting two Greek Koppa together was necessary, and how it relates to Polish cultural history. Why they realised that it appeared Nazi related, and instead of simply not doing it decided to only not do it in Germany.

    Y’ou just really, really wanna downplay this, huh?

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  • [+] -34 points 5 months ago (4 children)

    Lol, no, I'm just here to laugh at everyone malding about what is very clearly an innocent mistake.

    Seriously, this is Tankie Triad levels of conspiracism, y'all.

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  • [–] 18 points 5 months ago (5 children)

    The Schutzstaffel is purely a Nazi symbol.

    There was no reason to use 2 of those runes together, especially when not using it in German mailers because they thought it would violate hate speech laws.

    Either you are trying to gaslight people into thinking that ᛋᛋ is not a symbol of hate and genocide, or you are extremely ignorant.

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  • [+] -8 points 5 months ago (2 children)

    Did you read the article? It's not Schutzstaffel.

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  • They didn't even use the rune though. They didn't use the sowilo rune ᛋ but the koppa symbol ϟ because it looks more like the sig rune. If they actually meant to use the sowilo rune they would have and also why make a doppelrune? This is nazi shit.

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  • [+] -13 points 5 months ago

    Just think they're ukrainian, then it's OK

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