#things you wish were ai generated but aren't

[rungian]

Hey remember when they wallpapered a steam locomotive?

[eltristan]

NGL #45212 looks much better without wallpaper, regardless of the marque of wallpaper paste ...but all I can think of are the poor volunteers at the heritage railway who had to scrape it all off afterwards...

Did a little more digging and managed to find the original advert for the wallpaper livery 😅 (I could not for the life of me get the audio to record so closed captions will have to do)

[katyspersonal]

you would be alot happier if you got off tumblr/fromsoftware games discourse btw

I would be a lot happier if normies like you stopped infesting the fandoms. No, in all seriousness, I have no sympathy for people who think caring strongly about their interests and creativity and community and wanting the fandom to stop being toxic is some terrible thing.

Fandoms are primarily for autists, geeks, nerds, cringe weirdos, loosers and other people who could not or did not want to find happiness in the routines of real world, not for normies who just cOnSuMe CoNtEnT in their spare time or advertise themselves. If you think being a fan and being in a fandom is not about strong passion and investment, fine, but then you are a GUEST in fandoms as a concept, not the PURPOSE of them. And if you think that getting angry at seeing people mistreat each other over headcanons and preferences and not wanting them to kill down others creative spark before it could become a fire over petty snobbish reasons is something "wrong" that I should "overcome", then YOU should be the one to get out of the internets, because clearly you are on the "but people in the internet aren't real humans and nothing that happens here is real 🥺" side.

I am irritated because humans are irritating, not because I am using Tumblr or like Soulsborne. When I am at work or other place IRL, I likewise scold people for being unfair, and if you bothered learning more about me before sending your stupid passive-aggressive message, you'd know that I've gotten into literal fights at my work because when others put up with dumb shit our coworkers did for the sake of avoiding extra stress, I called them out. And they didn't take it well because they were drunk and aggressive people in general. Also a recent funny situation was when a customer started to boast to his friend about using AI "art" and training it to basically make scripts and videos for him requiring minimum effort, on his words I quote, "I like creating so much" I straight up interrupted my work to scold him for being just a lazy thief, "loving creativity" so much that he did everything in his powers to NOT create and parasiting on hard work of other people. Then I call my mom to argue about artistic desicions of directors of the movies she unfairly trashed because of her very narrow idea of what makes "good art". Do you see it? That the real life is not some safe haven from the internet?

I am "unhappy" because someone does or says dumb shit that isn't fair and then people like you wish people like me were silent about it and this is what society stands on and will always stand on. I am just a person like this. And the question of how I am not fired and nor even got a trouble from my boss goes into the same place as the question of why you bothered sending me a passive-aggressive anon if you by your own admission don't think anything about "fandom discourse" deserves any attention. Just block me to not see my rants and go back in your circle of fans who apparently feel superior over "not caring". Hypocrite.

[jrwiconfessions]

I've been in the process of writing a self insert x canon character fic with a PC from one of the relatively recent campaigns. And I wish I could say it was ironic or a crackfic, but no. It's an honest to god angst filled slow burn staring a character that carries several aspects of me that I thought would either jive well with the PC or terribly contrast them to the point of conflict.

And I genuinely both love and hate how much thought I've actually put into it. I hate and love how much work I put into it.

It feels wrong, for a lot of reasons. I could not find from any of the JRWI guys if they were necessarily comfortable with something like this. Looking for their boundaries on these sort of subjects felt like trying to read books from a forgotten flooded library. And the fact that OC/Self inserts is just not a thing I see too often with this fandom makes me think they aren't comfortable with that, or that it's some sort of unwritten rule.

Hence, this fic will probably never see the light of day. It'll be sent to my close friends at some point, and live in the back of my mind for a while but this is the only time anyone else will hear about it. Good day.

It's not often I respond to an ask, but I think this one is important. Idk there's an expectation from some these days for any fanwork created to be completely sterile and pure "too good for this world", and policed mostly by other fans using the concept of morailty or boundaries against others. But really, fanworks are a way of interacting and interpreting the source material. Fanworks are for the people enjoying the material, not necessarily the creators. It's good that you are making an effort to be respectul towards the creators boundaries, but at the end of the day, it's your work and you've transformed the source material into something new and awesome. If you're asking me, I wouldn't feel bad about self insert/canon, it's a part of fandom in general, and even though it's smaller, it's still a valid part of the fandom experience. It's not up to the creator to say how and how not you can interact with their work, it's out into the world now, besides plagarism fuck plagarism and especially fuck ai.

TLDR: Fanfiction is called "fan fiction" not "for the creator fiction".

-mod

[raindrop-on-a-spiderweb]

Appointment in Samara is one of my favorites ever. I think about it a lot. It’s incredibly well written, and to this day, I’m still in awe of how you managed to make a blowjob far more frightening than what they did in chapter 8 or before and after that. I've never felt such paralyzing fear before, and I dare say they were being mild about it, at least compared to that sick film they did to her. It felt like I was truly there, and I could feel the men's jeans against my skin and hear their distant conversations. 

What made you write AIS? Who's your favorite character in it? 

It's totally alright to just ignore this. I hope you are well, and congratulations!!💛💛

It's really touching that you sent this. I always felt that gustatorial sensation is better than any other way of getting emotions across. In the moment, you aren't considering your emotions, just going off synapses and sensations. Being viscerally frightened is a very biological reaction, as is being very happy, or deeply angry. And honestly, sometimes it's the implicit threat that is more frightening than the threat carried out. There is nothing worse than something heavy hanging over your head in which only your mind can complete. Show, don't tell, is my shibboleth.

I have always had a general interest in geopolitics, as well as general black-ops and undercover work. I had been considering an espionage story set in the USSR for a long time before I switched ideas, and some of its elements were incorporated into Appointment in Samarra. But the general hectic lifestyle of a mercenary lent more of a flexible plotline and plot twists, and so I pivoted to something more modern. Soldier of Fortune magazine, Frederick Forsyth, The World's Most Dangerous Places (this one mainly, Coskun Aral is an incredible war journalist), and about a thousand documentaries were some of my inspirations. Things didn't exactly go as planned–I had started with a grand, world-spanning adventure diluted with espionage, political intrigue and backstabbing, but as it went on It gradually became less of a world spanning adventure and more of a contained emotional drama.

I like Tatiana, honestly. She's just a normal woman roped into a scheme way beyond her comprehension, and who even when she gets an inkling of the danger she’s in, she is still ready to throw down for the sake of her friend. I wrote her character before I met my Russian fiance but it's kind of funny how accurate it is lol. Russians tend not to make friends easily, but they're very loyal friends towards the ones they have.

Conna and Fox too–I like how Conna's backstory unfurled and how her character bloomed as the story went along, and Fox's shady backstory and unstable temperament.

Also, I unironically have a soft spot for the Romanian hooker. I love her bile and honesty and kind of wish I'd written more scenes with her. 

Thank you so much for your ask, it put such a smile on my face and I absolutely loved answering it. I hope to finish Samarra soon!!

P.S. for those who liked the Moroccan arc, this is a really good example of lodgings in North Africa, tiling, bedding, decor.

https://maps.app.goo.gl/zmxPNsjKfnzcU6k96

[trashyandtiredsol]

UPDATED: December 23rd, 2024

My Pinterest

My Twitch

My YouTube

ART FIGHT My Art Fight Profile

[ART FIGHT ID CARDS MASTERPOST]

Arcane Season 2 Live Reaction [Currently For Act 3]

[COMMISSION INFO] OPEN

Full Sona Picture Art Piece

Bust Up Sona Picture Art Piece

Updated Sona Reference Sheet

|TO HELP A CAT WHEN CHOKING|

|ADULTING CHEAT SHEET FOR Y'ALL AND MYSELF|

|ALSO HERE'S WHY KOSA IS FUCKED UP|

|MY TUMBLR FAM TREE FOR Y'ALL INTERESTED|

|A WAY TO DEAL WITH YOUR ART BEING USED FOR AI|

|SOME WAYS TO START MAKING ART|

|SOME HEART ATTACK INFO TO KNOW|

|MY THOUGHTS ON AI ART|

|WIKIPEDIA MONSTER COMPILATION PAGES|

|QUICK PSA FOR Y'ALL THAT NEED IT|

|SKIN TONES IN ART|

|WRITING DESCRIPTION NOTES|

|HOW TO CANCEL YOUR ADOBE SUBSCRIPTION FREE|

|DON'T RELY ON AN APP TO FORAGE PLEASE|

|TUMBLR BLOG TERMINATION SUBMISSION FORM|

|WHAT TO DO IF YOU SUDDENLY FIND YOURSELF HOMELESS|

|SIMPLE INSTRUCTIONS ON EVERYDAY TASKS YOU MAY NOT KNOW HOW TO DO|

|33 THINGS TO EAT WHEN YOU HAVE NO FOOD AT HOME|

|PLEASE WEAR SUNSCREEN EVERYONE|

|COOKIE IN A MUG RECIPE FOR Y'ALL|

|REF RECS FOR WHUMP WRITERS (and something to come back to for my au)|

Reblogs On My Art Are Greatly Appreciated!

Please Do NOT Repost, Edit, Trace, Use, And/Or Sell My Art‼️

ASK For Anything Else Regarding My Art‼️

Life Death and Love - Master Post

-> |#Life Death and Love au|

Water Strider (X-Men/Spidersona/OC) - Master Post

-> |#sol spidersona/oc|

|Art Requests Open!|

Personal Info And Tags (Only Some That I Actually Remembered To Add :P) Under The Cut

Multi-Fandom Blog (Don't be surprised when you follow me for one thing then I post about another thing).

My name's Sol or Solstice! (On here that is, not my actual name, tho I wish it was sometimes :/)

17 (Birthday's May 2nd, 2007 !!)

🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈 Demigirl and Queer! 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈

Recently found the term demigirl and I quite like it for myself so- ye I'm adding it here :3

Pronouns are He/She/They (mainly She/They tho)

-> |#sol full of art| my art tag

-> |#she/they| the pronouns posts I've made for myself

-> |#pinned post| important stuff

-> |#my saved art tips|

-> |#my saved tips|

-> |#nice music| It's just music I've reblogged that I like and maybe you'll enjoy it too!!

-> |#venting me| my vent tag, feel free to ignore!

-> |#answering asks|

-> |#nice convos!!| for conversations I have!! Kinda forget to tag this sometimes (a lot of times) and some of the conversations aren't really conversations either

-> /#absolutely/ plus some other word like fabulous or love it or lovely or gorgeous or stunning or love this concept or some other words I don't remember at the moment (Try searching absolutely in my blog and hopefully all the reblogs I did will show!)

-> |#saving!!| for some saved stuff I wanna look back on

-> |#sol full of texts| for my text posts

-> |#sol full of asks| for answered asks

-> |#tag chain|

-> |#picrew| for picrew's I do

-> |#sol's sona fanart| for were other's draw my sona!!! :D

-> |#ask game| for ask game reblogs

-> |#blum pirates| for the Blum Pirate Crew im a part of! All the info on that is in this tag

-> |#foodie au bluecrop blueberry| for my foodie au oc

-> |#tmnt foodie au| general tag for the foodie au

-> |#collabs| collabs I've done with others

-> |#art| art from reblogs and very occasionally my art if I add that tag to those art posts and is also a huge compilation of a whole bunch of art from different fandoms (you can click on other specific tags on most of those to find other related stuff I've reblogged)

-> |#Garfield Logan| and |#Beast Boy|

-> |#dtiysol💚| My DTIY's!

(70+ Follower DTIY) so far it's only Blue from the foodie au ( participant's: 01 ) Deadline: December 1st, 2023 (only adding a deadline so I don't end up forgetting about this after 2 months)

(Finished)

(100+ Follower DTIY) for my Life Death and Love au

( participant's: 00 ) Deadline: None

(Permanently Ongoing I Guess? )

[valdevia]

The amount of times I see you on my tl and have to remember it's not real is wild. I just saw your fungal grandma on twt and thought once again that was something real since your art and especially captions are so realistic. Since there are some fascinating things that did happen and some are still unexplained is horror like yours esp the medical ones not so unbelievable if you looked into past events. Let's just hope those won’t become reality. Your creatures however? I wish. Some are maybe more obvious but some real animals get often called aliens so some aren't that impossible. That plus how much is still unexplored. I really love horror like yours that could be real but isn't with loving details even if they're just one offs with not much info. Generic horror also got a place but man I wish there were more artists like you or that they would be more well known. I only know a few and it's a shame. Love your work and, since I saw someone else who does similar stuff being asked a lot, hope you won't have to deal too much w people asking/accusing you of ai work. It's a shame real artists get tangled up in this esp since some deliberately choose to make their art look off like you do for effect.

Thank you so much! And yeah, lately I've had a lot of people accusing my work of being AI-generated. Feels like I get a few comments like that in every popular post lately! Or just people saying "phew I'm glad it's not AI" when I mention it's made in photoshop.

I thought about putting some kind of "Not AI" disclaimer on my profile, but I doubt that would stop these people since they don't really read the bio.

[sharpth1ng]

hey again!! thank you for answering my ask, and for the clarification! i figured you probably had it all sorted out because you're a grown adult and seem to know your stuff but i still said something anyways just in case haha

i should have been more clear with my original ask but i myself still find all this stuff quite confusing so thats my bad sorry 😞 basically it has nothing to do with the labour of printing or if the company publishes it or not, it’s because fan fiction is already grey area, it’s ok when no one is making money off it. as soon as at any point someone makes any money off it, like these printing companies, or commissioning someone on etsy, or even just going somewhere local to get the pages printed, it now becomes illegal - fanworks infringe on the creator's intellectual property and you need a licencing agreement if it's not public domain etc blah blah blah you get it lol

as soon as the word "pay" comes in, it's illegal - you can't pay for anything, even if you are the one that wrote the fanfic (which fucking sucks). but your merch and stuff is completely fine because the references are based on your original writing, like theyre not gonna be like "how dare you sell this tshirt with a bloody B on it thats illegal!!" bcs that whole thing is entirely unique to your work and has no ties to the original property 👍

but thats just my understanding of it, and the specifications of it can get really confusing!! same thing happens with fanart too, technically you aren't allowed to sell fanart - that's why people often only sell it irl at cons to avoid copyright strikes. but then again there is people selling fanart on redbubble and in fanzines etc so like, i honestly don't know how that side of it works as well?? i think its under a different law since it’s a transformative work maybe...??

its all very confusing i wish clarification was more clear 😭 but you sound like you've looked into it and know what you're doing so thats fantastic, and i'm glad to hear. thank you again for answering so quickly i dont mean to be a bother. ur a talented writer and i loved debaser, keep it up 😊

Yeah no problem! I do appreciate the effort to give a heads up. And like to be fair I’ve done my research but I’m not a copyright lawyer or a legal scholar and the law on this stuff is very confusing to me.

In terms of the fanart stuff my understanding is that it is illegal to sell but for the most part fan Artist are too small for copyright holders to go after, it’s just not really a thing that’s done for the most part. There’s even a number of situations where selling fanart led to those artists being directly employed by the copyright holders. I think it’s very rare for fan artists to get sued for copy right and the only examples I know of are from Disney.

For the most part fanart sold is illegal, but it’s similar to torrenting content where its not really enforced so people do it anyways, and often at a pretty large scale. The stuff on red bubble and in fanzines is also illegal as far as I know, it doesn’t count as transformative.

Honestly I think it’s very unlikely that anyone printing my work would get targeted like that, mostly because this fandom is small and I’m even smaller. I only have a little over 1000 followers here and while that’s more followers than I’ve ever had before in my life it’s pretty much microscopic on the internet. Beyond that there’s less than a handful of printed copies as far as I’m aware.

Honeslty I have a lot of issues with copyright law- obviously it needs to apply to things like generative AI which is essentially a very environmentally damaging collage machine, but in terms of fanart and fanfiction I really don’t see how it could be construed as taking away profit from copyright holders.

People for the most part only read my work because they were already into scream, and a number of people have even told me my work got them to watch scream so if anything I’ve created profit for them. Fandom is the reason these original works have the legacy they do, and fanworks are a massive part of that because you can only consume the original content so many times before you get bored.

Beyond that we wouldn’t have some of our most highly acclaimed cultural works if copyright law had existed hundreds of years ago. Like, Shakespeare would have been fucked.

Alright lmao rant over. Tl;dr I’m doing my best to do this all in a legal way, but it’s good for folks to be aware that there may be an issue with the legality of printing my work even if they aren’t paying me. I think it’s unlikely any of you will face repercussions because this fandom is miniscule but if you’re worried maybe don’t post on Tumblr- but feel free to dm me or post in my discord 👍

[luukka]

I watched Wish recently, and regarding what people had said, it wasn't bad.

It wasn't good either but it wasn't bad it was... meh.

(Might be spoilers but yeah, if you didn't/don't want to watch it my little analysis won't really interest you)

Now as a Disney and animation fan, I must talk about it because I watched it very late and still manage to bear my own opinion even if no one asked for it so here it is yoohoo

Did I laugh ? Yes two are three times (and no joke, I was the only one cause I'm an easy-laughter); did I smile ? Sure; did I find some music interesting ? Kinda; were the colors pretty ? Yes; the animation for a disney ? Err... m'k.

I get people that like it, there are things that are interesting, it... passes the time, you can show it to toddlers, but yeah, I mostly get people that didn't because I was kinda disappointed. If you take one thing apart from the other, it's quite awful, and when you put it all together it's a "hell no", especially because it's supposed to be the 100th Disney classic. I mean, I get the point of foreshadowing old classics, but some were really messed up like- some characters are just carbon copies of old design ? Asha's best friend is Snow white if she was a disabled four-eyed girl, the tired guy looks like the rich guy in Big Hero 6 and Bambi ? Little John ?? Can't you do that any clearer, we're fucking blind here.... I mean, ok I laughed when I heard that but I don't count I'm an easy laughter, wtf was that, like- I couldn't help but look at my brother like "did you see the same shit I just saw ? And you forced me to come and pay for that ?" and I was mostly laughing out of embarrassment because I WAS ALONE GIGGLING TEARS OF WTF-NESS

Some things were cool I guess, like the mirror effects when Magnifico sings I think ? And at the end when he elsa'd his castle to take the star. The Jafar effect wasn't bad either, but because it's Jafar effect and Jafar is a fucking badass, same with Elsa-ying the castle, because this scene in frozen was very cool

I felt bad at first but I must say, the songs are very disappointing. Like I wasn't expecting much, and it sure stuck in the head easily but that doesn't mean it's nice. The ones I appreciated were the song about the wishes (the clip is pretty) and maybe the revolution song (but the clip was urgh and why the hell they look so lifeless ???) I get why people said it was made by AI lol

In terms of character, except the Queen and grandpa, I didn't like any of them. Like usually I can't hate or dislike a Disney character, but here ? None of them was fine to me. Actually, I felt nothing from them. The villain was erh... basic I guess, he could be nice like the woman in The Rescuers but no he was, well basic "I'm perfect they should be grateful but they are not so let's become an asshole !" So yeah. Disappointed. He was a better villain than Hans, tho, maybe because Hans wasn't supposed to be a villain at first and that Magnifico was like Jafar, Evil Queen and Scar had a baby. Also, it seems to me like they didn't have a few or any -like ANY- personality, like- I CALLED THE TREASON OUT THE MOMENT I SAW THE LIFELESS BIG BOY COMON'

Now, I'm coming to people saying all the kids love it and I'm too old for that: no. No, I'm not too old for that, Disney is for everyone. No, not all the kids will love it, kids get easily bored, and this movie isn't very attractive. I bet if I show this to my nieces and nephews and siblings, they wouldn't care less - and they already don't very much care about movies in general when you put one for them. There were at least four kids in the theater and none laughed, or sounded interested, one preferred to play on his daddy's phone ??? well, I know all kids aren't like that, but really, this movie wasn't made to content the kids, it was made to content the fans clearly, that is why the movie isn't good.

Anyways, if you enjoyed it good for you ! The colors are pretty and the technic used is interesting, the chara design of Asha and the Queen are pretty, I can't say anything for the rest, tho, because the bg design is just resuming the old (and new *cough* encanto *cough*) classics anyway, but less good at guess... but really, if you like it, good for you, and say why, so I don't have a bad souvenir of it forever lol

[jacksmusesdrv3]

Awesome! I'm just gonna list them. Sorry this got a bit long I hope this can be entertaining. 🥲

The time loop game, where the game has already been going on for who knows how many rounds by the time we start playing it. By that I mean that the reason there need to be two survivors at the end is that one person needs to become the new mastermind, while the other is given two options: Freedom and leave the new mastermind behind, or stay and see all their dead friends revived. And so far, no one was able to resist seeing their fallen friends again, so every time the survivors stay, get their memories wiped, and everyone meets anew like they never knew each other. The way to break through this cycle is that the longer this endless game goes on, the more people have this sense of deja vu and almost-memories. Perhaps someone might also stumble upon the dreaded cauldron-on-the-head memory machine in a hidden room.

A sort of B-side to the above, everyone but the two survivors are clones. Each loop is a new batch of clones with implanted memories. Everyone has been dead for a long time.

Instead of opening the vault door to see the earth apocalypse, we were on the moon all along. The virus happened, but the meteors happened. Or maybe the other way around. The group was sent into space as a sort of safety net for humanity before Monokuma messed it up by wiping and replacing their memories. Not even Monokuma (An AI Despair Girls style) knows what earth is like at the moment though. It's up to the survivors to make it down to earth somehow and find out what's going on down there.

Idea: Since V3 is fiction, it is impossible to 'step into' reality the way the ending is shown to us. Instead, you step into another realm of fiction. The surviving three step into the light only to find themselves in a wacky magical girl realm or a western or fantasy elf land or some such. They find other versions of their dead friends, who can either be reminded of their V3 past (but why would you remind them of this pain) or not (they aren't really them, they are literal AU versions).

The survivors DO step into reality (unclear what kind. Maybe it really is peaceful, maybe it's the HPA real sort of deal) and are haunted by the dead. But they can only see them in mirrors and reflections, and they can only hear them in their dreams. Their dead friends are trying to tell them something, but what? And is this even really happening or are they wishful hallucinations?

Good ol' Shuichi is the true mastermind but it's a split personality sort of deal. The Shuichi we know genuinely doesn't know, he just sometimes blacks out and his other side does things. Sometimes that other side seeps into his day time self and he doesn't know why he said something so forcefully or lied so convincingly all of a sudden.

Spin a wheel to pin the mastermind role on a random character, see what happens.

Wow this is a bunch! I'm loving the time-loop-dejavu, sheltered-on-moon and the (cracked? Why did I think of cracked, symbolic I guess) reflections of the dead- that last one sounds ominous as heck. Fiction multiverse is wild, excuse to make variations actual mage Himiko much

I feel so vexed about the Shuichi personality one, I know we already have a Genocide Jill and all but still I'd probably do something with memory stuff generally than alters >< that said the Werewolf-style mastermind-pick on 7 could result in him being a special case in... some way (drawing a blank on how though, rip).

Thank you for sharing!

[smaller-comfort]

Well, it's the reason the story is rated M! I wish I could figure out how to tag this, but I'm pretty sure "sex from a non-human pov wherein everyone involved is completely alienated from their physical body in some way but they're just going to make the best of it" is over the character limit.

Technically the sex is not particularly explicit, but it kind of feels like it actually is, to me. I don't know anymore. I realize the line between an M and an E rating is often pretty blurry; the Ratings Police probably aren't going to arrest me for using the word "sphincter".

Anyway. Notes below the cut; you know the drill, I like to hear myself talk.

I really, really love some of the language in this, but I recognize that I may have gone overboard a little bit in places.

'I may have gone overboard' sums up my feelings about this one in general, actually. I'm not about to provide a fully annotated draft where I justify my word choice, phrasing, and characterization line-by-line, but I probably could. (I definitely could.) I kind of really, really love this story. A lot. I'm not gonna lie, I'm really proud of it, even if it probably could've been like...half as long. Anyway. You get a cookie if you can figure out which bits are my favorites.

I almost decided to rewrite this whole thing in past tense. I'm still not entirely sure I shouldn't have, but it would be way too much work at this point. I tend to write smut in present tense; make of that what you will.

The game itself has a fairly distinctive "voice," and I do try to mimic that at least a little. B'st in particular walks this funny line between a formal register (doesn't use many contractions, 'Great Alchemist') and goofiness (taking out the trash, his transformations). (When people tell me I hit the voices right it makes me giddy for hours.)

Still operating on the premise that Songsters are funky little guys and not humanoids. Don't ask me how they have sex, though, I really haven't gotten that far and I'm probably not going to. "Not like this," thanks B'st, that's extremely illuminating. He's never actually going to get around to drawing that diagram.

('Safe sex' for human/songster couplings typically involves earplugs. Ancient Repine sex ed would've been a trip.)

"Hey, v, anatomically speaking-" shhhhh. It's magic glass. Don't worry about it. (Is any of the sex here actually sexy? Is it supposed to be? These are questions I ask myself frequently; I have no answers. At any rate, I think I nailed the 'weirdly alienating with lots of feelings' vibe, and that's mostly what I was going for.)

I like to headcanon Songsters having extremely complicated extended familial structures. B'st and T'kor might not have had kids of their own, but they would have shared childrearing responsibilities for members of their extended family. In that respect, Mooncradle's communal society is very familiar to B'st.

I know about the T'kor=AI Core theory, and it feels like exactly the sort of thing where Thierry would go "Oh, I thought that one was way too obvious, actually." I kind of hate it, though, because it's too tragic and it makes me too sad.

Speaking of things that are too sad! I cut some extremely depressing dialogue about how the abandoned lab and the lost souls were actually left behind for Resh'an to find. Aephorul intended for them to be another "gift"- he knew about Resh'an's work on living glass, and what he needed to finish it. It wasn't a coincidence that all the materials Resh'an needed were there.

B'st was already aware of this; Resh'an figured it out on his own. At this point neither of them is going to bring it up. B'st assumes it will just make Resh'an feel pointlessly guilty all over again, and Resh'an...is already feeling extremely guilty about it! Imagine that.

Living Glass was supposed to be Resh'an's solution to their decaying bodies. But by now Resh'an doesn't actually think he has a strong enough will to live to survive the process anymore (as he's got the depression) and Aephorul was never a fan of the idea of having a non-organic body to begin with.

(Not to say that Resh'an doesn't have an unshakeable sense of purpose, but that's not quite the same thing. Living Glass vs Borrowed Time rules.)

When I first started this one, it actually was going to be set in the same timeline as Loser Takes All, because it was much funnier that way. (Resh'an is not equipped to handle getting laid this much.) My thought was to make it a series where various characters find increasingly ridiculous ways to pin Resh'an down and fuck him stupid, since that's...kind of a recurring theme with me, I guess! Yomara was going to be next on the list.

Somehow my scrap file is almost 4000 words long, but I didn't actually end up cutting very much. The ending got rewritten like six times; the majority of the first chapter was originally supposed to take place after the sex. It flows better this way, though.

I did cut one of my favorite lines, though, so here you go:

“You may feel conflicted about what I am now and how I came to be, but I do not. Have faith in that, if nothing else. In this moment, in this time, I am exactly as I am meant to be.”

I'm not saying I'm not gonna write that eventually, mind you. Welcome to the niche corner, etc. Yomara deserves something nice, and the Three Sisters have been eating the corners of my brain a bit lately.

(B'st/Romaya is probably more likely at this point, though.) (Shout out to that one Serai/Romaya fic on ao3 that rewired my brain slightly, you're a real one.)

I've got Winter and Spring now, so the next story in the series should be Summer. But I might have more than 4 stories to tell in this particular universe. So maybe I'll jump straight to Autumn and keep with a general theme of "seasons" for everything.

[cleanarchitectures]

Tagged by my dears @metaphrasis, @vinosities, @kjw1532. Thank you for sharing these insights, truly enjoy reading from you!

Last song: "The Nearness of You" by Bill Charlap

Favourite colour/s: Dark green, dark blue, the white of snow.

Last film/ TV series: I started showing my partner Devs (2020), a short series by Alex Garland, because we were discussing AI models at a high level and the possibility of creating simulations of life (for different purposes, finding cures etc). The show touches on some of that, only with quantum computing. Anyways I often enjoy material on the application of tech for these kind of theories.

For Karolina, I also watched Phantom Thread very recently, and it's a favorite of mine as well. One to revisit a few times and sit with my thoughts on the complexity of relationships.

Sweet/spicy/savoury: All have their place, I love sweets that aren't too sweet. A nutty black sesame dessert.

Last thing/s I googled: Stays in Yosemite. February is a busy month for Firefall, but maybe we could stay a weekend.

Current obsession/s: The cold, sunny Northern California winter. Taking it in on my bike rides to my office building, a small comfort before a work day. Weekend drives south to Monterey, or north to Point Reyes. Danish design and maybe the general Nordic way of life; I loved talking with my mother-in-law about the Icelandic tradition of letting babies sleep outside in the clean air, thoroughly adorable. Cleaning a little each day, keeping a neat wardrobe (depiling, steaming, cleaning and conditioning leather). Mascarpone.

I would tag @kxowledge, @petrichorals, @detachedperfectionist, @un-peu-de-vin, @semperfeminae and anyone else. Wishing you all a warm January!

[lesbian-forte]

I wanna say a few things about Synthesizer V, because a lot of vocal synth fans, especially of mainly Vocaloid and UTAU, tend to misconstrue intent when it comes to wishing for vocals to migrate or cross-platform on the engine.

-It isn't about 'realistic,' or at least for the most part. It isn't about disliking their classic robotic sound just because of progress. I'm gonna say it- I do dislike Vocaloid 6. I don't think that's an unpopular opinion. But I don't hate Vocaloid in general, and want badly for the software to improve.

Banks like Gumi and Una got smoother transitions and (bad) crosslang... at the cost of getting put through a white noise factory. Their V4s were much clearer and even Gumi V3 English was far more reliable, while their V6 updates sound as though someone in the recording booth is rubbing styrofoam and the mic lacks a pop filter. Supposedly in the name of the iconic 'Vocaloid sound' that the type of engine noise doesn't even resemble. And for those who like the robotic sound and don't like SynthV because it's not, I've got news for you- you can have it without the fuzz.

For one, you can tune robotically in SynthV very easily. Tune entirely manually like any non-AI program, and since there's very little of that metallic twang, certain effects just move to mixing. Rather than taking out the sound of engine noise, it's putting certain things back in instead, which is a lot easier to do than the inverse- and the option of keeping things sounding more natural and clean without all that work is a huge bonus for people who don't think that sound fits their taste or style.

I personally love robotic-sounding vocals. But a clean, clear, and fluent base render output is essential to get the most out of your sound. I love Eleanor Forte R1/lite because that's what she is. Clean, clear, and fluent. But not realistic in any sense, unless compared to previous vsynths. She's probably just an Arpasing bank with higher render quality, but she's amazing regardless. And free too!

-Accessibility. SynthV is very accessible and easy to pick up. There's a limited version to try it out and make projects at the cost of fancy features that even allows commercial use, and many voicebanks have lite versions also with limited features and no commercial use. There aren't time limits on trying out the program- and just like Vocaloid, if you tune something with one vocal you can send it to a friend to render with another. Having lite voices to work with a lower quality version of the same voice that will render it means you actually know for the most part what you'll get, save for a couple quite old exceptions.

And when you do want full versions, it's dirt cheap. It's cheaper than Cevio, and far moreso than Vocaloid or Piapro. The two most expensive voicebanks on the program convert to roughly $120USD, and they're known for their special features and high quality. Most are 60-90 for digital, and SynthV voicebanks are feature-rich with the equivalent to appends already built in.

Full versions of AI voicebanks (the current gen) are also multilingual with little quality loss between languages, mainly just an accent. No need to purchase a separate English voicebank with no appends or deal with extremely clunky input and tuning. Currently four- (soon five!!) are options usable for any voice. Japanese, Mandarin, Cantonese, English, and when testing is done, Spanish will go from being exclusive to one bank to fully available.

It's also just generally very user-friendly. Especially if you dip your toes in with the basic editor before being barraged with all the features of pro, everything is laid out simply. While the UI could use a minor revamp because it's getting crowded and being able to resize the sidebars would be nice, there isn't really anything bad to say about it. As someone who'd hardly touched vocal synths myself, I knew how to work it in hours.

Oh, the autopitch. This one is contentious. There is a certain laziness to doing plug-n-play on a cover and calling it a day, just like with any other vocal synth. However, on originals, or working with it to make sure the voice cooperates, more time can be spent on phonemes, parameters, and mixing. Calling SynthV bad because it's just 'too easy' is gatekeeping vocal synths, plain and simple. Being able to make what you want without having to manually make every single pitchbend or fight with the program before getting to do anything more interesting is a way to make people more creative, not less.

-In regards to people complaining about the updates- aside from Stardust because of her limited copies and discontinuation, previous versions are still there! Dreamtonics doesn't give companies or individuals predatory contracts that force them to stop distributing older products with the same VP or wait for years to move. They're okay with their voices being on multiple engines and still supported. You'll still get your UTAU Teto, Renri, Oscar and XYY, Cevio Rose, Popy, and Kafu, and Vocaloid Gumi, Sora, Miki, and Kiyo. And you'll get your SynthVs!

Synthesizer V, Voicepeak, and Dreamtonics are not turning into a monopoly. Vocaloid still has tenure and the current version has a backlog spanning back to V3. Cevio has some heavy hitters that make it huge in Japan. Ace Studio is big in China and has the Vsingers. If you see characters coming to SynthV, that speaks of the quality of the program and its capabilities of bringing a wider audience. It has naturalness for those that want it, high quality render output, expressiveness, fluent English for marketing to the west, and Windows, Linux, and Mac support. There's nothing wrong with wanting options, and the companies know this. It's broadening the market, not vice versa.

[sucuretcannelle]

Imperial, queen, and prince/princess for Ai, Nash, and Siran because WHY WOULD YOU TELL ME THAT CURSED KNOWLEDGE.

It wasn't that bad

IMPERIAL - How powerful is your OC? Physically, mentally, emotionally? Are they satisfied with the amount of power they have, or are they actively trying to seek more of it? What lengths would they go to obtain power?

Aibreanne: She's very strong physically, mentally, and emotionally, but she has her moments. She breaks down more often than Aquinas does, but for shorter periods of time. It's to the point where by the time most people figure out that she's having a moment, it's already over (or she's just done showing it). She generally thinks that the more power she has, the safer her loved ones are. She's been slowing down on trying to seek power just because she's busier and she's been having a bit more trouble with controlling them. Still, her morals aren't the best (even though she acts like they are), so it's not like she considers the ethical part of getting power.

Nash: Just like Ai, he's very strong in all 3 ways...but his breakdowns are far more explosive than any of the other Sins. Nash's goal is to be more powerful than Ai, but he's not that serious about it, just because he has other things to worry about. Just like Ai, his morals have gone down the drain so any time he wants power, he doesn't care about where he gets it from or how he gets it.

Siran: Siran is much stronger emotionally and mentally than he is physically. No one who is still alive has ever seen him break down before. The last time he ever experienced emotions that strong was the day Eliza was born. Siran is actually a sociopath to an extent, because unlike Ai and Nash, he feels no sympathy or empathy for the people he hurts to get power. They know it's wrong and can at least feel bad, but he doesn't. He's really good at faking it through. Siran only cares about gaining power because it would be unfitting for a God to be weaker than the High Lords.

QUEEN - What would be their method of leadership? Would they preserve all power to themselves? Or would they distribute it amongst those they trust? Why?

Aibreanne: She seems like a very laid back leader, but that's only because she gives people a lot of wiggle room. Despite being a leader already, most of the rules she wants people to abide by aren't written by her, because Raivath deals with most of it. Whenever he doesn't, people can just kind of assume what she expects of them, and most people don't test that.

Nash: When Nash led Hell, he gave people NO wiggle room when it came to his rules. They were sudden and set in stone...until he broke them and had to change them. He wanted to deal with most of Hell's issues by himself, which made Raivath's job a lot easier (Theoretically. In reality, Raivath was constantly trying to stop him from doing dumb shit).

Siran: When Siran led hell, it was actually...normal? Not hellish at all really, it was pretty close to a representative democracy, because he knows that's what a lot of people are used to, or they can get used to it pretty quickly. He had his moments where he'd put his foot down, but it was rare. He felt very comfortable dividing his power with the Sins because they all respected him.

PRINCE/PRINCESS - How does your character feel about their lineage? Are they approving at what their parent’s, grandparents, and ancestors have done in the past? Or do they despite their family history and wish to deviate from it as much as possible? Why?

Aibreanne: She feels...guilty? It's all really confusing to her so she chooses not to think about it, but the fact that her parents were so close to raising the perfect child and she had to go ahead and ruin it by becoming WRATH?? She doesn't approve of what they were doing because other people don't approve of it, but she's very numb about it for the most part.

Nash: Nash is very proud of himself, but not his family. Sometimes he forgets that he even had parents in the first place because they played such an insignificant role in his life. He doesn't know what happened to them, but he can only assume that they became sinners and died at some point, as they never chose to reach out to him. He never knew much about his grandparents either.

Siran: He's apathetic about it. He was born into a pretty powerful family, he's now far more powerful than all of them, so why should he care about them anymore? If anyone asks, he'll speak of them fondly though.

[noraqrosa]

TL;DR: in this post, i wax on about the abandoned concept album/multimedia project Lifehouse by Pete Townshend/The Who in the context of algorithms and artworks

people on Twitter aren't understanding that this is an ad for a scifi novel. it sounds interesting, to a degree.

the first sentence reminds me of [The Who's] Pete Townshend's Lifehouse, still one of the most fascinating musical experiments i've ever read about.

i wish i knew about all that back when the Lifehouse Method website was a thing. for those unaware, it was a site created by Pete in conjunction with composer Lawrence Ball and software developer Dave Snowdon in which someone could input their personal data and generate "authentic musical 'portraits,'" pieces of music customized via algorithms that work based on whatever data you input. if you know anything about The Who, you'll probably recognize this as a facet of what would eventually become the album Who's Next, Lifehouse, a huge multimedia project involving a rock opera album, live performances with audience participation and complex tech on stage, a movie, who knows what else.

https://archive.is/8tYoM

i've always wished i could do one of these "musical portraits." i remember when I first heard about algorithmic (i refuse to call it AI because it isn't true AI) music generators, this was the first thing i thought of. back when they were in a rudimentary state, i played around with one for my own amusement (not for my own music, all that comes from my own head unfortunately for you), and while it was fascinating, it didn't go far enough in the direction i hoped. thinking of OpenAI's MuseNet, it takes a few notes worth of MIDI data & a style suggestion and then kinda randomly guesses what would be a good fit after those notes.

<image sourced from https://gigazine.net/gsc_news/en/20190426-muse-net>

and y'know, it makes for some fun meme videos:

<shoutout to the papaya>

but you can also see it only goes so far, and still requires musical input. it isn't quite on the level of being usable for much. and it really isn't quite the same. it's using inputted data, but not, say, biometric or biographical data. it's musical parameters that are being input as the data.

i really want to one day see a true realization of Lifehouse. one of my wildest goals is to be the one to do that. admittedly, i feel like in the current artistic climate the art world might no longer be ready for it; people would see it, instantly think "AI ART EW," and back away. but in this case, i don't feel like that's a fair assessment of what the concept is. the idea was to find each person's unique signature melody via these musical portraits. it isn't meant for anything really beyond personal identification, when it comes down to it. it fascinates me from a musical standpoint, and as a person who holds a psychology degree. imagine what someone can learn about oneself via this process! would your musical portrait be different at different points in your life? what could you tell about your personality from a single melody, or about your life history, or your beliefs and values? how would all of that reflect in your music? what genre is your soul? could a musical portrait truly capture any of that? with sufficiently advanced tech, sure, but idk if we're there yet.

heck imagine the therapeutic implications! imagine this tech being used in an art/music therapy setting, in which you work with a therapist to input your data, get a melody, and then use that melody with whatever form of musical expression you prefer (e.g. if you prefer to play the piano, guitar, a DAW, etc). what would you and your therapist be able to learn about you?

i truly do believe that, when it comes down to it, everyone has their own musical identification, "a song in their heart" if you will. i wish to expose people's hearts to get that music out, so that people may hopefully understand themselves better.

we might actually be at the level of tech necessary to truly realize a project like Lifehouse, but the tech isn't being used in this way. our current tech relies on predictive algorithms that kinda mostly draw on established musical forms, tradition, and there are only so many notes in the musical alphabet and only so many combinations and permutations thereof. a true realization of this tech would work, say, maybe in a similar way to how Pokémon speedrunners essentially break the game and essentially reprogram it to do what they want via a series of unexpected inputs. arbitrary code execution is what that's called, and i bet a similar function might help greatly in creating a uniquely generated musical portrait. because, when it comes down to it, are we not all Glitch Pokémon who cannot be contained by the boundaries of our programming?

anyway that was a long ramble. feel free to gimme feedback like you're a guitar held up to an amp or feedback like an echo chamber, whichever you prefer. this post idk if it'll make both pro & anti AI people mad or not, but that's what happens when your position on a thing is more complicated than a simple binary.

currently homeless still, so please help me if you can:

My partner's donate links are here: https://linktr.ee/IzukuLeeYoung. that's the best place you can send us money to keep us in our current hotel room and off the street.

https://odiohi.me/pages/product-categories - if you wanna help me by buying my wares (including my music)

To support me directly:

https://ko-fi.com/NoraQRosa

https://cash.app/NoraQRosa

https://patreon.com/NoraQRosa

[feral-renaissance-cat]

Some of the most engagement I got outside of posting fics for a fandom event were when I admitted I had gotten disheartened about a story I was halfway through and wasn't sure I could finish it. That's when people chose to tell me how much they enjoy my work and hoped I would come back to that fic someday. I'm still struggling to finish it years after that, not only because the fandom has mostly moved on from the pairing I write for, but also because the whole trend of putting unfinished fics into AI generators when the author doesn't post "fast enough" has me scared that people have already done that.

If you want to get more fic, you have to express to the author somehow that you want to hear it FROM THEM. There's that post about sharing things online is like if you brought a cake to a party and people took a single slice of the cake into another room and all talked about how much they love it and wish they could get more of it, meanwhile you're at the table looking at your cake with only one slice taken out of it, feeling sad because no one wants it, apparently. After that, you're not going to bring another cake to the next party because you're afraid it will go to waste again.

Plus the irony of everyone who DMs their favorite showrunners on social media hoping to get the inside scoop on an upcoming season or make suggestions. The showrunners legally aren't allowed to tell you anything, but you know who would love to share their process or hint at future stories or take your feedback into consideration? Fucking. FIC WRITERS.

A writer friend told me something that broke my heart a little bit today; they're going to quit publishing their fanfic.

My instant thought was that they had been trolled or attacked or that something terrible had happened in their life because this person is so passionate about their writing. It wasn't any of that. Engagement with their works has been going down, as it has for many of us. Comments are like gold dust a lot of the time, and just looking through the historical comment counts on old fics on ao3 demonstrates this trend very clearly. It was not simply the comments dropping off which caused them to decide to stop posting, however.

My friend came across a discord server for their fandom (I should point out here that their fandom interest and mine diverged a couple of years ago, we stay in touch but don't currently read each other's posts because I'm not into their fandom and they would rather gouge their eyes out with a wooden spoon than read anything Star Wars) and specifically to share fic in that fandom. They joined, because we all love a good fic rec, only to discover that their latest multichapter fic, which has almost no comments and very few kudos, is being hotly discussed in this server as one of the best stories ever. Not one of these people has bothered to say this to them on the fic. When they asked, none of participants could see the point in telling the author of the fic they apparently loved so much that they love it.

This discovery has absolutely destroyed my friend's love of sharing fic. They share because they love seeing other people's enjoyment, and fic writers do that through comments and kudos/reblogs/likes because we don't get paid. There is no literary critic writing a blog post/article about how amazing the story is for us to copy and keep/frame. There is no money from royalties. All we have are the words of the people reading our works.

Those people on that server could have taken five minutes of the time they spent gushing about how amazing my friend's story was to other people and used it to tell the one person guaranteed to want to hear that praise how much they loved it. They could have taken a moment to express their opinion to the person who spent hours upon hours plotting, writing, editing, and posting those chapters. Instead, they deprived my friend of thing that keeps them sharing their writing, and in the process have killed their love of it. My friend now feels used and unmotivated.

I won't be sharing a link to their fic, they said I could share their experience but not their identity. I know they plan to post one final chapter. I know they intend to express their hurt at being excluded from the praise for the thing they created, and I know they intend to announce that as a consequence they will not be posting for a long while, if at all.

So please, I beg you, don't hide your love of a story from the writer. It's just about the only thing we have.