#Nightshade protects corporate interests

[seriously-mike]

Nightshade, Corporate Greed, Model Collapse and You

I just realized another reason why Nightshade is useless against corporate AI models. Turns out that cooking chili stimulates the brain well enough to make me recall some interesting if obscure things unrelated to the process of cooking:

I did explain what data pollution and model collapse are, long ago. If you feed an AI enough of its own output, it's gonna come apart. How does Nightshade work, in practice? By turning your picture into StableDiffusion output, essentially running a low-denoise I2I on it (which will take a fuckton of time and computing power you most probably don't have). To you, the image looks like your image. To Stable Diffusion, and Stable Diffusion only, it contains barely noticeable noise data of an entirely different image.

BUT.

What the smell of freshly cooked chili made me remember was something called OpenNiji.

Last year, the sweaty nerds tinkering with Stable Diffusion had the undoubtedly bright idea to panty-raid Midjourney and yoink no less than one hundred thousand anime-style pics generated by Midjourney's data model NijiJourney. One would assume (like I did) that building a data model from AI-generated pics would be an enterprise doomed to fail because of model collapse, right?

LOL, wrong. That thing not only works, but got updated with even more images yoinked from Midjourney, and another, even bigger model was built for the beefier SDXL algorithm, still working fine as ever. Meaning, whatever noise Midjourney left behind is completely transparent and harmless to Stable Diffusion, and it's logical to assume the same is true the other way around.

What does it mean to you?

Well, uh, it means that...

Your art will be stolen, ground into mathemagical fairy dust and poured into the pit where schmucks can wallow in it and stick it together into crude kitsch for $10 a month, and the owner of the pit will once again make a cool $250 mil or more this year. Lovely, right?

[fragile-practice]

Week in Review

October 23rd-29th

Welcome to Fragile Practice, where I attempt to make something of value out of stuff I have to read.

My future plan is to do longer-form original pieces on interesting topics or trends. For now, I'm going to make the weekly reviews habitual and see if I have any time left.

Technology

OpenAI forms team to study ‘catastrophic’ AI risks, including nuclear threats - Tech Crunch; Kyle Wiggers

OpenAI launched a new research team called AI Safety and Security to investigate the potential harms of artificial intelligence focused on AI alignment, AI robustness, AI governance, and AI ethics.

Note: Same energy as “cigarette company funds medical research into smoking risks”.

Artists Allege Meta’s AI Data Deletion Request Process Is a ‘Fake PR Stunt’ - Wired; Kate Knibbs

Artists who participated in Meta’s Artificial Intelligence Artist Residency Program accused the company of failing to honor their data deletion requests and claim that Meta used their personal data to train its AI models without their consent.

Note: Someday we will stop being surprised that corporate activities without obvious profit motive are all fake PR stunts.

GM and Honda ditch plan to build cheaper electric vehicles - The Verge; Andrew J. Hawkins

General Motors and Honda cancel their joint venture to develop and produce cheaper electric vehicles for the US market, citing the chip shortage, rising costs of battery materials, and the changing market conditions.

Note: What are the odds this isn’t related to the 7 billion dollars the US government announced to create hydrogen hubs.

'AI divide' across the US leaves economists concerned - The Register; Thomas Claburn

A new study by economists from Harvard University and MIT reveals a significant gap in AI adoption and innovation across different regions in the US.

The study finds that AI usage is highest in California's Silicon Valley and the San Francisco Bay Area, but was also noted in Nashville, San Antonio, Las Vegas, New Orleans, San Diego, and Tampa, as well as Riverside, Louisville, Columbus, Austin, and Atlanta.

Nvidia to Challenge Intel With Arm-Based Processors for PCs - Bloomberg; Ian King

Nvidia is using Arm technology to develop CPUs that would challenge Intel processors in PCs, and which could go on sale as soon as 2025.

Note: I am far from an NVIDIA fan, but I’m stoked for any amount of new competition in the CPU space.

New tool lets artists fight AI image bots by hiding corrupt data in plain sight - Engadget; Sarah Fielding

A team at the University of Chicago created Nightshade, a tool that lets artists fight AI image bots by adding undetectable pixels into an image that can alter how a machine-learning model produces content and what that finished product looks like.

Nightshade is intended to protect artists work and has been tested on both Stable Diffusion and an in-house AI built by the researchers.

IBM's NorthPole chip runs AI-based image recognition 22 times faster than current chips - Tech Xplore; Bob Yirka

NorthPole combines the processing module and the data it uses in a two-dimensional array of memory blocks and interconnected CPUs, and is reportedly inspired by the human brain.

NorthPole can currently only run specialized AI processes and not training processes or large language models, but the researchers plan to test connecting multiple chips together to overcome this limitation.

Apple’s $130 Thunderbolt 4 cable could be worth it, as seen in X-ray CT scans - Ars Technica; Kevin Purdy

Note: These scans are super cool. And make me feel somewhat better about insisting on quality cables. A+.

The Shifting Web

On-by-default video calls come to X, disable to retain your sanity - The Register; Brandon Vigliarolo

Video and audio calling is limited to anyone you follow or who is in your address book, if you granted X permission to comb through it.

Calling other users also requires that they’ve sent at least one direct message to you before.

Only premium users can place calls, but everyone can receive them.

Google Search Boss Says Company Invests to Avoid Becoming ‘Roadkill’ - The New York Times; Nico Grant

Google’s senior vice president overseeing search said that he sees a world of threats that could humble his company at any moment.

Google Maps is getting new AI-powered search updates, an enhanced navigation interface and more - Tech Crunch; Aisha Malik

Note: These AI recommender systems are going to be incredibly valuable advertising space. It is interesting that Apple decided to compete with Google in maps but not in basic search, but has so far not placed ads in the search results.

Reddit finally takes its API war where it belongs: to AI companies - Ars Technica; Scharon Harding

Reddit met with generative AI companies to negotiate a deal for being paid for its data, and may block crawlers if no deal is made soon.

Note: Google searches for info on Reddit often seem more effective than searching Reddit itself.  If they are unable to make a deal, and Reddit follows through, it will be a legitimate loss for discoverability but also an incredibly interesting experiment to see what Reddit is like without Google.

Bandcamp’s Entire Union Bargaining Team Was Laid Off - 404 Media; Emanuel Maiberg

Bandcamp’s new owner (Songtradr) offered jobs to just half of existing employees, with cuts disproportionately hitting union leaders. Every member of the union’s eight-person bargaining team was laid off, and 40 of the union's 67 members lost their jobs.

Songtradr spokesperson Lindsay Nahmiache claimed that the firm didn’t have access to union membership information.

Note: This just sucks. Bandcamp is rad, and it’s hard to imagine it continuing to be rad after this. I wonder if Epic had ideas for BC that didn’t work out.

Surveillance & Digital Privacy

Mozilla Launches Annual Digital Privacy 'Creep-o-Meter'. This Year's Status:  'Very Creepy' - Slashdot

Mozilla gave the current state of digital privacy a 75.6/100, with 100 being the creepiest.

They measured security features, data collection, and data sharing practices of over 500 gadgets, apps, and cars to come up with their score.

Every car Mozilla tested failed to meet their privacy and security standards.

Note: It would be great if even one auto brand would take privacy seriously.

EPIC Testifies in Support of Massachusetts Data Privacy and Protection Act -Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC)

Massachusetts version of ADPPA.

Note: While it may warm my dead heart to see any online privacy protections in law, scrambling to do so in response to generative AI is unlikely to protect Americans in any meaningful way from the surveillance driven form of capitalism we’ve all been living under for decades.

Complex Spy Platform StripedFly Bites 1M Victims - Dark Reading

StripedFly is a complex platform disguised as a cryptominer and evaded detection for six years by using a custom version of EternalBlue exploit, a built-in Tor network tunnel, and trusted services like GitLab, GitHub, and Bitbucket to communicate with C2 servers and update its functionality.

iPhones have been exposing your unique MAC despite Apple's promises otherwise - Ars Technica

A privacy feature which claimed to hide the Wi-Fi MAC address of iOS devices when joining a network was broken since iOS 14, and was finally patched in 17.1, released on Wednesday.

Note: I imagine this bug was reported a while ago, but wasn’t publically reported until the fix was released as a term of apple’s bug bounty program.

What the !#@% is a Passkey? - Electronic Frontier Foundation

Note: I welcome our passkey overlords.

[echotrinityme]

Original Characters I have.

My ocs part 1

Name: Nathaniel Manson

Gender: Male

Character's Nickname: Nate, Negative

Sexual Orientation: Pansexual

Birthday: December 15

Age: 33

Height: 6'4"

Eye color: Brown

Personality: He's consider the "dad" in the group, he's also the oldest of the group. He's also one of the few in the group with a realistic mindset, while he does have his best friends' interests at heart, he's not shy to call them out on their misguided attempts at life. He's also a heir to a family owned corporation. He loves to drink tea, doesn't matter what kind. He also used to be a cult leader when he was in his early 20s, he regretted deeply and doesn't like to remember his past.

Distinguishing Marks: None

Hair Color: Brown

Length of Hair: Medium Long

How does he appear: He looks like he's in late 20s

Skin tone: Pale

Name: Shadow Wolfe

Gender: Male

Character's nickname: Smoke

Sexual Orientation: Bisexual

Birthday: January 19

Age: 32

Height: 6'3"

Eye color: Grey

Hair Color: Black with grey highlights but he's not old.

Hair Length: Long.

Personality: Shadow is a bold, brash man. He can be egotistical, competitive, tough, and a little short tempered. But for all his flaws, he can be loyal, a good friend, and can protect his friends. Overall he's a good person with flaws. He plays sports mostly soccer and volleyball. He secretly loves to read adventure novels, loves naps, and can be lazy at times.

How old does he appear: He's supposed to look like in his early thirties but he actually looks like he's in his 20s.

Skin tone: Pale like a vampire but he isn't one.

Distinguishing Marks: He has a scar over his left eye and how he got that I will explain later.

Name: Desmodeus Darkwell

Age: 31

Species: Half-Vampire

Character's nickname(s): Dakota, Demise, and Nightshade (only by his husband.)

Sexual Orientation: Gay

Birthday: March 27

Eye color: Grey when calm, Red when angry, Blue when sad, and yellow when being happy which is rare.

Hair Color: Black with white bangs.

Hair length: Short, 80s goth style.

Height: 6'6"

Personality: He may look intimidating but in reality he's nice and gentle. He's shy, introverted, has a talent for art, loves horror stuff, and loves cats. However, he has a hidden dark side that he makes sure no one knows. He's the youngest of 5 brothers, he has a favorite brother; Brendan Darkwell.  And...he has a controversial relationship with third brother; Corbin Darkwell. He can eat human food and drink blood to survive. He and his husband have a loving relationship and a healthy sex life. He's insanely good at video games.

How old he appears: Since he's half vampire, he looks younger than he looks.

Skin tone: Pale

Distinguishing Marks: None

Name: Samuel Diaz

Age: 30

Gender: Male

Character's nickname: Scream, Sam

Sexual Orientation: Gay

Birthday: April 6

Eye color: Brown

Hair Color: Black with green highlights.

Hair Length: Medium short and shaggy.

Height: 6'2"

Personality: Sam is decently laid back in personality and not much really gets under his skin. He rarely gets angry but if he does, he gets scary but not as scary as Dakota. He loves sports especially track and soccer. He plays soccer with Shadow whom he always beat, he loves food and no matter how much he eats, he will always stay skinny. He's also a major geek, he likes comics, anime, video games, etc. He and Dakota sometimes have a games day. Sam dated Dakota and for a prank, they got married. Are they still married? No.

Skin Tone: Dark, Tan.

How old he appears: He looks like he's in early 20s but he is actually 30 years old.

Glasses/Contacts: He wears special sunglasses cause he's suffering an eye disease.

Distinguishing Marks: None.

A/N: Hey, guys I’m planning making original stories with these ocs. Don’t worry, I will still be doing Henry Stickmin fanfiction. I just want to try out putting my original stuff. 

[seriously-mike]

Hey retards, once again I would like to remind you that, by design, Glaze and Nightshade don't work on Midjourney and DALL-E.

Meaning, you're glazing, nightshading, buttering and dilating your assholes just so Midjourney and Microsoft can fuck you again, and again, and again.

Come on, rub those two brain cells together: who benefits from software that targets only one AI generation algorithm, curiously the one that is open source and brings no profits? No, not you. The answer is: the competing corporations that make a shitload of money from selling tickets to their art theft shitshow and would prefer to be the only game in town.

You're, as I said before, pissing on the candle while your house burns.

Good news, fellow artists! Nightshade has finally been released by the UChicago team! If you aren't aware of what Nightshade is, it's a tool that helps poison AI datasets so that the model "sees" something different from what an image actually depicts. It's the same team that released Glaze, which helps protect art against style mimicry (aka those finetuned models that try to rip off a specific artist). As they show in their paper, even a hundred poisoned concepts make a huge difference.

(Reminder that glazing your art is more important than nighshading it, as they mention in their tweets above, so when you're uploading your art, try to glaze it at the very least.)

[neveroutoftime]

No Questions Asked

Hey guys! Here’s a bit a sneak peak of the fic I wrote for the @artemis-fowl-zine: A Fowl Mood.

Phhtt… Phhtt…  

It was not the force, but rather the shock of the impact that knocked Trouble a couple of steps forward, his right foot landing in the stream of water that branched off from the nearby river.  “D’arvit,” He swore under his breath, feeling the water seep into his boot. He looked up into the trees, searching for his attacker, but there was no sign of Julius Root anywhere.

As he sloshed over to a rock to empty out the water, Corporal Kelp mused over his next course of action. He’d just been tagged twice and there wasn’t any sort of warning. If he kept on going at this rate, he would surely fail the initiation.

“You tag me before I tag you, and you’re in. No questions asked.” He muttered, getting to his feet. “So much for that now.” Trouble shook his head and rolled up the sleeves of his traffic uniform; suddenly he was very thankful for Haven’s controlled climate. He was not prepared for the humidity of the Amazon rainforest, but there he was, drowning in sweat with no way to cool off unless he either stripped or went for a swim in the river. Trouble wasn’t fond of either of those options, so he opted to deal with being hot.

“Raaah raaah raaah!”

Trouble jerked his head up just in time to see a scarlet macaw take off out of the tree above him. The bird had startled him a bit, snapping him out of his sulking. Right. If he was going to make it into Recon, there was no time for lollygagging. He had to move.

“And I still got tagged six more times after that…” Trouble muttered, scrolling through his emails as he looked for one in particular. He really needed to sort through these things and get rid of all the junk. He swore that half of them had to be complaints from his brother or Foaly asking for a raise for a new project. As much as he’d like to do that, he had a limited budget that the Council had given him, and most of that was being put into getting new equipment for his officers. It had been three years since the Crash and they were still recovering, though recently things were finally looking up for the LEP and for the People in general.

They had rebuilt, both in the physical sense and as a community, and Haven was thriving. A peace lingered around them now that Koboi was gone. It was a weird feeling, but it was honestly a relief. Sure, there was still crime and the typical commotion that came from living in a busy city, but that didn’t compare to the sense of impending doom that came along with having psychotic villains on the loose. Sometimes, Trouble had fears that one day they would have to deal with another catastrophe. That one morning he’d wake up to find that the lives of every fairy in Haven were at risk. He didn’t want that to happen again. Especially not while he was Commander; he’d had enough of that for one lifetime. But it was his duty to protect the People. If he was charged with stopping another fairy like Koboi, he would lay down his life in a heartbeat if it meant that Haven would remain safe.

Trouble sighed in relief as he found the email he was looking for, the one with the names of the new Recon recruits and the location of that afternoon’s initiation. He opened it up to look at the names once more, when there was a single knock on the door. He didn’t respond, so the officer went ahead and let themselves in.

“Hey Trubs, you ready to go? The recruits are in the hall. But I’m going to assume you knew that and you’re definitely not procrastinating. Come on, time to be professional.”

He barely glanced up from the screen. “And they all just heard you call me ‘Trubs’. Who’s the professional one now, Captain Short?”

Holly rolled her eyes and leaned over his desk, firmly placing her hands on it. "Well Trubs, I suggest you get a move on then. Don't want them getting too cocky." She winked a bit. "And may I say, we've got a great looking group out there. Ol’ Beetroot would be proud, I think. Maybe a bit worked up, but overall he'd be a fan of the progress."

Trouble snorted as he stood from his desk. "They aren't in Recon yet, Holly. Though I will admit that this group does have the potential. Let’s just hope that these ladies don't break any rules today." He nudged his co-worker with his elbow as he walked to the door.

Holly smirked, following after him. "Well, as long as a criminally insane elf armed with two goons and Tunnel Blue Spiders doesn’t attack us, I’d say there would be no reason to break any rules.”

Commander Kelp finally cracked a smile and laughed at his friend. “I suppose you’re right, but that’s never stopped you.” He teased, stepping out into the hallway where six corporals stood waiting. They all snapped to attention as Trouble called out their names.

Fern Nightshade. Mira Rowan. Aspen Bixby. Zinnia Maddox. Phoenix Terra. Maia Ember. Two elves, two sprites, a dwarf, and a pixie. An interesting little group for sure, but all of the young women were confident, had top marks in the Academy, and were of course a bit cocky as a lot of initiates were. Trouble had high hopes for them, but that by no means meant that he would be going easy on them. He’d learned quite a few tricks from the late Commander Root and these youngsters were about to find out exactly what he could do. He’d heard the rumors. Commander Kelp was going soft. He was too… easy. Trouble was no trouble was one he’d caught wind of lately. He thought it was cute, honestly, that the youngsters thought he was losing his game. He’d set the record straight during the initiation, that much was certain.

Trouble and Holly lead the little group down to the E1 shuttle port, where they had a shuttle loaded up and ready for the journey up to the surface. Holly began pricking each recruits finger, explaining how it was important to be prepared for any possible situation while up on the surface.

“As I was told at my initiation, there might be a time when you find yourself out of magic and stuck on the surface.” Holly smiled reassuringly at Corporal Terra; the dwarf was gritting her teeth, not from pain, but anxiety. “During the initiation, we’ll be evaluating on how well you make use of the rest of your skills.”

“Well, you certainly know a lot about that don’t you, Captain? How many times have you been on a mission and ran out of magic?” Trouble said, smirking as he pulled down the paintball guns from their racks, handing one to each of the six recruits. He sidestepped to avoid a well-aimed punch, but even then, it slightly clipped his shoulder.

[the-prophet-lemonade]

Hi, it's me!💍I've been rereading everything in anticipation of chapter 10, like I promised, and I was wondering about everyone's super names. In universe, I assume the vigilantes picked their own names, but what about the Idris supers? And how long did it take you to come up with theirs, what made you decide on certain names? Did you end up going back to change any halfway through writing?

hello darling !!!!! i’m very excited about chapter 10, i think it’s gonna be a good one :D

the super names were probably the very first thing i came up with after i’d decided on my concept ... so, they all came long before the plot and i don’t think they changed very much after i settled on them - but a lot of thought went into most of them so i’m happy to explain!

alec | sentinel: i wanted to pick something stoic and powerful for alec, but something that reflected his presence and his willingness to watch over people from above. the name represents his protectiveness and his enduring nature, reflects his role as a soldier and a guard, and also has angelic connotations (to tie into sh canon and/or jace being arkangel) ... lastly, the word sentinel also ties into a particular line from javert’s solo (”stars”) in les miserables that he sings on a rooftop edge in the movie and that is a Very Relevant song ok, you should look up the lyrics

magnus | nightlock: i went back and forth on a couple ideas for magnus’ name, but i wanted something magical and colourful and magician-esque for him. in my mind, nightlock is a portmanteau of “deadly nightshade” and “warlock” (although the “-lock” suffix could also come from “hemlock”) . deadly nightshade is obviously very dangerous and poisonous, and causes delirium and hallucinations (which is reflected in magnus’ ability to manipulate the world around him), but the main symbolism i wanted from it is the flower’s colour - that very deep, plutonic purple matches very well with the fic aesthetic. in addition, a little historical relevance: socrates was executed through consumption of hemlock for “questioning the gods” and entertaining ideas of political insurgency and the pursuit of justice so that’s ... also very relevant.

jace | arkangel: this was the first name i settled on for jace and liked it a lot, so stuck with it. it has heavenly and angelic connotations (obviously) and is a name imbued with a great deal of omniscient power (representative of jace’s op abilities) and some golden colour symbolism too. i chose the “ark” spelling rather than “arch” because i liked the harder consonant sound, it works better for jace’s personality. also, jace can fly lol 

clary | muse: clary was the one i went back and forth on a lot when i was picking her alias ... originally, she was going to have fire elemental powers like johnathan, but i decided against it, because pyrokinesis is a very violent and erratic power, and whilst clary is unpredictable and scrappy, i don’t think she’s intentionally destructive. i think her artistic manifestation suits her well and is a very adaptive ability, which matches her personality better. aNYWAY the other names i considered for her were “firestorm”, “sunfire”, and “athena” but i went with muse to match her powers. also, it’s a single syllable so sounds better in tandem with arkangel (three syllables) considering they’re often mentioned together in the text and i think lots about rhythm and sounds!

simon | 8-bit: i wanted something super geeky and given the time period, the snes and the gameboy had just been released by nintendo, so nintendocore and 8bit music was becoming a thing! plus, as simon is a technopath, i wanted a name to both represent his powers and represent simon’s playfulness and naivety when it comes to superhero business hahaha my alternative choices for simon were “cyber”, “shockwave”, and “electro” but those were all too boring

luke | wolfsbane: i considered “sabretooth” for luke but there’s a pretty well-known xmen hero by that name, so i went with wolfsbane. again, wolfsbane is the name of a poisonous dark purple plant (like nightshade), so there’s a direct link to magnus there, which is highly relevant as the two of them have history and used to be vigilante partners in the 1980s (which we haven’t yet uncovered in the fic). there’s also another member of the xmen called wolfsbane who, funnily enough, can turn into a werewolf, much like luke haha

maia | veil: this is another one i chose instantly and has everything to do with maia’s powers. now, maia as a person is pretty abrasive and unforgiving and unapologetic and doesn’t hesitate to get physical if need be (e.g. punching jace that one time lmfao), so i wanted to give her a power the exact opposite of this feisty outward persona. i think maia is an intensely vulnerable person who puts up a lot of walls and thick skin around her heart to protect herself and hide her feelings, so i wanted her to have a power that was cerebral, but also one that tied into this vulnerability and her unwillingness to let people see her real self. so, that’s why she can manipulate illusions, and that’s why her alias is veil. 

catarina | witchlight: i don’t know if this one has been said outright in the fic yet, but it’s in between the lines if you read close enough! we’ll get a bit of cat in the upcoming ch 10, but magnus/nightlock has already mentioned her both by name and alias in past chapters. cat’s powers are healing magic (surprise surprise) and her name comes from a type of crystal that glows in the hands of good-intentioned and good-hearted people ... very much in-line with the phial of galadriel/light of earendil from lord of the rings if i’m honest (and a giant nerd) ... witchlight as a stone is also found in sh canon! in addition, witchlight has this great simultaneous feeling of antithesis and parallelism to “nightlock” and i don’t really know why but they sound good together! there’s a sense of balance between their names, don’t you think?

dot | salem: another one like cat, you’ll have to look between the lines for this one, but she’ll be cropping up a bit more and has a very crucial role to play in a later chapter. this matches cat’s witch motif but with darker connotations (reflective of dot’s superpowers) when taken in the context of the salem witch trials and therefore has links to the fic’s themes of persecution. however, the biblical connotations of the name “salem” are to do with peace, so that’s nice.

lydia | apex: this one is very literal - the apex of something is the pinnacle, the top, the best. lydia is one of idris’ best supers and her power is super strength, so go figure

valentine | silver tongue: we haven’t seen valentine use her powers of persuasion yet, and they’ve only been hinted at (and it seems that johnathan is doing most of the grunt work, golly gosh i wonder why that is and what it means and whether it matters for a later part of the plot ... hmm). this one’s pretty straightforward too though: someone with a silver tongue is someone who is eloquent and persuasive at speaking, and valentine is known to be a good orator as we know. honestly though i just think of that simpson’s episode where lisa finds out jebediah springfield has a silver tongue and that has nOTHING to do with this so idk why i brought it up lmfao

there are of course a few others: ragnor, aline, helen, raj, and victor, but i haven’t named them ... i think aline has electrical/lightning powers, and raj can teleport, but i don’t think i settled on what helen and victor can do, so i just didn’t bother mentioning their aliases. izzy and raphael (yet to appear) are also supers but don’t have code names ... and i’m also curious what maryse and robert’s powers and aliases might be! there’s also sebastian/johnathan who does have an alias but it hasn’t been revealed in the story yet so ... no spoilers!

your note about idris supers is interesting and honestly i hadn’t considered it ... i imagine idris supers do get to pick their aliases but they’d have to be ‘corporate-approved’ by higher ups. lydia (apex) and alec (sentinel) both have very strong and powerful names, whilst clary (muse) matches her powers, and jace (arkangel) is an odd one because the name reflects his wings rather than his adoptive muscle memory, and obviously he’s been a super longer than he’s had his wings so i guess that’s just a plothole hahahaha (maybe he had a different super name before he got his wings and much to alec and izzy’s annoyance, decided to change his name after he got his new gear? who knows)

[seriously-mike]

Allow me:

I would like to remind you that, by design, Glaze and Nightshade don’t work on Midjourney and DALL-E.

Meaning, you’re glazing, nightshading, buttering and dilating your assholes just so Midjourney and Microsoft can fuck you again, and again, and again.

And in case you missed it, the "stock" image in the article was generated using DALL-E 3, owned by the very same Microsoft that told Disney to fuck off after getting caught with Pixar's poster art in their database. Which illustrates my point perfectly.

Good.

[howtoloseweightfastsafely]

Nutrition Basics for Fast Pain Relief (and Weight Loss)

1. Spend the first 30 days grain/wheat-free, dairy-free, and gluten-free.

a. That means no bread, no pasta, no milk, and obviously no cookies you Cookie Monster, you. And, of course, no added sugar (2 pieces of fruit is OK).

b. Restrictive? Yes.

c. Effective? Absolutely

2. Eat the following:

a. Meats/fish (fattier, grass-fed/wild-caught versions to nourish the body with clean, healthy fats and quality proteins)

b. Veggies (excluding starchy ones like corn, peas, and carrots)

c. Olive oil (for dressings, or to add post-cooking) (don't use for most cooking, since it goes bad under high heat)

d. Extra-virgin coconut oil (for medium/high heat cooking)

e. Eat until you are satisfied. Don't worry about eating too much - trust me, it's hard to overeat when you're chewing on nutrient-dense protein for example, as opposed to inhaling a red velvet cupcake

3. BIG ONE for pain relief: Avoid nightshades.

a. These include some fairly well-known veggies and spices that come from the Solanaceae family, such as:

i. Potatoes, eggplant, tomatoes, peppers, paprika, Tabasco sauce, and more (sweet potatoes and black pepper are not nightshades)

b. The steroid alkaloids (one of 4 alkaloids) in nightshades, which include solanine, are the main offenders.

c. They are naturally-produced toxic substances that help the plants defend against insects, diseases and other predators.

i. These are very similar to lectins binding to glucosamine and penetrating our cell walls, as discussed in Chapter 11.

d. These alkaloids are thought to cause calcium loss in the bones, and excess calcium deposits in soft tissue.

i. As a result, there may be a significant pro-inflammatory response in the body

e. To avoid this pro-inflammatory response, if you have osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, gout, or any form of joint pain, it is wise to cut these foods OUT for 30 days.

i. See how the body responds. Assess the damage (or lack thereof) and continue forward.

4. During the 30 days of this eating plan, you will be removing most food-based chemicals and allergens from your diet.

a. Many annoying health issues, including muscle and joint pain, aches, and stiffness, will seriously reduce significantly.

b. I'm not kidding, it's that simple. Food has a profound effect on pain, much more so than is commonly understood.

5. After the first 30 days, you can slowly experiment with adding foods back into your diet, and seeing how your body, skin, pain conditions, and mind react.

a. This process has been ESSENTIAL in helping me determine what I can and cannot eat for optimal health.

b. Only add in ONE FOOD per week. If you add more than 1 food and notice adverse reactions, you won't know which food is the troublesome one.

6. If you just can't fathom giving up regular milk, try Coconut and/or Almond Milk as an alternative (but no soy milk!).

a. Dairy is pro-inflammatory for many people but not so much for others. So, experiment with adding back it back into your diet after 30 days.

7. As for carbs: In the first 30 days, avoid them altogether (except for those from veggies and about 2 pieces of fruit).

a. After the 30 days, you can start experimenting with rice to see how joint pain and other health indicators (body fat, skin quality, etc.) respond.

b. Week by week, slowly add in other gluten-free, wheat-free carbs. Try sweet potatoes, quinoa, buckwheat, and millet.

c. You can try oatmeal and beans too, but they tend to be problematic unless properly soaked, sprouted and fermented.

d. Only if you are somewhat lean (under 20% body fat for men, 25% or so for women) AND training intensely, include white rice, sweet potatoes and/or yams during your post-workout meal. (For maximal pain reduction, though, I would still eliminate them for 30 days unless you absolutely cannot function without, due to your training load.)

Sound good?

Good.

Oh yeah, there's one more HUGE thing.

The Last and Most Important Points:

Adopting patience and acceptance

1. The lifestyle habits you've developed over the years got you to where you are right now.

True, we've been lied to by mass media and big corporations, but we've also played a part in our condition. It is what it is. Accept this and move on.

2. You now have a solution. It is up to you to implement it into your life. During this process, it will be difficult, but absolutely crucial to have dedication, discipline, and most importantly, patience.

To be completely honest, I spent 22 years eating junk, not exercising correctly, and not nourishing my body well. It would be ridiculous of me to simply expect the effects of this to all disappear overnight.

And you shouldn't either.

But, you are guaranteed to have lots of quick, early success including significant pain relief and much more.

These results will happen as long as the plan is followed correctly, at least 90% of the time (for example, no more than 2 cheat meals or 'screw-ups' at most per week, out of 21 total meals).

FYI, in regards to pain conditions, you will feel it after a cheat meal.

The rush of refined grains, unhealthy oils, and more take an immediate toll on promoting inflammation and joint pain. So, I would definitely try my best to eat as 'clean' as possible, even for cheats. Try some home cooked rice, butter, and chicken with some paleo brownies, as opposed to ordering a deep dish, Meat Lover's pizza.

With all this being said:

Beyond the early successes, for most people, there is more work to be done in pursuit of the body, mind, and life you want. Practice acceptance, have dedication, and give it time.

And moving on, read the '6 Weeks to Lean' Exercise Guide, which includes a quite detailed section of reducing pain through foam rolling (self-myofascial release) and stretching.

So if you're not quite in workout-ready shape yet, you can at least get a jumpstart on relieving pain and feeling better!

 Interested in losing weight? Then click below to see the exact steps I took to lose weight and keep it off for good...

Read the previous article about "How To Lose Weight Fast If You're in Chronic Pain"

Read the next article about "How To Track Results (And Not Fall Into the Trap That Ruins 95% of Well-Thought Out Diets)"

Moving forward, there are several other articles/topics I'll share so you can lose weight even faster, and feel great doing it.

Below is a list of these topics and you can use this Table of Contents to jump to the part that interests you the most.

Topic 1: How I Lost 30 Pounds In 90 Days - And How You Can Too

Topic 2: How I Lost Weight By Not Following The Mainstream Media And Health Guru's Advice - Why The Health Industry Is Broken And How We Can Fix It

Topic 3: The #1 Ridiculous Diet Myth Pushed By 95% Of Doctors And "experts" That Is Keeping You From The Body Of Your Dreams

Topic 4: The Dangers of Low-Carb and Other "No Calorie Counting" Diets

Topic 5: Why Red Meat May Be Good For You And Eggs Won't Kill You

Topic 6: Two Critical Hormones That Are Quietly Making Americans Sicker and Heavier Than Ever Before

Topic 7: Everything Popular Is Wrong: The Real Key To Long-Term Weight Loss

Topic 8: Why That New Miracle Diet Isn't So Much of a Miracle After All (And Why You're Guaranteed To Hate Yourself On It Sooner or Later)

Topic 9: A Nutrition Crash Course To Build A Healthy Body and Happy Mind

Topic 10: How Much You Really Need To Eat For Steady Fat Loss (The Truth About Calories and Macronutrients)

Topic 11: The Easy Way To Determining Your Calorie Intake

Topic 12: Calculating A Weight Loss Deficit

Topic 13: How To Determine Your Optimal "Macros" (And How The Skinny On The 3-Phase Extreme Fat Loss Formula)

Topic 14: Two Dangerous "Invisible Thorn" Foods Masquerading as "Heart Healthy Super Nutrients"

Topic 15: The Truth About Whole Grains And Beans: What Traditional Cultures Know About These So-called "Healthy Foods" That Most Americans Don't

Topic 16: The Inflammation-Reducing, Immune-Fortifying Secret of All Long-Living Cultures (This 3-Step Process Can Reduce Chronic Pain and Heal Your Gut in Less Than 24 Hours)

Topic 17: The Foolproof Immune-enhancing Plan That Cleanses And Purifies Your Body, While "patching Up" Holes, Gaps, And Inefficiencies In Your Digestive System (And How To Do It Without Wasting $10+ Per "meal" On Ridiculous Juice Cleanses)

Topic 18: The Great Soy Myth (and The Truth About Soy in Eastern Asia)

Topic 19: How Chemicals In Food Make Us Fat (Plus 10 Banned Chemicals Still in the U.S. Food Supply)

Topic 20: 10 Banned Chemicals Still in the U.S. Food Supply

Topic 21: How To Protect Yourself Against Chronic Inflammation (What Time Magazine Calls A "Secret Killer")

Topic 22: The Truth About Buying Organic: Secrets The Health Food Industry Doesn't Want You To Know

Topic 23: Choosing High Quality Foods

Topic 24: A Recipe For Rapid Aging: The "Hidden" Compounds Stealing Your Youth, Minute by Minute

Topic 25: 7 Steps To Reduce AGEs and Slow Aging

Topic 26: The 10-second Trick That Can Slash Your Risk Of Cardiovascular Mortality By 37% (Most Traditional Cultures Have Done This For Centuries, But The Pharmaceutical Industry Would Be Up In Arms If More Modern-day Americans Knew About It)

Topic 27: How To Clean Up Your Liver and Vital Organs

Topic 28: The Simple Detox 'Cheat Sheet': How To Easily and Properly Cleanse, Nourish, and Rid Your Body of Dangerous Toxins (and Build a Lean Well-Oiled "Machine" in the Process)

Topic 29: How To Deal With the "Stress Hormone" Before It Deals With You

Topic 30: 7 Common Sense Ways to Have Uncommon Peace of Mind (or How To Stop Your "Stress Hormone" In Its Tracks)

Topic 31: How To Sleep Like A Baby (And Wake Up Feeling Like A Boss)

Topic 32: The 8-step Formula That Finally "fixes" Years Of Poor Sleep, Including Trouble Falling Asleep, Staying Asleep, And Waking Up Rested (If You Ever Find Yourself Hitting The Snooze Every Morning Or Dozing Off At Work, These Steps Will Change Your Life Forever)

Topic 33: For Even Better Leg Up And/or See Faster Results In Fixing Years Of Poor Sleep, Including Trouble Falling Asleep, Staying Asleep, And Waking Up Rested, Do The Following:

Topic 34: Solution To Overcoming Your Mental Barriers and Cultivating A Winner's Mentality

Topic 35: Part 1 of 4: Solution To Overcoming Your Mental Barriers and Cultivating A Winner's Mentality

Topic 36: Part 2 of 4: Solution To Overcoming Your Mental Barriers and Cultivating A Winner's Mentality

Topic 37: Part 3 of 4: Solution To Overcoming Your Mental Barriers and Cultivating A Winner's Mentality

Topic 38: Part 4 of 4: Solution To Overcoming Your Mental Barriers and Cultivating A Winner's Mentality

Topic 39: How To Beat Your Mental Roadblocks And Why It Can Be The Difference Between A Happy, Satisfying Life And A Sad, Fearful Existence (These Strategies Will Reduce Stress, Increase Productivity And Show You How To Fulfill All Your Dreams)

Topic 40: Maximum Fat Loss in Minimum Time: The Body Type Solution To Quick, Lasting Results

Topic 41: If You Want Maximum Results In Minimum Time You're Going To Have To Work Out (And Workout Hard, At That)

Topic 42: Food Planning For Maximum Fat Loss In Minimum Time

Topic 43: How To Lose Weight Fast If You're in Chronic Pain

Topic 44: Nutrition Basics for Fast Pain Relief (and Weight Loss)

Topic 45: How To Track Results (And Not Fall Into the Trap That Ruins 95% of Well-Thought Out Diets)

Topic 46: Advanced Fat Loss - Calorie Cycling, Carb Cycling and Intermittent Fasting

Topic 47: Advanced Fat Loss - Part I: Calorie Cycling

Topic 48: Advanced Fat Loss - Part II: Carb Cycling

Topic 49: Advanced Fat Loss - Part III: Intermittent Fasting

Topic 50: Putting It All Together

Learn more by visiting our website here: invigoratenow.com

[seriously-mike]

In case you have missed it, here's a couple of simple images to explain the obvious about Nightshade and Glaze.

And the obvious is, that shit won't protect your art from corporations that make actual money (about $250 million a year for Midjourney alone) on stealing it, corporations that can tell Disney to fuck off (like Microsoft did after its users had a field day creating "Disney Pixar posters" of serial killers, genocidal dictators and school shooters, complete with Disney logo), corporations whose algorithms are closed-source, confidential, blackboxed to hell and impossible to reverse-engineer (not to even mention countering or sabotaging).

You can, however, have some animalistic satisfaction of kicking down a couple of sweaty nerds who can't even make enough money to afford lunch from monkeying with open-source software that's available for free to download from GitHub and run on your own PC with no additional expenses. All while wafting the smug stink of self-righteousness.

And both Midjourney and Microsoft will be happy about that, because without open-source software the myriads of schmucks who want to try AI image generation will go to them and pay them actual money for messing with more stolen art than the sweaty basement nerds could ever procure off the Internet.

[seriously-mike]

What Will Destroy AI Image Generation In Two Years?

You are probably deluding yourself that the answer is some miraculous program that will "stop your art from being stolen" or "destroy the plagiarism engines from within". Well...

NOPE.

I can call such an idea stupid, imbecilic, delusional, ignorant, coprolithically idiotic and/or Plain Fucking Dumb. The thing that will destroy image generation, or more precisely, get the generators shut down is simple and really fucking obvious: it's lack of interest.

Tell me: how many articles about "AI art" have you seen in the media in the last two to three months? How many of them actually hyped the thing and weren't covering lawsuits against Midjourney, OpenAI/Microsoft and/or Stability AI? My guess is zilch. Zero. Fuckin' nada. If anything, people are tired of lame, half-assed if not outright insulting pictures posted by the dozen. The hype is dead. Not even the morons from the corner office are buying it. The magical machine that could replace highly-paid artists doesn't exist, and some desperate hucksters are trying to flog topically relevant AI-generated shots on stock image sites at rock-bottom prices in order to wring any money from prospective suckers. This leads us to another thing.

Centralized Models Will Keel Over First

Yes, Midjourney and DALL-E 3 will be seriously hurt by the lack of attention. Come on, rub those two brain cells together: those things are blackboxed, centralized, running on powerful and very expensive hardware that cost a lot to put together and costs a lot to keep running. Sure, Microsoft has a version of DALL-E 3 publicly accessible for free, but the intent is to bilk the schmucks for $20 monthly and sell them access to GPT-4 as well... well, until it turned out that GPT-4 attracts more schmucks than the servers can handle, so there's a waiting list for that one.

Midjourney costs half that, but it doesn't have the additional draw of having an overengineered chatbot still generating a lot of hype itself. That and MJ interface itself is coprolithically idiotic as well - it relies on a third-party program to communicate with the user, as if that even makes sense. Also, despite the improvements, there are still things that Midjourney is just incapable of, as opposed to DALL-E 3 or SDXL. For example, legible text. So right now, they're stuck with storage costs for the sheer number of half-assed images people generated over the last year or so and haven't deleted.

The recent popularity of "Disney memes" made using DALL-E 3 proved that Midjourney is going out of fashion, which should make you happy, and drew the ire of Disney, what with the "brand tarnishing" and everything, which should make you happier. So the schmucks are coming in, but they're not paying and pissing the House of Mouse off. This means what? Yes, costs. With nothing to show for it. Runtime, storage space, the works, and nobody's paying for the privilege of using the tech.

Pissing On The Candle While The House Burns

Yep, that's what you're doing by cheering for bullshit programs like Glaze and Nightshade. Time to dust off both of your brain cells and rub them together, because I have a riddle for you:

An open-source, client-side, decentralized image generator is targeted by software intended to disrupt it. Who profits?

The answer is: the competition. Congratulations, you chucklefucks. Even if those programs aren't a deniable hatchet job funded by Midjourney, Microsoft or Adobe, they indirectly help those corporations. As of now, nobody can prove that either Glaze or Nightshade actually work against the training algorithms of Midjourney and DALL-E 3, which are - surprise surprise! - classified, proprietary, blackboxed and not available to the fucking public, "data scientists" among them. And if they did work, you'd witness a massive gavel brought down on the whole project, DMCA and similar corporation-protecting copygrift bullshit like accusations of reverse-engineering classified and proprietary software included. Just SLAM! and no Glaze, no Nightshade, no nothing. Keep the lawsuit going until the "data scientists" go broke or give up.

Yep, keep rubbing those brain cells together, I'm not done yet. Stable Diffusion can be run on your own computer, without internet access, as long as you have a data model. You don't need a data center, you don't need a server stack with industrial crypto mining hardware installed, a four-year-old gaming computer will do. You don't pay any fees either. And that's what the corporations who have to pay for their permanently besieged high-cost hardware don't like.

And the data models? You can download them for free. Even if the publicly available websites hosting them go under for some reason, you'll probably be able to torrent them or download them from Mega. You don't need to pay for that either, much to the corporations' dismay.

Also, in case you didn't notice, there's one more problem with the generators scraping everything off the Internet willy-nilly:

AI Is Eating Its Own Shit

You probably heard about "data pollution", or the data models coming apart because if they're even partially trained on previously AI-generated images, the background noise they were created from is fucking with the internal workings of the image generators. This is also true of text models, as someone already noticed by having two instances of ChatGPT talk to each other, they devolve into incomprehensible babble. Of course that incident was first met with FUD on one side and joy on the other, because "OMG AI created their own language!" - nope, dementia. Same goes for already-generated images used to train new models: the semantic segmentation subroutines see stuff that is not recognized by humans and even when inspected and having the description supposedly corrected, that noise gets in the way and fucks up the outcome. See? No need to throw another spanner into the machine, because AI does that fine all by itself (as long as it's run by complete morons).

But wait, there's another argument why those bullshit programs are pointless:

They Already Stole Everything

Do you really think someone's gonna steal your new mediocre drawing of a furry gang bang that you probably traced from vintage porno mag scans? They won't, and they don't need to.

For the last several months, even the basement nerds that keep Stable Diffusion going are merely crossbreeding the old data models, because it's faster. How much data are Midjourney and OpenAI sitting on? I don't exactly know, but my very scientific guess is, a shitload, and they nicked it all a year or two ago anyway.

The amount of raw data means jack shit in relation to how well the generator works. Hell, if you saw the monstrosities spewed forth by StabilityAI LAION default models for Stable Diffusion, that's the best proof: basement nerds had to cut down on the amount of data included in their models, sort the images, edit the automatically generated descriptions to be more precise and/or correct in the first place and introduce some stylistic coherence so the whole thing doesn't go off the rails.

And that doesn't change the fact that the development methodology behind the whole thing, proprietary or open-source, is still "make a large enough hammer". It's brute force and will be until it stops being financially viable. When will it stop being financially viable? When people get bored of getting the same kind of repetitive pedestrian shit over and over. And that means soon. Get real for a moment: the data models contain da Vinci, Rembrandt, van Gogh, and that means jack shit. Any concept you ask for will be technically correct at best, but hardly coherent or well thought-out. You'll get pablum. Sanitized if you're using the centralized corporate models, maybe a little more horny if you're running Stable Diffusion with something trained on porn. But whatever falls out of the machine can't compete with art, for reasons.