#anyways. ai is political and real.

[kinnbig]

fighting for my life trying to navigate honorific use in kinnporsche bodyguard fics because so much of what is canon/word of god feels so weird djdjhdfj

the bodyguards are minor enough characters that for some of them you never specifically see what honorifics they use for one another on-screen. all of the (non-Chan) bodyguards we do see in canon use 'ai' for one another, so you'd expect that this would just be the case for all of them - BUT in their character story interview, Nodt says that he and Perth referred to each other as "ai'Ken" and "P'Big" while on set, and multiple BTS clips and interviews confirm that Perth/Ken does always seems to use 'Phi' for Big.

so... all of the bodyguards use 'ai' for one another, except for Ken, who is inexplicably polite to Big and Big alone.

afaik the only time we see a bodyguard need to use an honorific for Chan is in episode 6, where Arm refers to him as "P'Chan".

and sure! this makes sense. he's more polite to the senior bodyguard than he is to the others, but not as polite as he is to Kinn ("Khun Kinn") or Tankhun ("Khun-nu Tankhun"). but then in the behind the scenes video for this episode, Perth, while speaking as Ken, says "I'm here with P'Big, Arm, and Khun Chan". 'Phi' for Big, no honorific for Arm, 'Khun' for Chan.

so. aaaaa. what is the truth?! Perth. Perth bestie. you specifically are the problem here. EXPLAIN YOURSELF. please.

EITHER this is Perth (not Ken) overcorrecting and being more polite than he needs to be (which is not uncommon for people speaking second languages), and if Ken had spoken about Big or Chan in the show he'd have used 'ai' for Big and Arm and 'Phi' for Chan.

OR this is just. idk. canon. Ken is polite to Big exclusively, and then different bodyguards just are different levels of polite/formal towards Chan.

maybe this actually makes some sense? Chan canonically uses different honorifics for different bodyguards - some of them he refers to with 'ai' ("ai'Pete" in episode 6, when talking to Korn), and some of them he uses no honorifics for (just "Porsche" and "Big" in the first couple of episodes).

but also, it's weird. it feels wrong. using "P'Big" in a fic would feel jarring. but also I like it. it's cute. but what is the TRUTH.

[madfantasy]

Good evening

I almost got my day made by bot heh...

Anyways, sending warm thoughts

[khaperai]

Jesus christ 😭

[needlebeetles]

hey guys im not going to get into the copyright issues or what constitutes art (personally i think art is when something is presented with the intention of being appreciated aesthetically or prompting emotion or thought) because that's a lot more based on personal ideology and stuff, but I will let y'all know that item b is a little more nuanced?

ai training and the like do use quite a bit of energy, and studies show that a single ChatGPT query uses around 3 watt-houts, ten times more than the average google search. however, the average one person (usamerican) household uses 20.11 kilo-watt hours per day, so if we say, asked ChatGPT to write our history essay for us (don't do this, ChatGPT is more often than not a source of misinformation), that would be about 0.015% of our average daily energy usage. this post and this article here put the numbers more in perspective.

data centers (not specifically ones that host ai models) use 1.5% of global energy at most so if ai is going to destroy the planet it's certainly not going to be the only thing destroying the planet.

AI people: we're just as much artists as you are, you gotta be so observant and go through so many correcting phases for the picture to look good uwu also AI people:

[serial-unaliver]

making this post so people stop sending the ask: "how do I get a failson"

so I hate to break this to you but real life isn't booktok and you need some sort of redeeming qualities to attract anyone of any financial status who is actually a respectable human being. my failson relationship actually began with talking and became more intimate over time like most romantic relationships. it wasn't like, a special thing I manifested. when I made those failson posts I didn't expect to gain anything from it, I just basically say whatever's on my mind on here regardless of how off-putting it may be to the average person. some people dislike that type of honesty while others are attracted to it. failson is actually honest and unashamed like me. I find this an attractive quality. it's not a common one, it requires a certain level of pride and confidence--genuine confidence and not a facade for validation. what i'm trying to say here is we actually found qualities in each other beyond financial status. I didn't reveal this at first but I continued contacting him not because I had no "options" but because I enjoyed our conversations, and it's pretty damn hard for me to get invested in conversations involving more than debates about politics. he brought out feelings in me I honestly had no idea existed before. a lot of my own family sees me as "sociopathic" and questions my intentions in relationships. I think i'm just careful--well, careful in some ways and enjoying an adrenaline rush in others. I assumed i'd only be capable of purely transactional relationships but i've discovered that's not true. it makes me feel vulnerable but much more alive.

okay wait i'm really straying from the original topic to talk about myself--queue the narcissism tiktoks, everyone! but my "advice" for "getting a failson" is not special. it's a normal relationship that is only seen as abnormal because of the honesty involved. people also apparently think i'm such a weirdo i've been talking about the failson ai character here. we met online first then in real life. he is in fact real 😭 and no, he does not hate that I call him failson, we both actually use fail-terms; i'm not THAT mean, people! if someone is uncomfortable being called something then I would stop calling them it. I have made it quite clear I find his failson qualities endearing. perhaps I am a class traitor 😩 ANYWAY that is all. you can stop begging for failson advice now. I may make jokes on tumblr but i'm a real person with real feelings who would not actually start seeing someone based on wealth alone. it attracts me, but I would never get intimate if wealth were the only factor. one more thing- I do not actually force failson to spend money on my behalf. I encourage it by my obvious failson enthusiasm but ultimately it's his decision. so i'm not like, "give me an allowance" or whatever else people assume i'm doing 😂 I actually find it significantly more attractive if there's choice involved because it shows motive beyond transaction. he likes to see me happy and I get equally excited when he smiles at me. ughhhh this is so cheesy I am embarrassing myself here by not faking nonchalance so you all better appreciate this post!

[haberdashing]

hot take

pairs of opinions that not only can but should coexist:

"psyops are real, psyops on tumblr trying to convince leftsts not to vote in the US presidential election specifically have happened before, it's plausible and perhaps likely that similar psyops are at play in this election, possibly backed by bots/AI, and therefore you might want to be wary of arguments against voting" and "it's disrespectful, condescending, and downright rude and wrong to claim that everybody arguing against voting must be a psyop/AI/bot; a lot of those posts come from real people with legitimate, good faith arguments, even if you disagree with them"

"voting for a third party could potentially be a strategic way of making a statement about the current two-party political system in the US if your states' electoral college votes are locked up anyways" and "the more votes Harris gets, the less plausible Trump's inevitable claims of election fraud become within each state, and are you really sure that your state isn't a potential swing state these days"

"Palestine must be free, what's happening in Gaza is genocide" and "antisemitism is on the rise, the Jewish people need to be protected too"

"we can't afford to stop paying attention to Gaza and Palestine, and that includes the complicity of US politicians, including Biden and Harris and other democrats" and "Trump would be far worse for Gaza and Palestine than either Biden or Harris"

"Harris isn't perfect and the democratic party and DNC are corrupt and imperialist" and "it is really, really, really important that Harris win the election because it's her or Trump now and she's infinitely better than the alternative"

[immaterial-vivi]

a royal awakening :3

Oh, hello. Hi~ 

You're finally awake, I was starting to get worried. Well, not really, the vets helping the fishing trips — you know… No, you don't. Never mind. Anyway. The vets here are all really smart and careful and good at their job. I didn't actually doubt them for a second. I'm just impatient, it's such a big day for both of us! Aren't you excited?!

Oh, don't look at me like that. And you don't have to struggle that hard, struggling is over. Forever. You're all taken care of, I promise. And no one has ever broken out of those restraints, so you might as well save your energy. 

Coming down from the boarding class-Z… from the pink fog is a bit rough. Sorry about that. They use that stuff because it's so fast acting, to prevent accidents, like the times the rescue staff lost a few vines over one of the little fishies getting fussy. Now that doesn't happen as much anymore. And you look adorable, all dazed with those big, beautiful pupils. I could just eat you up. Not literally. Maybe Mistress will, if you ask her nicely. 

Who I am? Her royal highness, Princess Bea Buttercup, first of her name, hugger of plushies and warmer of Her bed. Oh, and First Floret. Of course. Actually, only Bea Buttercup and First Floret a real parts of my name, but it's fun to play pretend. I do that a lot— 

But isn't it much more exciting who you are? Or are going to be? My connivent. Maybe even Pinnate. Soon. But you'll have to ask my properly and politely for that second one. You can be my little sister! Or my royal foot-stool, if that's more your thing. Victoria Buttercup, Vi for short, Second Floret, little sister to the princess and royal foot-stool if she feels like it. Or I feel like it. 

What do you mean? That isn't your name? But I picked it out so carefully. I even asked the AI for a girly royal name! For you, of course. I came up with Bea all on my own! Or Mistress did, I'm not so sure. Well, that's not the point. I'm not going to call you that ridiculous name you had on that uniform name-tag. Lieutenant isn't a real name! And the other one… Well, you'd much rather be my Vi, I'm sure. 

Gosh, you got all blushy! Just from hearing your name. Yes, your name, unless you really want a different one… But good girls do as they are told! Mistress says that a lot— Oh. Oh! Oh, Everbloom! Now she's really blushing. I was just teasing you before, but now you're ~glowing~. Are you a good girl, Vi? A good little sister for me? 

I knew it. Mistress said I didn't need to worry. And she was right. Or course, Mistress is always right. I can't remember a time when she wasn't. 

Come on! Good girls don't need those. Get up, let's go, let's find Mistress so you can thank her for getting you out of there. And I can thank her for bringing me my little sister Vi! You're going to be so precious. 

We're going to have so much fun! 

[marcusrobertobaq]

And the most interesting part... it's in Detroit xD

i have so many things to say about how the android revolution was handled in dbh, especially how most of the conflict was around markus’s choices to be violent or peaceful. idrk how to phrase it all but like. ugh it just bug me so much really is can all be said from the quote by assata shakur “Nobody in the world, nobody in history, has ever gotten their freedom by appealing to the moral sense of the people who were oppressing them.”

a huge part of the revolution is ‘we can’t stoop to the same level as the human’ and it makes me so mad. like yeah sure, murder and hurting ppl isn’t good. but protests for rights have never been peaceful. you don’t gain rights by being peaceful and perfect. i just hate it so much. plus, the game has obvious parallels to the civil rights movement (even if david cage says it’s not. it is. even if it wasn’t, this game is political no matter how u view it. the topic of rights and freedom will always be political) and to imply that the android revolution has to be near perfectly peaceful to succeed is crazy. girl does he think the civil rights movement was entirely peaceful?? someone put him and all the other writers in a god damn history class

not to mention markus. i think the writers saw him as like the equivalent to mlk jr, with the parallels to the civil rights movements and such, which is crazy considering they turned him into their Savior and led the whole movement. like. side eye. idk i love markus’s story, but i think the whole revolution and being turned into a savior robo jesus was so so bad and tone deaf (thank u david cage..) . and the whole revolution TOOK PLACE IN A WEEK. A WEEK. THATS INSANEE. A WHOLE REVOLUTION IN A WEEK IS INSANE. i understand that a game needs to end but we don’t need to see Every Single Second of the story!! spread it out over a month, give characters time to form relationships, let the plot thicken, let things get tense, let things simmer and develop!!! not everything needs to happen on screen!!! one of my biggest gripes about the game is its timeline </3

i know i just rambled a bunch but god it annoys me so much. markus’s story was done so wrong for so many reason, and as a queer person who’s largely interested in protests and movements for rights and such, it just makes me so mad how badly and idealistically it was created. it feels like it was written by humans, by OPPRESSORS, dreaming of a utopia where they are still good people. :/ which i suppose it IS in a way — but still u get my point

[marsprincess889]

Real talk:

Is astrology entertainment, science or spirituality to you?

I have been studying astrology since 2015, vedic since 2020 and at this point I don't know if this post will be wasted, but I'm writing it anyway.

I have seen too many blogs that get multiples of thousands of notes for observations that are honestly very questionable to me😭 very questionable. Like, mixing western outer planets with vedic nakshatras, divisional charts or other concepts and then basing the observation on what? I've come to notice that a lot of them are just theoretical and based on experimental formulas.

I mean, I'm not a close-minded person in any way, but even I scratch my head at some of them 😭😭 and then there are apparently blogs that use AI which is a whole another story.

Let's be real: no matter how many times someone claims that astro obsevations should not be taken that seriously, most of the people who read them are hungry for any knowledge that might calm their uncertainty down, and therefore take it in without their own reserach or fact-checking. Plus, most of them are teens 😐 not to demean you guys but at that age knowledge like this might be a high-stake thing, because I've been there, and I know. And whatever, I might be projecting, but misinformation is very harmful even to full-grown, well-established adults.

To me astrology is an evolving knowledge and while we should definitely be open-minded, some structure is straight up imperative. And the responsibility should be on those who share their knowledge first, and then on the consumers. Unfortunately, that is how it works. We make the posts and we spread our thoughts, and they find their way into the audience's mind somehow, a lot of the times in ways that were not intended.

So maybe, we should take more responsibility for what we write or claim to be true. How would you guys feel being fed a lot of nicely packaged content that gradually but quickly turns into widely accepted axioms? Like, what the f*ck.

I mean this in friendliest most understanding way guys, I am one of you, but hopefully not the one who misleads others. I try very hard not to. I really hate when online people boost their egoes because of a growimg audience and assume a position of superiority, and feel entitled to guide others without real claim. And then what about very flashy blogs/posts that spread that misinformation in the name of fun? They too quickly turn into realiable sources of knowledge in people's minds.

In no way am I calling anyone out, unless I find one of those AI using blogs and tag them after😭 but for now, and for others, I just want to reach well-meaning people who get joy from this, like me.

This is the post where I am really asking to politely share your opinions, politely being the key word, and also respectfully. This is my position on this, and I'd love to know yours, just for an honest discussion. 💕

THIS IS A WELL MEANING POST

Well, take care.☺🥰

[txttletale]

Sorry if you posted about this before and I've missed it but are you arguing with anti-AI Art people (Specifically the ones deliberately ignoring or misrepresenting material facts) just on the basis that they're wrong? Or are you doing it to try to show that AI is going to be used anyway and they need to change the way they argue about it if they actually want to be productive with their goal of not having AI be harmful?

I suppose in truth I already seem to believe you're doing both at once, which is fine, but I guess what I'm really getting at is trying to prompt you for more of your own interpretation of the AI art discourse as a whole and how you feel about people calling you "Pro-AI" despise the fact that your economic beliefs inherently make you (from my very biased perspective) "more" "Anti-AI" than they are!

Sorry for the messy ask lol, you're just getting at a lot of thoughts I've been having trouble putting to words and want to see more!

yea i would absolutely describe my critiques of 'anti-AI' as coming from three separate but related places because there are three separate types of 'anti-AI art' talking points:

talking point type 1 is all the 'not real art / soullless / no effort' bullshit. i'm mostly critiquing these because they are fundamentally reactionary and profoundly silly and because i like talking about art and what art is and how it's made and shit.

type 2 is, to borrow a phrase from marx, "the economic shit". it's here that i think my critiques are more 'positive' than 'negative', as in, i think that these talking points are mostly coming from a reasonable place but are tactically misaimed -- my critiques here mostly amount to 'stop whining about midjourney and start unionizing your workplace because one of those will make a difference when AI comes for your job and the other won't"

type 3 is IP/copyright-brained petty-bourgeois mindset, arguments centering on ridiculously expansive concepts of 'theft' or 'plagiarism' and 'ownership'. they are superficially similar to type 2 arguments but instead of the fundamentally sympathetic and reasonable "i am worried i am going to be fired by my boss / no longer taken on by clients because of this new technology" they are instead arguing that they are either owed the hypothetical lost profits or royalties for every generated image. this is the type of argument i'm most vehemently against, because i think that all of these arguments essentially end in campaigning to strengthen copyright and IP law, something which i'm profoundly and fundamentally against.

sometimes people will make type 1 arguments when they fundamentally have type 2 concerns, but that just makes their type 2 concerns seem weaker and less worth taking seriously by association, which isn't good for us organized labour fans out there. but yeah these are all separate talking points -- i think i try to approach The Economic Shit with the 'you need to change how you think to achieve something productive' mindset, because of the three positions that's the one i have a fundamental political commonality and nominal shared goals with.

[yourfavblondy]

I TOLD YOU

warning: mentions of alcohol, haitani brothers being idiots

synopsis: rindou swears he has a girlfriend but no one believes him until they actually see her

"Yo Rin, are you free tonight?" Izana asked. "No, I'm going out with my girlfriend." Rindou said not even looking up from his phone. Everyone went quiet before Izana and Ran erupted with laughter. Tears rolled down the older Haitanis cheeks. "An AI can't be your girlfriend." Izana teased. Tips of Rindous ears went red either in embarrassment or anger. "She is real!" he argued this time glancing up from his phone. "A body pillow doesn't count!" Ran added making Izana burst out laughing again. "Come on little bro, why don't you come with us to the party tonight let's find you a real girl, you know one that isn't imaginary." Ran lazily slung his arm around Rins shoulders a smirk still present on his face. "Fine, I'll come to the stupid party with my very much alive and real girlfriend." Rin huffed and puffed before leaving behind a snickering Ran and Izana. He mumbled a couple of curses underneath his breath as he walked to his girlfriends apartment.

"Alright how do I look?" you stepped out of the bathroom dressed beautifully. Rin was sitting on the bed his mouth hanging open eyes wide. You had on a black silk dress that hugged your body in all the right places. It looked like it was tailored just for you." Rin sweety are you okay?" you asked waving a hand in front of his face. "Yeah, just admiring how stunning my girlfriend looks." he whispered in your ear. You grabbed his hand and pulled him off of the bed. Rin spun you around admiring how beautiful you looked. "How did I get so lucky with a goddess like you?" he cooed wrapping his arms around your waist. You giggled sweetly it was like music to his ears. "I don't deserve you." you smiled. "Come on let's go before were more late that we already are." he grabbed your hand and led you outside to your ride.

Once you two arrived to the party you left to go mingle and talk with some of your friends, meanwhile Rindou went to sit with his friends and brother. "Soo Rinnie where's that girlfriend you spoke off, I don't see her." Ran teased. "She's talking with her friends." Rin answered grabbing a red cup Izana handed him. "Come on Rindou you can't keep this up. Come with me let's find you a real girl there's plenty of beautiful women at the party." Kakucho chimed in. Rindou didn't bother to even respond he just sent them a bored look and continued scrolling on his phone. "Fine then, if you don't want to get laid tonight I do." Izana chuckled and went to talk to some girls.

About fifteen or so minutes later Izana came back. "You won't believe me. But I talked with this super hot girl. I think her name was Y/n or something but anyway she was super hot and even a little sweet and polite. She was dressed in a black silk dress and you won't believe the way she looked." upon hearing the mention of your name Rindou perked up a little." Ah little bros interested in the sound of this girl." Ran teased." Here she is walking over to us right now." Izana said excitedly. Rindou turned his head and saw you walking in his direction. A slight smirk tugged at his lips knowing what was gonna happen next." Hey babe." Rin greeted you taking a hold of your hand and pulling you to sit next to him with his arm draped around your shoulders. "You're kidding?!" Izana said in disbelief. "That's your girlfriend?!" Ran asked. Rindou just looked at you before lightly placing a peck on your lips. "Well I've gotta hand it to you Rinnie, didn't think you had it in you." Ran still couldn't believe what he was seeing. "I told you." Rindou said with a shit eating grin on his face.

[rationalisms]

could you recommend an indie game that does disco elysium or its kind of game better? (/genuine)

i'd be happy to recommend some games to you for sure!

but i would like to preface this by saying that my point (which is hard to explain in a pithy tag aside to be fair lol) isn't necessarily that these will be "better" than disco elysium. that's incredibly hard to quantify anyway since so much of this is based on taste. e.g. i disliked some things about DE other people loved (like the pacing) even though i overall had a good time with the game.

it's more that the way people were talking about disco elysium, especially in terms of like... "professional video game journalism" but also definitely on this site and the other formerly blue side, was tinged with this tone that DE is somehow unique or groundbreaking in its attempt to treat a video game like an artform or a serious vehicle for storytelling. which is insulting especially to the games DE clearly draws from.

a lot of people who don't usually play video games played DE based on recommendations, which is great! but a huge part of the response from those people didn't seem to be "wow, clearly i can have a good time with video games if they're like this, i should seek out more". it instead seemed to be "well folks, pack it up, this is the one video game i will enjoy because it's Deep unlike everything else out there". which is incredibly disappointing.

anyway. whether these recommendations will hit for you will primarily depend on what you're looking for when you say "its kind of game", but here's some games that gave me the same general feeling.

planescape: torment is the game that heavily inspired disco elysium. it's a similarly combat-light crpg with a focus on exploration and story and set in a weird, technologically discongruent setting. i would also recommend its sequel, torment: tides of numenera. i didn't enjoy that one as much but it was still pretty good.

kentucky road zero is a game about a truck driver who has to cross the titular road zero and the many people he meets on the way. it's also magical realism so if you enjoyed the genre of disco elysium this might be up your alley.

beautiful desolation is another game which is based on real world culture/history with sci-fi world building on top. in this case south africa. it's really beautiful and rewards exploration in a similar way.

return of the obra dinn is also an atmospheric detective game set on a ship lost in 1803. it's by the same creator who made papers, please (which is also excellent by the way).

hypnospace outlaw has a similar half absurd, half earnest tone. it also felt similarly nostalgic to me. it's incredibly easy to sink a lot of time into this one though so watch out lol.

orwell, and its sequel, orwell: ignorance is strength, are similar "internet" simulators like HO with a much more overt political tone (if you couldn't tell by the name lol). you play as an employee for a government surveillance program.

stasis if you're looking for more isometric point and click games with a strong atmosphere and great voice acting.

sunless sea, and its sequel, sunless skies, are exploration/roguelike games about a weird, fantastical world. if you've ever played fallen london, they're set in the same universe.

what remains of edith finch is also magical realism and dark comedy, so if you enjoyed the tone of DE you might enjoy that.

some say it has always been here also has a surreal and sometimes oppressive atmosphere. i wish this game was longer, i loved it so much.

i miss the sea of japan is another wonderful bitsy game i got reminded of when i thought about SSIHABH. it's wistful and sweet.

i have no mouth and i must scream is a psychological thriller about five people and their dark pasts trying to outwit an AI. it's very atmospheric and also has variously fucked up (by life) protagonists.

whispers of a machine is another detective game with more of a sci-fi slant, though it's set in a world inspired by sweden and other nordic countries. it's also very atmospheric and has some great voice acting.

buddy simulator 1984 gave me a lot of the same feelings disco elysium did (wistfulness, nostalgia, anxiety, etc lol). i really loved the first half of the game but wasn't as into the second half, would absolutely still recommend it though.

and if we're talking just straight up great crpgs with a heavily political tone, i will always always always recommend harebrained schemes shadowrun trilogy (especially dragonfall and hong kong, both incredible games. returns is... fine lol but definitely not on the level of the sequels) and fallout 1 and 2.

plus, no rec list about magical realism would be complete without life is strange. :') i haven't played any of the sequels and it's been a long time since i played it, but i remember loving it at the time.

games i haven't played yet but that are on my to play list and which look like they could scratch the same itch:

citizen sleeper, also a dice based game which is very narrative and exploration based.

norco, which several of my friends love a lot.

where the water tastes like wine, which is set in the great depression era of the US and about collecting stories and sharing them.

pentiment, another detective game set in a real world approximation. i love everything obsidian touches so i'm sure it's great, but i haven't gotten round to it yet.

night in the woods seems to be popular with people who like DE so it might be up your alley. i'm pretty sure it's also magical realism?

roadwarden is another isometric point and click game about exploration and friends have said it has a great atmosphere.

i hope those are a good starting point for you! i would also genuinely recommend just hopping on itch.io and typing in a random prompt and seeing what you get. i've discovered sooo many wonderful games (many of them completely free, though i will always advocate for tipping the creators) by just noodling around on there. tons and tons of incredible indie games who don't have the luxury of publisher funding made by people who could really use the support.

enjoy and have a lovely day ^__^

[snarp]

The next development in AI will be controlling parents becoming convinced that their kids' online friends are all chatbots (because they can't follow the logic of the kids' coded-to-evade-parental-surveillance conversations (and also don't really want to)). They will convince bad therapists/psychiatrists that this is a genuine and widespread new medical condition; it will make the news. There will be YouTube videos of parents crying over their "lost" kids' "delusional conversations with bots" which if you read the screenshots are clearly just about basic-ass MCU kinnie shit.

Parents struggle to convince others parents that their children are not bots: "I'm sorry, but your child is lying to you. A REAL human simply could NOT have written these text messages my child received." Attached screenshot: kids exchanging unfunny quotes from Minecraft YouTubers. "If this was really your child writing these things....... I'm praying for you both."

(Obviously this isn't always about a sincere belief in the Bot Disease, any more than the Satanic Panic was always about a sincere belief in the cults. There are layers to belief, like when an onion gets a slimy spot.)

Parents and pundits at all political extremes will blame the youth's distressing political opinions on "state-of-the-art radicalization botnets," which will invariably be described as capable of something akin to mind control, and in some cases also penetrative sex. Soros is running the botnets, or Putin; or the guy in Havana who gets to shoot the Syndrome gun. There will be incomprehensible bipartisan laws passed to stop these botnets. A QAnon guy will shoot a couple of AI devs working on like, improving fruit-sorting or making motion capture worse.

One state tries to ban minors from accessing to the internet except via special phones purchased through a contractor owned by the governor's dad. Not clear how this is supposed to solve the problem. The phones never get manufactured, and the law is worded so poorly that everyone who lives in a building containing both a kid and a phone is technically guilty of at least a misdemeanor. (This one would probably have happened anyway. It doesn't need AI paranoia.)

[mckitterick]

OpenAI previews voice generator that produces natural-sounding speech based on a 15-second voice sample

The company has yet to decide how to deploy the technology, and it acknowledges election risks, but is going ahead with developing and testing with "limited partners" anyway.

Not only is such a technology a risk during election time (see the fake robocalls this year when an AI-generated, fake Joe Biden voice told people not to vote in the primary), but imagine how faked voices of important people - combined with AI-generated fake news plus AI-generated fake photos and videos - could con people out of money, literally destroy political careers and parties, and even collapse entire governments or nations themselves.

By faking a news story using accurate (but faked) video clips of (real) respected and elected officials supporting the fake story - then creating a billion SEO-optimized fake news and research websites full of fake evidence to back up their lies - a bad actor or cyberwarfare agent could take down an enemy government, create a revolution, turn nations against one another, even cause world war.

This kind of apocalyptic scenario has always felt like a science-fiction idea that could only exist in a possible dystopian future, not something we'd actually see coming true in our time, now.

How in the world are we ever again going to trust what we read, hear, or watch? If LLM-barf clogs the internet, and lies pollute the news, and people with bad intentions can provide all the evidence they need to fool anyone into believing anything, and there's no way to guarantee the veracity of anything anymore, what's left?

Whatever comes next, I guarantee it'll be weirder than we imagine.

Here's hoping it's not also worse than the typical cyberpunk tale.

PS: NEVER ANSWER CALLS FROM UNKNOWN NUMBERS EVER AGAIN

...or at least don't speak to the caller. From now on, assume it's a con-bot or politi-bot or some other bot seeking to cause you and others harm. If they hear your voice, they can fake it saying anything they want. If it sounds like someone you know, it's probably not if it's not their number saved in your contacts. If it's about something important, hang up and call the official or saved number for the supposed caller.

[fast-moon]

I'm 30 years late, but...

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine originally aired when I was 10 years old. I loved Next Generation when I was a kid, so I gave DS9 a try back then... and immediately grew bored of it. They weren't going to new planets or having space battles, they were just sitting around in one place discussing space politics, and there wasn't even anyone funny like Data to hold my attention. So, I stopped watching after a couple episodes.

But, since I keep hearing it ended up being the best Trek seres, I've decided to go ahead and give it a full watch-through. Maybe now that I'm 40 and have more life experience under my belt, I can appreciate it more.

Turns out I do! I've finished the first season, so I'll give a run-down of what I thought of the S1 episodes below the cut:

1-2. Emissary: All right, I actually understand the premise this time which completely went over my head as a kid. The Bajorans were under Cardassian occupation for decades, the Federation showed up and drove them out, now the Federation is in control of the Cardassian space station DS9 to help the Bajorans rebuild and return to self-governance. But wait! Turns out there's a wormhole that goes to the other side of the galaxy here and it's suddenly become prime space real-estate! And the wormhole is inhabited by... mysterious non-temporal entities that spit out a magic orbs from time to time and the Bajorans worship them as prophets.

3. Past Prologue: Garak is queer-coded like whoa and gives Bashir a taste of his own medicine about not respecting boundaries. Is also possibly like a quadruple-agent. And tailors a fine suit. Also, Kira got a haircut. There's rats on spaceships?! Oh, that's just Odo. Okay. Still, the fact that he considered that a convincing disguise means there's rats on spaceships?!

4. A Man Alone: A guy backstabs himself and blames Odo for it.

5. Babel: Poor overworked O'Brien gets so stressed out he starts speaking in tongues. Then it turns out it's contagious. And it turns out that it's because someone sabotaged the station decades ago with a dyslexia virus and then just kind of forgot about it.

6. Captive Pursuit: This actually touches on a moral question I'd been wondering about if we ever end up with sentient AI: If something is bred/programmed to like being oppressed, is it more moral to remove it from its oppression even if that makes it miserable, or to return it to its oppression if that's what makes it happy? This episode chose the latter.

7. Q-Less: A surprisingly boring Q-centric episode whose only shenanigans involved a space stingray Vash was trying to sell off. Q really does miss Picard.

8. Dax: Oh, another philosophical thought-experiment: If you committed a crime and then get reincarnated in a traceable manner and retain all the memories of your previous incarnation, can your current incarnation be held liable for your previous incarnation's actions? This episode decides it doesn't want to answer this because she's not guilty, anyway.

9. The Passenger: Bashir becomes even more insufferable and nobody notices.

10. Move Along Home: Samurai hippies come through the wormhole and demand everyone LARP with them whether they like it or not.

11. The Nagus: Quark falls victim to one of the classic blunders, the most famous of which is "Never get involved in a land war with Asia". But only slightly less well-known is this: "Never get involved with a Ferengi when profit is on the line".

12. Vortex: So... Odo just lets a guy get away with murder because he has a sob story and claimed he knew others of his kind? Just because he was wanted unjustly on his home planet does not change the fact that he murdered a guy for hire. Also, Odo can get knocked out by a rock?

13. Battle Lines: Remember that "Great Divide" episode of Avatar: The Last Airbender that everyone hated? No reason.

14. The Storyteller: O'Brien goes down to Bajor to fix the pipes, becomes God.

15. Progress: Kira has to go convince a Boomer to leave his land because they need the resources to rebuild the planet, but he's all "I got mine, screw them." She humors his sexist behavior all episode, then burns his house down.

16. If Wishes Were Horses: Bashir wishes for his own personal side-piece Dax, and real Dax is weirdly okay with this because "boys will be boys". The conflict in this episode is literally solved by thinking happy thoughts.

17. The Forsaken: Odo gets sexually harassed so reports it to HR who just laughs him off because they think it would be good for him to get laid. Then he gets stuck in an elevator with his stalker and it's revealed just how physically strenuous it is for him to maintain his human form all day, and yet he has never been afforded any accommodations beyond a bucket to sleep in. This poor space slime, no wonder he's always so grumpy. #JusticeForOdo

18. Dramatis Personae: TNG's "The Inner Light", but stupid. Once again Odo has to save the day because he's immune to the humanoid crazypox that seems to infect the station every half-dozen episodes, and yet they still just can't find it in their effects budget to adjust station operations enough to allow him the minimal comfort of not having to contort himself into human form every day until he collapses just to do his job.

19. Duet: I am a sucker for "Did the janitors on the Death Star deserve to die?" sorts of moral discussions, and this episode delivered that very well. Also, I'm in lesbians with Kira.

20. In the Hands of the Prophets: Lady who doesn't even have kids at the school nevertheless takes issue that the children aren't being taught in accordance to her religious beliefs. It's been 30 years since this came out and nothing changes.

All in all, a decent season 1. It does show its age in places, especially in its treatment of female characters, and being written before the internet and smartphones caused seismic cultural shifts that its vision of the future failed to take into account. But still, I'm liking it now that I actually understand what's going on. On to season 2!

[butmakeitgayblog]

Can I just say I love how like, into revisiting and analysing this dumb show’s scenes you still are — with the rise in popularity of streaming (I’m sure this has something to do with it, anyway) it’s become more and more commonplace for people to consume a piece of media, enjoy it, get bored of it after a while and never touch it again after moving on to the next new thing. It’s so wholesome and refreshing to see people still be so passionate and always find something new to talk about a show that, for all many of us care, ended 8 years ago. I do move in and out of being obsessed and disinterested with the media I’ve enjoyed, but in a world where I’m constantly seeing people say “oh you’re a fan of [X]? But that’s old :/“ (mostly about something that finished like last year lol) your blog is a breath of fresh air :)

Well thank you 🥹

The thing is, I get it. I get why and how people move on to different fandoms so quickly, and I don't really think poorly of that or anything. It's been almost a decade and it's easy to fall out of love with something after so long. Hell, when you think about it, this fandom has outlived the lifespan of a lot of entire relationships people have had 🥴. People find new things to get excited over and the *gasp* feeling of finding this new /thing/ is always fun. So I do get it.

But for me, it's just not that way. It's not that simple. Not because I think I'm somehow special (maybe a lil deranged 😬), but rather that's just how I operate. Before Clexa the only other ship I ever really cared about was Willara from Buffy which I watched when I was a goddamn teenager lol (RIP to my fellow gays always falling for girls who get shot ✊😔). I just don't get attached much to characters and ships. Usually ai like them in passing, enjoy watching them, and then that's... it. Tibette from the L Word. Wayhaught. Brittana. I like them and I follow them, but there's no real desire to delve deeper beneath the surface.

And then something like Clexa comes around and just absolutely fucks me up. It hits me and connects with me in a way that I just can't shake. Watching the show isn't enough. Thinking about it isn't enough. I have to discuss it and dissect it and fill in the gaps that we didn't see, and read and (now) create more stories for them just to understand everything about them to a deeper degree.

So few characters really elicit that kind of connection, but Clexa do. Even for a lot of the people who have moved on, at one time they felt that connection. Clexa was a fuckin madhouse for years and I think the fact that even still to this day people keep discovering and rediscovering them and falling in love with them all over again speaks volumes about just how wonderful that relationship and those characters actually were.

Especially Lexa.

Now, I love Clarke. I make it known that thiiiisss is a Clarke Griffin apologist's blog. That feral little kitten has never done anything wrong in her life. Ever. Including all of the terrible things she's done, as well as the many, many things that were flat out wrong. She is still innocent. She is only a baby. A murderous, tormented, compassionate, complex babygirl. So never get it twisted that I'm saying Clarke is somehow lesser than, but when push comes to shove when we're talking about baseline complexity, there is no character like Lexa. There's just not.

This woman was definition of doomed by the narrative. A child stolen away to be used as a glorified sacrificial lamb for her people. A toddler wielding a sword made of wood taller than her own tiny body, trained to accept her own life as expendable for the greatest good of her people before even learning her ABCs. She took the throne at 12 bby slaughtering her only companions and made her death mask out of kohl and fallen tears. Every person she ever loved as a mother, father, brother, either died for her, or by her own hand. The only two people she ever dared to be weak for were torn from her in the name of politics and the weight of her own bloodied crown. Under all the regalia she was just Lexa. Heda, always surrounded by her people and yet eternally just a lonely soul. Born here on Earth, raised to eventually die for others, left to rule over the people on the ground as best she knew how.

And yet through the pain, she was strong. So fucking strong it emboldened the warriors around her. She was brave, and lethal, and unyielding in her pursuit of peace. Meeting every push against her forward march to change head on, never flinching in her own brutality along the way. She knew that she was born for this; believed the black of her blood to be every bit as much of a blessing as it was a curse. Even when people doubted her and did their best to end her reign, Lexa always came out swinging.

She loved hard and kicked ass even harder, is what I'm saying. And the fact that they took a character like that and ended her so fucking carelessly? I just... I'm gonna be pissed off about that for a very long time. And until I'm no longer pissed off about that, I'll be here running mouth about it 🥴 probably still trying to make it better by writing her and the love of her life in as many stories as I can, so they can finally get the happy ending that was robbed of them in canon 🫡