#my friend says theyve never felt the needle before

[the-kr8tor]

Demiromantic hobie and demiromantic reader anyone? Heres a cute idea i have.

Hobie falling in love with a close friend of his, not knowing that friend likes him. But he doesnt nnow how to feel as hes never been in love or felt like this before. So he comes to them and only says its happened with them as theyve got closer and known each other more personally. Reader who tells him they feel the same way and also ask if he’s demiromantic. Since they go by that label and he ask them what demiromantic is. They then explain it to him and he thinks about it saying to the reader he isnt one for labels. But some labels just cant help but feel right to him (as he is inconsistent that and he actively loves his band and him being in a band is what some would consider a label of him and his friends playing music instruments.) Him and said close friend decide to explore it a bit more, only for their feelings to grow stronger day by day. Years later him and reader are still together their love only have growing stronger over the years and still growing. Even though it’s physically doesnt seem possible and feels like their love just stretches infinity out. Dont we love open communication? (I hate miscommunication so much)

CUTE! If you're planning on writing a fic abt this pls do! Hobie would absolutely love you for who you are 🥰 (if you're looking for a best friends to lovers fic with our man, check out my thread the needle series!)

I hate the miscommunication trope too as a reader but man i do love writing it LMFAO

[krykir-blog]

My Experience With Transitioning

fuck me im just copying and pasting what I’ve done up until now

Info already so right now i think im nonbinary but i think i might be completely trans idk (edit later in time: i can say for sure I am completely trans, not just nonbinary.), ive felt this way for a while and my bud sen helped me figure it all out bc i was hella confused and i felt very masculine. A year and a few months ago I cut my hair super short and realized that this was how I've always wanted it because oh my god if i ever grew long hair again id want to die, i hate it and i hated how I looked. So that was that and i was like that for a while and I think sometime during the summer of 2015 i figured out what I wanted to be called (ryan). I started out w/ having people on the internet call me that and it was awesome, but kinda weird having people in real life call me by my birth name and it was really odd. Then October came and my stepcousin was getting married- during that wedding was when i told my dad and stepmum i wanted to be called ryan so I consider that to be the time when I actually started transitioning. It took a painfully long time to get my mother on board to be honest, her boyfriend (who is now her ex) was actually down with it right away but of course he didn't call me or my brother that because it would've been awkward, but we had some late night talks about it frequently. When they broke up it was kinda iffy but I think it was soon after that happened that she started calling me and my brother by our preferred names. At a party my parents went to one night they told all their friends about me and my brother and we've been enrolled in a study, which is 6 MRI's total. I've already had 3 MRI's and let me tell you, they suck, but I think later next year I'm gonna have to get my next round- just basically contribution to help trans people or anyone taking hormones to transition. This year I got into high school and I'm going to a place that's pretty far away from where my last school was, so no one there knows me or that I'm female- I'm completely authentic and I think that's pretty cool, it's what I wanted. So far I think that's all you need to know lmao if I have more info to put down i probably will. Thank you guys for the support, i love you <3 8/29/16 First injection of testosterone. No changes yet ofc, but I found that I was hardly hurt by the needle so now I'm a lot more excited lmao. (Dose amount is currently 0.1 ML) 9/5/16 Second injection. Of course, no changes yet, so there's not much to say except this was my first time doing it at home. stepmum did it tbh, it still surprises me at how much it doesnt hurt lmao 9/12/16 Third injection bois. No really noticeable changes yet however i think i have a bit more hair growth from where the bellybutton is down to the nether areas which is still something and I'll take it xD I'm starting to think I prefer shots in the arm tho. Surprisingly they don't hurt as much as far as I can tell?? it's pretty neat lmao 9/19/16 Still no noticeable changes. I can now say for sure that shots hurt less in the arm than the leg, surprisingly enough at least for me lmao one month b o i s 9/26/16 (sorry for being super late with updating this one) still no noticeable changes yet, dosage is still small as all hell >> 10/3/16 No noticeable changes that I can identify, but I have a friend who told me that my voice is deeper. regardless of that, it's not at all by much at least to me and there's still nothing super noticeable and it's rather irritating. 10/7/16 Not a shot, but my first MRI after getting the three baseline scans before I got testosterone. I got my blood drawn more than I ever have and it got to the point where my vision became brightly dotted and my ears started ringing like mad, it was awful, i thought i was gonna pass out. But the MRI itself was actually a lot better than my last three scans, theyve made so many improvements to make it less anxiety inducing. 4/6 MRIs done, 1/3 blood draws done. 10/10/16 SEVENTH SHOT OF T I'VE BEEN OVER THE MOON TODAY THO 'CAUSE I'M GETTING MY DANK ASS FRIEND A BINDER AS fOR the actual T, I haven't noticed any super big changes but my friends are like "yeah jesus christ ur voice is deeper" so I GUESS THATS THAT I also started recording my voice after the sixth shot so ill keep up w/ that too as much as I can 10/17/16 Still no noticeable changes to me, however we got new needles and the measurements are different and it's weird but ye nothing super exciting to say I guess hhh sorry for being so slow at updating this rip 10/24/16 This time the needle really hurt and idk why but oh well. Still no noticeable changes besides more hair growth on my legs and the happy trail area. I compared my voice now to my 6th shot and there's no distinct difference >> i really wish my dosage was higherrrr Also for some reason I keep having dreams of me with longer hair?? it's really not okay :'D I don't recognize pictures of myself with long hair anymore tho so I guess that's something. 10/31/16 -ok so i dont remember getting a shot this day but w/e, im late to updating it- still no noticeable changes 11/7/16 SO I GAVE MYSELF A SHOT FOR THE FIRST TIME AND IT WAS AWFUL 1- I PRICKED MY FINGER AND IT STARTED BLEEDING A LOT AND IT STILL HURTS 2- WHEN I ACTUALLY PUT IT IN MY ARM I DIDNT PUT IT IN DEEP ENOUGH SO IT ALL STARTED COMING OUT AND I WAS BLEEDING A LOT IM SICK FROM SCHOOL TODAY AND I HAD DETERMINATION TO DO IT BUT I DIDNT DO WELL 11/14/16 soRRY FOR BEING AWFUL AT UPDATING i had a really shitty monday this most recent monday but its ok my friend brought their trans bf over and watched me and my borther put in our shots and it was chill no noticeable changes to report i dont think 11/21/16 Nothing special to report, the needle kinda stung tho oddly 11/28/16 AAAND MY DOSAGE IS NOW 0.2 BOIS I GO BACK IN 3 MONTHS AND ITLL PROBS BE UPPED TO 0.3 BUT IM EXCITED I loved the nurse who drew my blood lmao she was really cool, i love the people who work in that office so much. They're all so nice ;v; I have a bit more acne and my doctor said my voice sounded a bit deeper, so I guess I'll take it. Things should hopefully speed up at 0.2. 12/5/16 Second shot on 0.2! It didn't hurt as bad as the last one which is good~ I've been noticing more acne on my face nd shoulders which is also hella //well in progress terms it is 12/12/16 YOU GUYS MY VOICE IS GETTING MORE RASPY AND I CAN CRACK IT ALL OVER THE PLACE EASIER THAN I COULD BEFORE ITS NOT SUPER NOTICEABLE YET BUT IM GETTING THERE IM EXCITE SORRY FOR BEING SHITTY AT UPDATING THIS ITS OK 12/19/16 BREATHES NOTHING SUPER NOTEWORTHY BUt my voice iS noticeably going down- not a ton buT AGAIN ITS GETTING THERE ;V; My arm really hurts tho for the first time after and idk why 'cause the shot iddnt hurt at all 12/25/16 Not a shot but just a lil random update ;;v; MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ERRYONE BY THE WAY, I HOPE YOU ALL HAd a great day! sO onto the stuff Today I got an assload of money and I'm deciding to spend a lot of it on a packer and a packing harness. I already bought the harness but I'm gonna have my dad order the packer since there's no good ones on amazon hhhh buT YE IM PUMPED ILL HAVE A BULGE 12/30/16 HOLY SHIT YOU GUYS MY VOICE IS GETTING REALLY NOTICEABLY DEEP IM LITERALLY SCREAMING [link] 1/5/17 I GOT MY PACKER MOTHERFUCKERS ITS HUGE AND ITS GREAT AND IVE GOT A DICK NOW 1/9/17 This is the day I officially became male. This is the day I officially became Ryan. I never have to write my birth name ever again. I am so fucking happy. The judge was super super nice and I was anxious as fuck but it ended up super well. Voice is still getting deeper and im getting hairier in some places, it's great~

[viralhottopics]

Were on the Brink of a Revolution in Crazy-Smart Digital Assistants

Heres a quick story youve probably heard before, followed by one you probably havent. In 1979 a young Steve Jobs paid a visit to Xerox PARC, the legendary R&D lab in Palo Alto, California, and witnessed a demonstration of something now called the graphical user interface. An engineer from PARC used a prototype mouse to navigate a computer screen studded with icons, drop-down menus, and windows that overlapped each other like sheets of paper on a desktop. It was unlike anything Jobs had seen before, and he was beside himself. Within 10 minutes, he would later say, it was so obvious that every computer would work this way someday.

As legend has it, Jobs raced back to Apple and commanded a team to set about replicating and improving on what he had just seen at PARC. And with that, personal computing sprinted off in the direction it has been traveling for the past 40 years, from the first Macintosh all the way up to the iPhone. This visual mode of computing ended the tyranny of the command linethe demanding, text-heavy interface that was dominant at the timeand brought us into a world where vastly more people could use computers. They could just point, click, and drag.

In the not-so-distant future, though, we may look back at this as the wrong PARC-related creation myth to get excited about. At the time of Jobs visit, a separate team at PARC was working on a completely different model of human-computer interaction, today called the conversational user interface. These scientists envisioned a world, probably decades away, in which computers would be so powerful that requiring users to memorize a special set of commands or workflows for each action and device would be impractical. They imagined that we would instead work collaboratively with our computers, engaging in a running back-and-forth dialog to get things done. The interface would be ordinary human language.

Pipe Down, Jarvis

For decades, the talking tech in movies has eclipsed anything weve been able to build in the real world. Thats finally starting to change.

Computer from Star Trek | A kind of proto-Google with a voice, the Enterprises computer provides status updates, calculations and tea, Earl Grey, hot.

HAL 9000 from 2001: A Space Odyssey | HAL, the psychotic AI with an FM-DJ voice, is able to control every last detail of a mission to Jupiter.

KITT from Knight Rider | Michael Knights in-dash AI partner is sarcastic, indestructible, and always ready to get Knight out of a jam.

Jarvis from Iron Man | You never see Jarvis, but his diagnostics, worried nagging, and instant calculations are crucial to Iron Mans superheroness.

Samantha from Her | She starts by reading his emailand eventually becomes much more than a helpful assistant in Theodore Twomblys ear.

One of the scientists in that group was a guy named Ron Kaplan, who today is a stout, soft-spoken man with a gray goatee and thinning hair. Kaplan is equal parts linguist, psychologist, and computer scientista guy as likely to invoke Chomskys theories about the construction of language as he is Moores law. He says that his team got pretty far in sketching out one crucial component of a working conversational user interface back in the 70s; they rigged up a system that allowed you to book flights by exchanging typed messages with a computer in normal, unencumbered English. But the technology just wasnt there to make the system work on a large scale. It wouldve cost, I dont know, a million dollars a user, he says. They needed faster, more distributed processing and smarter, more efficient computers. Kaplan thought it would take about 15 years.

Forty years later, Kaplan says, were ready. And so is the rest of the world, it turns out.

Today, Kaplan is a vice president and distinguished scientist at Nuance Communications, which has become probably the biggest player in the voice interface business: It powers Fords in-car Sync system, was critical in Siris development, and has partnerships across nearly every industry. But Nuance finds itself in a crowded marketplace these days. Nearly every major tech companyfrom Amazon to Intel to Microsoft to Googleis chasing the sort of conversational user interface that Kaplan and his colleagues at PARC imagined decades ago. Dozens of startups are in the game too. All are scrambling to come out on top in the midst of a powerful shift under way in our relationship with technology. One day soon, these companies believe, you will talk to your gadgets the way you talk to your friends. And your gadgets will talk back. They will be able to hear what you say and figure out what you mean.

If youre already steeped in todays technology, these new tools will extend the reach of your digital life into places and situations where the graphical user interface cannot safely, pleasantly, or politely go. And the increasingly conversational nature of your back-and-forth with your devices will make your relationship to technology even more intimate, more loyal, more personal.

But the biggest effect of this shift will be felt well outside Silicon Valleys core audience. What Steve Jobs saw in the graphical user interface back in 1979 was a way to expand the popular market for computers. But even the GUI still left huge numbers of people outside the light of the electronic campfire. As elegant and efficient as it is, the GUI still requires humans to learn a computers language. Now computers are finally learning how to speak ours. In the bargain, hundreds of millions more people could gain newfound access to tech.

Voice interfaces have been around for years, but lets face it: Thus far, theyve been pretty dumb. We need not dwell on the indignities of automated phone trees (If youre calling to make a payment, say payment). Even our more sophisticated voice interfaces have relied on speech but somehow missed the power of language. Ask Google Now for the population of New York City and it obliges. Ask for the location of the Empire State Building: good to go. But go one logical step further and ask for the population of the city that contains the Empire State Building and it falters. Push Siri too hard and the assistant just refers you to a Google search. Anyone reared on scenes of Captain Kirk talking to the Enterprises computer or of Tony Stark bantering with Jarvis cant help but be perpetually disappointed.

Ask around Silicon Valley these days, though, and you hear the same refrain over and over: Its different now.

One hot day in early June, Keyvan Mohajer, CEO of SoundHound, shows me a prototype of a new app that his company has been working on in secret for almost 10 years. You may recognize SoundHound as the name of a popular music-recognition appthe one that can identify a tune for you if you hum it into your phone. It turns out that app was largely just a way of fueling Mohajers real dream: to create the best voice-based artificial-intelligence assistant in the world.

The prototype is called Hound, and its pretty incredible. Holding a black Nexus 5 smartphone, Mohajer taps a blue and white microphone icon and begins asking questions. He starts simply, asking for the time in Berlin and the population of Japan. Basic search-result stufffollowed by a twist: What is the distance between them? The app understands the context and fires back, About 5,536 miles.

Mohajer rattles off a barrage of questions, and the app answers every one. Correctly.

Then Mohajer gets rolling, smiling as he rattles off a barrage of questions that keep escalating in complexity. He asks Hound to calculate the monthly mortgage payments on a million-dollar home, and the app immediately asks him for the interest rate and the term of the loan before dishing out its answer: $4,270.84.

What is the population of the capital of the country in which the Space Needle is located? he asks. Hound figures out that Mohajer is fishing for the population of Washington, DC, faster than I do and spits out the correct answer in its rapid-fire robotic voice. What is the population and capital for Japan and China, and their areas in square miles and square kilometers? And also tell me how many people live in India, and what is the area code for Germany, France, and Italy? Mohajer would keep on adding questions, but he runs out of breath. Ill spare you the minute-long response, but Hound answers every question. Correctly.

Hound, which is now in beta, is probably the fastest and most versatile voice recognition system unveiled thus far. It has an edge for now because it can do speech recognition and natural language processing simultaneously. But really, its only a matter of time before other systems catch up.

After all, the underlying ingredientswhat Kaplan calls the gating technologies necessary for a strong conversational interfaceare all pretty much available now to whoevers buying. Its a classic story of technological convergence: Advances in processing power, speech recognition, mobile connectivity, cloud computing, and neural networks have all surged to a critical mass at roughly the same time. These tools are finally good enough, cheap enough, and accessible enough to make the conversational interface realand ubiquitous.

But its not just that conversational technology is finally possible to build. Theres also a growing need for it. As more devices come online, particularly those without screensyour light fixtures, your smoke alarmwe need a way to interact with them that doesnt require buttons, menus, and icons.

When I started using Alexa late last year, I discovered it could tell me the weather, answer basic factual questions, create shopping lists that later appear in text on my smartphone, play music on commandnothing too transcendent. But Alexa quickly grew smarter and better. It got familiar with my voice, learned funnier jokes, and started being able to run multiple timers simultaneously (which is pretty handy when your cooking gets a little ambitious). In just the seven months between its initial beta launch and its public release in 2015, Alexa went from cute but infuriating to genuinely, consistently useful. I got to know it, and it got to know me.

This gets at a deeper truth about conversational tech: You only discover its capabilities in the course of a personal relationship with it. The big players in the industry all realize this and are trying to give their assistants the right balance of personality, charm, and respectful distanceto make them, in short, likable. In developing Cortana, for instance, Microsoft brought in the videogame studio behind Halowhich inspired the name Cortana in the first placeto turn a disembodied voice into a kind of character. That wittiness and that toughness come through, says Mike Calcagno, director of Cortanas engineering team. And they seem to have had the desired effect: Even in its early days, when Cortana was unreliable, unhelpful, and dumb, people got attached to it.

Theres a strategic reason for this charm offensive. In their research, Microsoft, Nuance, and others have all come to the same conclusion: A great conversational agent is only fully useful when its everywhere, when it can get to know you in multiple contextslearning your habits, your likes and dislikes, your routine and schedule. The way to get there is to have your AI colonize as many apps and devices as possible.

To that end, Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Nuance, and SoundHound are all offering their conversational platform technology to developers everywhere. The companies know that you are liable to stick with the conversational agent that knows you best. So get ready to meet some new disembodied voices. Once you pick one, you might never break up.

David Pierce (@piercedavid) is a senior writer at WIRED.

Read more: http://bit.ly/2jcdA2u

from Were on the Brink of a Revolution in Crazy-Smart Digital Assistants