#which IS what i want for my art and how i generally think art should be

[dresshistorynerd]

#William Morris#fast fashion#long posts#reblogging this post I have to add that I own I think five pieces from that collection (four bought new and one secondhand)#I wouldn't buy them new now#but a couple of the dresses I particularly love#those two in the pictures are the worst in the collection I think#obviously using synthetic and toxic dyes and fabrics goes against everything he stood for#it would be great to own something similar using natural dyes (which aren't always great for the environment either) and fabric#but a more artisanal approach would definitely be more expensive#which is something he struggled with in his life time#as only middle and upper class people could really afford his designs#I'm sure the OP's done more research around that than I have#as I just wrote one essay about it about 12 years ago#about reproductions of his designs in general#so my memory's a bit hazy on the little research I did do#that's a lot of tag rambling with little conclusion#it's an interesting subject with a lot to think about

My purpose definitely was not to make anyone feel bad about having any piece from this collection (or really any other mass produced thing with Morris' design), so I hope you keep enjoying and loving the clothing that you have from this collection! It's not the fault of the consumer that we are deprived of Good Art TM, like Morris himself wrote, the destruction of artistry is just as much a crime against the user as it is against the maker. The people making decisions at H&M are the ones who should feel bad about this. I'm also not commenting about like the aesthetics and the taste of it all regarding this collection, since that's not really what Good Art TM in Morris' view was about, and I'm sure in a vacuum many pieces from this collection can look nice.

Morris was frustrated about being only able to sell to middle and upper class people and the compromises he had to make to achieve even that, but in his view the solution was not abandon Good Art TM, but to redistribute wealth so that even working class people can afford a good simple life, which involves Good Art TM, scale down the overindulgent lifestyles of the rich that are not actually fulfilling because they lack Good Art TM and move away from profit focused economy, with of course the end goal being abolishment of capitalism all together. He said in one interview:

"I have got to understand thoroughly the manner of work under which the Art of the Middle Ages was done, and that is the only manner of work which can turn out popular art, only to discover that it is impossible to work in that manner in this profit-grinding society. (..) Except with a small part of the more artistic side of the work, I could not do anything (or at least but little) to give this pleasure to the workmen, because I should have had to change their method of work so utterly that I should have disqualified them from earning their living elsewhere."

He means with "the Art of the Middle Ages" pre-industrial art, basically craftsmanship. And with "popular art" he means traditional folk art, not high art, nor the common meaning today as in mass-produced art, but art made by the common people for the common people. Popular art often referred to mass-produced art already in his day, and he often made the point that mass-produced art is not the "real" popular art since it's designed and produced by the capitalist class, only the work is done by workers, but the decisions on what and how it's done are not.

Of course his method of production was more expensive and today too hand-crafted products are more expensive, but that's not a bug, that's a feature. In our economic model it means only rich and middle class people can afford stuff like that, but Morris didn't want our economic model. He wanted to create a world, where all workers have agency and get good compensation for their work, where there's no owner class that steals worker's profits and creates massive income differences, where we don't over produce and over consume, and everyone gets enough high quality things that last long without owning in excess. If all workers got craftsmanship worth of money and got to keep all that, they would also be able to buy artisanal products. Not in excess of course, but mass-producing in excess is finally coming to bite us in the ass and destroying our world, a thing Morris already warned about. So we shouldn't own things in excess and we wouldn't need to or feel the need to if everything we owned was high quality, made with love and had value to us beyond it's price. This becomes very obviously true when learning about history. People in the past, especially in pre-industrial societies, who on very simplified monetary level were much poorer than most people today (I mean when you don't take into account that in most of these village communities you didn't need to buy the necessities of life but your community collectively produced and shared them), had much higher quality artisanal possessions than basically anyone today.

But again, this is not about personal consumption. No one of us workers and regular consumers have the power to change this with our personal consumption. It's not our fault we have to settle for poor quality rags. I don't want anyone to feel bad about owning fast fashion or having to rely on fast fashion. Feeling guilty doesn't help, feel angry for being deprived of better options, and being forced to participate in the exploitation of others. The best we can do is to try to get as good and enjoyable things we can when we need them and use them with care as long as possible and try to develop our identity and personal expression as independent from consumption as possible. Personally I mean. Of course together we are many and with political action we can do much much more. Unionizing and supporting unions is a great start for all bigger political changes, since we have power in numbers and to utilize that power we need to organize. For more immediate political change particularly in the fashion industry, I wrote a couple of plausible political changes I think we should try to enact right now at the end of my post on the state of the fashion industry.

The Morrisian case against fast fashion

Today I discovered that H&M made a William Morris collection some years ago. The heath death of the universe can't come quickly enough. We can stop now. Satire is dead and we killed her.

It's not just the whole concept of H&M using William Morris' designs for their fast fashion which is insanity inducing, but also the critical response it garnered. Like sure, people did realize this is insane and there was a lot of think pieces about it at the time, but I read several of them and they all seem to still miss the point in spectacular way.

The basic premise of these think pieces go along the lines of: "Would William Morris spin in his grave with a speed of light because of the H&M collection of his designs? A difficult question indeed. William Morris was a complicated man. He wanted art to be affordable to everyone. Isn't H&M affordable? That kinda fits. Though probably he would have some concerns about H&M's practices."

On the surface - yes - but like in reality - fuck no. There's no nuance in this particular issue. He talked about many times what he though of the H&Ms of his time, the retailers selling poor quality industrially produced "fashionable" bullshit. We know exactly what he would have thought of H&M. Here's couple of quotes from his 1884 lecture "Art and Socialism", which makes it very clear.

"It would be an instructive day's work for any one of us who is strong enough to walk through two or three of the principal streets of London on a week-day, and take accurate note of everything in the shop windows which is embarrassing or superfluous to the daily life of a serious man. Nay, the most of these things no one, serious or unserious, wants at all; only a foolish habit makes even the lightest-minded of us suppose that he wants them, and to many people even of those who buy them they are obvious encumbrances to real work, thought and pleasure. But I beg you to think of the enormous mass of men who are occupied with this miserable trumpery, from the engineers who have had to make the machines for making them, down to the hapless clerks who sit day-long year after year in the horrible dens wherein the wholesale exchange of them is transacted, and the shopmen, who not daring to call their souls their own, retail them amidst numberless insults which they must not resent, to the idle public which doesn't want them but buys them to be bored by them and sick to death of them."

He is describing the birth of consumerism, which was taking form during his lifetime in the late Victorian Era, which fast fashion is the extreme logical conclusion of, and he fucking hated it. He specifically railed against endless consumerist products, which H&M is the perfect representation of. It was definitely not the art and beauty he believed everyone required and deserved. He makes the distinction often.

"Now if we are to have popular Art, or indeed Art of any kind, we must at once and for all be done with this luxury; it is the supplanter, the changeling of Art; so much so that by those who know of nothing better it has even been taken for Art, the divine solace of human labour, the romance of each day's hard practice of the difficult art of living."

"And here furthermore is at least a little sign whereby to distinguish between a rag of fashion and a work of Art: whereas the toys of fashion when the first gloss is worn off them do become obviously worthless even to the frivolous—a work of Art, be it ever so humble, is long lived; we never tire of it; as long as a scrap hangs together it is valuable and instructive to each new generation. All works of Art in short have the property of becoming venerable amidst decay: and reason good, for from the first there was a soul in them, the thought of man, which will be visible in them so long as the body exists in which they were implanted."

When he thought of popular Art he thought of the craftsmanship of the common people. The art people have made from useful everyday objects with skillful handicrafts. This is what he means by "divine solace of human labour". It's not reverence of Puritanical work ethic, on the contrary, it's the reverence of creation, of the earnest joy people feel when they get to express themselves through their creative pursuits. He certainly didn't believe in work for work's sake, work needed to be worthwhile and enjoyable. He summarized his own position on what labour should be thusly:

"It is right and necessary that all men should have work to do which shall be worth doing, and be of itself pleasant to do; and which should he done under such conditions as would make it neither over-wearisome nor over-anxious."

He urged his middle class audience to reject consumerism (the lecture was for a very much middle class atheist society):

"For I say again that in buying these things: 'Tis the lives of men you buy! Will you from mere folly and thoughtlessness make yourselves partakers of the guilt of those who compel their fellow men to labour uselessly?"

I think it's glaringly obvious H&M and fast fashion in general is what he would consider luxury. Rags of fashion that are just churned out and discarded without thought and produced by compelling people to labour uselessly. It's not popular art that's made by workers and craftsmen, who are able to express themselves through it. There's no agency for the abused workers in H&M's sweatshops, they are not expressing their joy of creation, they are simply labouring uselessly.

Morris didn't shame workers for buying affortable things even if they weren't Art with big A, because that's the problem he despised the whole economic system for, for taking away the popular Art from people, making it inaccessible, and selling back mass produced products with very little practical or aesthetic value. So I don't think he would have problem with people who can only afford fast fashion today. They are the victims of capitalism too, because Art has been taken away from them. But the idea that some of these think pieces had that perhaps the H&M's Morris collection can be good actually if you squint, that H&M has the capacity to bring the art and beauty Morris advocated for for the people, is level of stupidity that's hard to express in words.

Morris didn't believe anything made with exploited labour could be truly beautiful, truly art. In his 1879 lecture "The Art of the People" he put it like this:

"That thing which I understand by real art is the expression by man of his pleasure in labour."

The way I understand this, is that art is communication. Through it we communicate feelings, ideas and thoughts, that is it's purpose. So for that communication to work, for it to be imbued with message, the person making it needs to feel passion and love for it's creation. How can there be love and passion if the hands making the garment belong to a tired exploited worker who has no agency what so ever in their work and can only think about survival to the next day?

Beyond the fundamental exploitativeness of H&M and fast fashion, this collection would still get zero points on aesthetic values from Morris even with his own designs. Because the work itself was such an important part of art for Morris, good design was nothing without good craftsmanship. Good design in his mind was always relative and dependent on it's purpose.

"For everything made by man’s hands has a form, which must be either beautiful or ugly; beautiful if it is in accord with Nature, and helps her; ugly if it is discordant with Nature, and thwarts her; it cannot be indifferent." (The Lesser Arts, 1877)

Here when he says nature, he means the nature of the thing that is made - basically it's purpose and function - and the nature of the materials it's made from. Basically, the design must always be made to bring out the function of the art and the qualities of the material it's made from, not fight against them. This is because he believed handicrafts were uniquely suitable for expressing the love of creation, therefore superior labour, and to really bring out the qualities of the craftsmanship and enjoy the creative process, the design should be suitable for that craft. The other side, which was the joy of using and experiencing art, required the craft to be selected for the suitable purpose. Using poorly functioning furniture for example is not very enjoyable, nor is using clothing that's made from materials that are not suitable for the climactic conditions it's supposed to be used in.

H&M of course utterly fails in this. They use Morris' designs in fully unsuitable ways. They print patterns made for example for wall papers on poor quality fabrics with synthetics dyes they weren't made for. This line from one blog post I came across really got me: "Therefore, without cheapening the artistic value of Morris’ designs, H&M’s collection offers an unparalleled potential for accessibility to them." No. Fuck no. They do in fact cheapen Morris' designs in every single way possible. Literally this is atrocious.

Despite the popular depiction, Morris wasn't in fact against industrial machinery or industrial art even, or at least he wasn't once his views on art and politics matured. He did think technology was useful, but he thought the people should use industrial methods for the benefit of all, not be enslaved by the industrial machine.

"I have spoken of machinery being used freely for releasing people from the more mechanical and repulsive part of necessary labour; and I know that to some cultivated people, people of the artistic turn of mind, machinery is particularly distasteful, and they will be apt to say you will never get your surroundings pleasant so long as you are surrounded by machinery. I don't quite admit that; it is the allowing machines to be our masters and not our servants that so injures the beauty of life nowadays. In other words, it is the token of the terrible crime we have fallen into of using our control of the powers of Nature for the purpose of enslaving people, we care less meantime of how much happiness we rob their lives of." ("How we live and how we might live", 1887)

However, he thought that the designer should approach it the way they approached any craft, by designing for the strengths of the machine work.

"But if you have to design for machine-work, at least let your design show clearly what it is. Make it mechanical with a vengeance, at the same time as simple at possible. Don't try, for instance, to make a printed plate look like a hand-painted one: make it something which no one would try to do if he were painting by hand..." ("Art and the Beauty of the Earth", 1881)

He did use some machinery for fabric and wall paper printing, but he was very intentional about their use. Still his designs weren't made for the type of methods these modern H&M machinery uses and he did for example use natural dyes. Particularly insulting is that some of the H&M clothes are made from viscose, rayon made with viscose method. Viscose method is extremely toxic and is known to cause long term health consequences for the workers and the people in surrounding areas. This has been well proven knowledge for ages. William Morris' wall paper factory in the beginning used the typical method used at the time which involved arsenic, but once he learned this could pose risks for the workers, he changed the method. Many of the new synthetic dyes were toxic at the time, which is the major reason he so favoured natural dyes, known to not cause health issues for workers or pollute the environment.

The question many of these think pieces about the H&M Morris collection posed was, would Morris disapprove and should we care? The first part of that is very easy to answer. Yes. Of course Morris would disapprove. He is currently powering the whole of British Isles with purely the kinetic energy his grave-spinning produces. Should we care though? If you care about Morris' art, if you want to see more of that kind of art in this world, you should care. Morris' art is not about the superficial qualities. Copying his designs and aesthetics and styles, will only lead to hollow imitations, that are exactly what he described the rags of fashion to be; as the shininess of novelty wears off they will reveal themselves to be soulless, useless and utterly empty. This collection is just that. To see more of the kind of art that makes you feel like his art makes you feel, not just something that reminds you of that feeling, you should focus more on the way the art is made and less on the specific aesthetics. If his vision of labour and art was realised, all art produced of course wouldn't be loved by every person, but all of it would be loved by someone, even if that someone was just the maker. And that would be more worthwhile than every single rag of fast fashion.

I will stop William-Morris-posting now and return to my thesis.

The full texts I quoted here:

Art and Socialism The Art of the People The Lesser Arts How We Live and How We Might Live Art and the Beauty of the Earth

[ordinaryschmuck]

Just saw The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie…

And I didn’t think I would. I figured I missed my chance because I failed to keep track of when the film would come out and I would have to plan carefully to see it next week if it came to it. Then, the other night, my mom said that she’s going to Snow White with my sister and niece. Hearing opportunity calling my name, I nonchalantly asked, “Is Looney Tunes playing in the same theater?” Thankfully, it did…an hour before theirs, meaning that I’d wait an hour and a half for them to leave theirs. But I didn’t care, I got the chance to see a beautifully and hilarious movie while they got to see Snow White. As far as I’m concerned, I won.

As for how good the movie is, well, do you remember that recent, Max exclusive Looney Tunes show that came and went? Imagine something of that art style and sense of humor, but given more of a budget. That’s basically what The Day the Earth Blew Up is, a movie version of Looney Tunes Cartoons, starring Daffy Duck and Porky Pig. That’s either gonna be your thing or it isn’t. I certainly wouldn’t think it was mine, because Looney Tunes Cartoons…wasn’t BAD, but it was clearly writers trying to modernize Looney Tunes but also trying to stick to their classic, cartoonish roots. Honestly, I feel like The Looney Tunes Show did that idea better, and even funnier. And if it were normal circumstances, I would have waited for it to come to streaming…Funnily enough, we’re no longer dealing with normal circumstances.

Warner Bros (More specifically, DAVID HORSE-FACE ZASLAV) has been SEVERELY screwing over the Looney Tunes. They canceled Coyote vs ACME for a bullshit tax write off, almost cancelled THIS movie for the same reason, and, just recently, ERASED THE ENTIRE LOONEY TUNES LIBRARY OFF OF MAX because Horse-Face McGee thought that appealing to children isn’t a viable strategy (Fucking idiot)! Going to see The Day the Earth Blew Up is more than watching a Looney Tunes movie. It’s giving The Looney Tunes a final salute as they face what’s basically their final swan song! If you love the Looney Tunes and animation in general, this is less of a movie you WANT to see, and more of a movie you HAVE to see. The good news is that you’ll at least have a good time.

The story…is unimportant. It’s a Looney Tunes movie. You’re not here for strong themes or an incredible narrative that rivals Oppenheimer or whatever Film Twitter tells me is incredibly brilliant that I should feel ashamed to not have watched yet. This movie is less BRILLIANT and more…clever. There’s a genuine twist in this that I didn’t see coming as it incorporated a throwaway moment that I completely forgot about. As far as I’m concerned, that’s pretty clever, even if it gave a character a…less than funny reveal for WHY he’s doing this certain thing. Speaking of which, you’re either going to appreciate the sense of humor in this film or NOT. Even for me, someone who’s often fond of wackadoodle humor, the jokes were often hit or miss. There is a LOT of comedic gold, don’t get me wrong. For instance, everything surrounding the character Farmer Dan is comedic GOLD, both in the way he’s animated and how he reacts to Porky and Daffy’s antics. But, at the same time…You have Daffy Duck clapping his cheeks to get internet famous. Remember what I said about Looney Tunes Cartoons trying to modernize the Looney Tunes? Sometimes it did it in the worst ways…

Thankfully, the one thing I say is absolutely perfect about the film is the animation. Every second of it is fluid, expressive, and, dare I say, LOONEY. Getting the chance to see it all on the big screen was a definite pleasure, as I adored getting to see hand drawn animation used at its best for the first time in a LONG time. The jokes and plot may not be the best, but the animation really carried the entire of the film.

Again, if you’re a fan of animation, you’re going to love it. And if you’re a fan of sticking it to a dipshit CEO, you’re gonna love it more. And if it SUCCEEDS, well, then maybe it won’t be all for the Looney Tunes…

[ink-the-artist]

holy shit I did NOT realize how popular my "I will remove my teeth, for I want to remain kind despite my anger" quote is. I just googled it for fun to see what would come up, a bunch of people are quoting it not knowing who its from, an artist called Kuma made an album titled that, so bizzare

[taraxippos]

There's a LOT of things people do wrong when constructing fantasy beliefs in pantheons of gods, but one of the more specific is having only one god related to fertility and it kind of being just a horny sex thing.

Like you'll have one in the entire bunch whose sphere is listed as fertility and it's basically like Yeah this is the sex one. She's always depicted naked (but not TOO naked because censorship and/or the writer's own skittishness). She's going to have the exact body type epitomized in contemporary western beauty standards and there's usually no chance in hell that she's gonna be fat (unless MAYBE they're referencing 'venus' figurines). Her thing is fertility, which means having sex and making babies. Might be a goddess of beauty or love or marriage too, because these are kinda sex things, but that's probably it. And yeah that sort of thing is virtually nonexistent in real life.

Like the concept of fertility is so fundamentally important to the function of most societies in human history in ways that it is just Not in industrialized imperial core countries. Most people are getting food from stores, and not having to worry about harvesting crops or breeding livestock or foraging for food or having enough animals to hunt, so fertility only really comes up as a concern if you're trying to have kids (and there is certainly societal pressure to have children, but your wellbeing and survival is rarely going to Depend on it). And I think writing only from that perspective and not even trying to learn about WHY fertility is so conceptually important is why you see this trend.

There's no absolute universal statement about how people believe in gods but it's broadly accurate that systems with many deities will Usually have more than one deity associated with fertility, and these associations will certainly include human reproduction but also the fertility of livestock/hunted animals, plants, the land itself.

Some fertility deities may also be heavily associated with seasonal changes or environmental factors that agriculture or foraging is dependent on (spring/summer/fall, seasonal rains, seasonal flooding, rain itself, sunlight, good soil, rivers, wetlands, etc). Some certainly might be related to love, marriage, sex, and beauty, but that's VERY RARELY going to be the sole way the concept of fertility is embodied. And they'll often will have other associations not directly about fertility, or related to fertility in culturally specific ways.

[deoidesign]

just wanted to say that I absolutely LOVE your comic I am so inspired by it and it’s so lovely and I wanna buy the physical books (I’ve never done that before) I just AUGGHHH EVERYTHING ABOUT IT IS SO 💙💙💙

do you allow fanart? And is there anything not allowed? I wanna draw adam and steve so bad 😭

Of course it's allowed! Fanart fanfic fan music fan dubs whatever!

I like to think I'm sort of "building a playground" when I make a story, have fun on it! I made it for you!

In my general opinion, it's not my business what my "fandom" does... It's on you and also me to curate our own spaces! If you're inspired by my work in any way, that's the greatest honor I could imagine and I want you to feel fully free to explore that. If someone is being weird, I know where the block button is and they can keep being weird where I don't have to see it haha

Just don't like... sell it... it's messy legally with webtoon and I'm one person making the story and it's my whole income so the few sales I get are kind of huge for me ;_;

[icewindandboringhorror]

examining a seemingly normal image only to slowly realize the clear signs of AI generated art.... i know what you are... you cannot hide your true nature from me... go back where you came from... out of my sight with haste, wretched and vile husk

[eggsistential-basket]

thinking about the person i could have been if i tried a little harder to find my own way

[strohller27]

.

[hotsugarbyglassanimals]

even though i feel like i can confidently tell when a piece of art is generative A/I, i really don't feel inclined or really even justified calling someone out for it due to the precedent it sets - especially when artists who DO make their own pieces get caught in the crossfire for being inexperienced or making the choice to be more free-form when it comes to character design / consistency...

[doctorwhoisadhd]

there's a certain quality the harmonies of like... early to mid 2000s alt rock has. which i am obsessed with... like i wanna do that. i NEED to figure out how to write harmonies that sound like that

[skenpiel]

in school next week i have to imitate an art style like an ism of my choice and paint something but ihavent decied yet maybe you guys should help me choose

[witch-queen-of-lesbos]

Today I learned that there's a limit to the number of notes you can put in a post.

hm actually i made a joke poll like this a while back but now im genuinely curious

[crushedsweets]

CREEPED VISUAL NOVEL Link, tutorial, extra art, Q&A, some chatter

The CREEPED Prologue is completely free and browser-ready. Gameplay is about 10 minutes. Please read the "tutorial" and notes before playing!

Follow Y/N and their dog, Max, through their grandparents' farm and a mysterious forest filled with...less than fortunate people!

PLAY HERE; works best on PC

This visual novel is powered by GOOGLE SLIDES! It has 0 programming and was created by one person in a little over a month, so please bear with any "bugs" and clunkiness!

TUTORIAL

>Click using mouse/trackpad >Go slowly to not break game >Do not use arrow or space keys

EXTRA NOTES:

>Works best on PC/Browser, I haven't tested the full game on mobile yet >In general, clicking the PNGs on the textbox (Apple, Teddy Bear, Hatchet, etc) will lead you to the right page >If you land on a page that tells you to "go back," that's when you should click the back-arrow key. If your cursor disappears, it doesn't register the click correctly >I recommend moving your cursor periodically to avoid it disappearing and sending you to the wrong page

EXTRA ART

some WIPS and the original sprite-style i was gonna choose LOOOOOOOL

Q&A

Q: Is this an x reader? A: This is a reader-insert, but it's not romantic and I try to keep it as neutral and unidentifiable as possible! Q: What's the plot? A: GENERALLY AND WITHOUT SPOILERS, your dog gets you into trouble and you're just looking to help him!

Q: Who is in the prologue? A: Tim, Brian, Toby, and Kate! More will be added in future chapters.

Q: When will future chapters be posted? A: Not sure! This took me about a month to do, and half was spent over winter break. I will try to get chapter 1 posted before summer, but I am a full-time student, employed, have extracurriculars, etc etc

ok thats all i only remember 4 questions feel free to ask more LMAO

CHATTER(because you know i can talk forever)

ok i just wanted to be able to talk about how the process was with this and how i feel about the results and whatnot...

ive been wanting to make a google slides visual novel since i was like 13 LOL it hit the point where i was repeatedly told i should just learn to code but i was like NOOOOO ITS GOTTA BE GOOGLE SLIDESSSS which is totally stupid but hey. i think that gives it some sort of simple charm that reminds me of being 16 and doing little projects in my room LOL i like working with the easiest tools . my bad

anyway. im just very happy LOL. it's not perfect but i feel like i came full circle in a sense?!?! i've been into creepypasta since i was 9 and it comforted me when things were really hard, and when i was 18 i was going through a really hard time and got back into creepypasta as a way to distract myself. i've always had a habit of throwing myself into fiction for escapism when things suuucked.

i'm 20 now but i've met SO many amazing people, had so many fun awesome exciting projects with friends, created tons of stuff im proud of, felt more motivated to create since i was like 13, have been inspired by so many amazing artists/authors on here, etc. just so so so lucky to find community in such a tight-knit cute fandom that thrives off of creativity and playing around! i hope i can keep the momentum and make a couple more chapters this year, but im kinda busy with school and work...LOL . i'm just excited to have this posted so i can have more discussion about it T_T

anyway thank you if you read this far and thank you if you played etc etc yaahhhhhh omg ok BYE THIS IS SO EMBARRASSING im just so grateful to be in this fandom

[chunkofchange]

constant conversations

[ktempestbradford]

I have been on a Willy Wonkified journey today and I need y'all to come with me

It started so innocently. Scrolling Google News I come across this article on Ars Technica:

At first glance I thought what happened was parents saw AI-generated images of an event their kids were at and became concerned, then realized it was fake. The reality? Oh so much better.

On Saturday, event organizers shut down a Glasgow-based "Willy's Chocolate Experience" after customers complained that the unofficial Wonka-inspired event, which took place in a sparsely decorated venue, did not match the lush AI-generated images listed on its official website.... According to Sky News, police were called to the event, and "advice was given."

Thing is, the people who paid to go were obviously not expecting exactly this:

But I can see how they'd be a bit pissed upon arriving to this:

It gets worse.

"Tempest, how could it possibly--"

source of this video that also includes this charming description:

Made up a villain called The Unknown — 'an evil chocolate maker who lives in the walls'

There is already a meme.

Oh yes, the Wish.com Oompa Loompa:

Who has already done an interview!

As bad (and hilarious) as this all is, I got curious about the company that put on this event. Did they somehow overreach? Did the actors they hired back out at the last minute? (Or after they saw the script...) Oddly enough, it doesn't seem so!

Given what I found when poking around I'm legit surprised there was an event at all. Cuz this outfit seems to be 100% a scam.

The website for this specific event is here and it has many AI generated images on it, as stated. I don't think anyone who bought tickets looked very closely at these images, otherwise they might have been concerned about how much Catgacating their children would be exposed to.

Yes, Catgacating. You know, CATgacating!

I personally don't think anyone should serve exarserdray flavored lollipops in public spaces given how many people are allergic to it. And the sweet teats might not have been age appropriate.

Though the Twilight Tunnel looks pretty cool:

I'm not sure that Dim Tight Twdrding is safe. I've also been warned that Vivue Sounds are in that weird frequency range that makes you poop your pants upon hearing them.

Yes, Virginia, these folks used an AI image generator for everything on the website and used Chat GPT for some of the text! From the FAQ:

Q: I cannot go on the available days. Will you have more dates in the future? A: Should there be capacity when you arrive, then you will be able to enter without any problems. In the event that this is not the case, we may ask you to wait a bit.

Fear not, for this question is asked again a few lines down and the answer makes more sense.

Curious about the events company behind this disaster, I took myself over to the homepage of House of Illuminati and I was not disappointed.

I would 100% trust these people to plan my wedding.

This abomination of a website is a badly edited WordPress blog filled with AI art and just enough blog posts to make the casual viewer think that it's a legit business for about 0.0004 seconds.

Their attention to detail is stunning, from how they left up the default first post every WP blog gets to how they didn't bother changing the name on several images, thus revealing where they came from. Like this one:

With the lovely and compact filename "DALL·E-2024-01-30-09.50.54-Imagine-a-scene-where-fantasy-and-reality-merge-seamlessly.-In-the-foreground-a-grand-interactive-gala-is-taking-place-filled-with-elegant-guests-i.png"

"Concept.png" came from the same AI generator that gets text almost, but not quiiiiiite right:

There are a suspicious number of .webp images in the uploads, which makes me think they either stole them from other sites where AI "art" was uploaded or they didn't want to pay for the hi-res versions of some and just grabbed the preview image.

The real fun came when I noticed this filename: Before-and-After-Eventologists-Transformation-Edgbaston-Cricket-Ground-1024x1024-1.jpg and decided to do a Google image search. Friends, you will be shocked to hear that the image in question, found on this post touting how they can transform a boring warehouse into a fun event space, was stolen from this actual event planner.

Even better, this weirdly grainy image?

From a post that claims to be about the preparations for a "Willy Wonka" experience (we'll get to this in a minute), is not only NOT an actual image of anyone preparing anything for Illuminati's event, it is stolen from a YouTube thumbnail that's been chopped to remove the name of the company that actually made this. Here's the video.

If you actually read the blog posts they're all copypasta or some AI generated crap. To the point where this seems like not a real business at all. There's very specific business information at the bottom, but nothing else seems real.

As I said, I'm kinda surprised they put on an event at all. This has, "And then they ran off with all our money!" written all over it. I'm perplexed.

And also wondering when the copyright lawyers are gonna start calling, because...

This post explicitly says they're putting together a "Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory Experience" complete with golden tickets.

Somewhere along the line someone must have wised up, because the actual event was called "Willys Chocolate Experience" (note the lack of apostrophe) and the script they handed to the actors about 10 minutes before they were supposed to "perform" was about a "Willy McDuff" and his chocolate factory.

As I was going through this madness with friends in a chat, one pointed out that it took very little prompting to get the free Chat GPT to spit out an event description and such very similar to all this while avoiding copyrighted phrases. But he couldn't figure out where the McDuff came from since it wasn't the type of thing GPT would usually spit out...

Until he altered the prompt to include it would be happening in Glasgow, Scotland.

You cannot make this stuff up.

But truly, honestly, I do not even understand why they didn't take the money and run. Clearly this was all set up to be a scam. A lazy, AI generated scam.

Everything from the website to the event images to the copy to the "script" to the names of things was either stolen or AI generated (aka stolen). Hell, I'd be looking for some poor Japanese visitor wandering the streets of Glasgow, confused, after being jacked for his mascot costume.

HE LIVES IN THE WALLS, Y'ALL.

[inbabylontheywept]

the fine and subtle art of arguing with old men

it was a good week for testing which meant it was a slow week for me. most of my job is fixing the machine when it goes down. if it doesn't go down, i don't have much to do. 

fortunately neither did marc. in a site full of ornery old bastards, he's the oldest and the orneriest, so it goes without saying that i enjoy spending time with him. he reminds me of my grandpa. hell, he reminds me of a lot of people. i've befriended enough grumpy old men that i've got a sort of momentum to it now - you know how it is, when you meet someone that reminds you of someone else you really like. you get to start that friendship off half built, because you already have an idea of how to like that guy, and some of that old warmth can be brought to the new friendship. a little ember to start the stove up with.

(i think that's one of the really undersold beauties of getting older. you stop viewing people as strangers and more like remixes of friends.)

anyway, i was sitting next to marc and we were talking about the future. i've got my eye on having kids sometime soon (year or two? hopefully?), and he's very happy for me. i've tried asking him for advice, but all he says is that he didn't do a great job with his own kids and they still turned out okay, so i should stress less and trust myself more. i hope he's right. he believes it, at least, and it's a hell of a thing to have the faith of an old man. his faith is hard won.

as for his plans, he's retiring at some point in the next six months, and is hoping to sell his home and buy something in florida. he's republican, so he views the state as paradise, and i'm not inclined to even try talking him out of it. it's his dream, you know? i know for a fact my paradise would be a lot of people's hell. life's funny like that.

still, we kept going on, and it was a good time, and then he reminisced about the last time he got close to quitting - back around 2020. our job required getting vaxxed, and he refused, and there was a big kerfuffle about it before the job actually backed down. i know there's not a lot of sympathy for the unvaxxed out here, but the man's 62. you get the shot when you're under 30 to protect the people around you, but when you're over 60, you're just getting it to protect yourself and it's hard to be mad at someone for kicking their own ass. 

still gave me pause though. i knew he wasn't going to take it well, but half the job of collecting curmudgeons is keeping them around, so i said 

hey. i'm sorry they bent your arm over it, but.

but. 

you should really get that shot. 

and he looked over at me, and i looked at him, and he actually spat. not on me, just the concrete, but it was enough to show that he was mad. then he walked away, as abrupt as anything.

i felt bad about it. i wasn't sure what i'd expected, when he was willing to lose his job over it before, but i'd been so invested in his dream of retirement - the idea of him sipping margaritias on a beach next to his wife, the wife he calls every day during lunch, the wife he says is the one thing in life he ever got right on the first try. the wife that almost divorced him back when he was in the airforce because he just wasn't home enough. 

(but he can be home now.) 

and then he mentioned the vax thing, and it was like seeing a pin hit a balloon. he works out every day and takes all sorts of crazy vitamins and is generally committed to getting the most out of his pension and his life. i didn't want this dumb weak point to be his achilles heel. 

---

i wasn't actually sure how long marc would be mad at me. i've seen him stay mad at some people for weeks. i wasn't sure if being friends would make that time go up or down. 

it went down. i'm glad it went down. 

he stopped being mad about two days later. we were doing front end maintenance one morning, and it was just that simple mechanical rhythm - hex key, replace the anode sheets, punch some off-gassing holes, oil it up, put it back in - that put things at ease. it always does. people working there are too busy to remember grudges, and it has this sort of mandatory practical communication that helps smooth things over. it was going great, and then out of the blue he said babs, you gotta be careful giving advice. those shots come with complications. what would you do if i got that shot, had a stroke, and died? 

and i don't know what answer he was expecting, but i just told him the truth, which is that i would be devastated. i'd feel like i killed him. i thought that was a pretty normal response, but he looked taken aback. he asked why i said it then, and i said i'd have felt the same if he died of covid. that's just life. sometimes, there's no way forward that doesn't risk some kind of regret. 

we finished the tube after that, in a silence that felt heavier than peace but lighter than anger. it felt like the ball was back in marc's court. like it would be rude to take that turn from him. 

we parted ways with a nod and didn't speak until the next day. 

---

i was doing spreadsheet work when he found me again. standard paper engineering - thinking of things we might need and ordering them in batches, months ahead of time. it always feels a little like plugging holes in a dam with my fingers. 

but he popped up, and we didn't even exchange pleasantries. he just said i'm gonna die one day, and you can't blame yourself for that. 

which is a hell of a thing to just tell someone right off the bat. 

so i said what 

and he said babs, i am in my 60s. something is gonna get me eventually, and whether it's covid or heart disease, or a stroke, there will be something you could have said or done before. and that's okay. it's not your job to make me live forever. 

and you know, he actually made a lot of sense. so i said 

okay. 

i'll keep your business yours. i just

you were talking about your retirement before this. and i want that for you very much. you've worked hard for 45 years, and you deserve a break. we're getting to sick season, and it would be the saddest fucking thing in the world if you got this close to winning the race then tripped in the last ten feet. 

and we sat there a few moments longer. i wasn't sure what to say, and i wasn't sure what he'd say, but eventually he just shrugged and said

yeah 

then he left. i figured that would be the end of it. 

---

i did front end maintenance yesterday, after being gone a week. it's one of my favorite things to do. i like working with my hands. i really like working with my hands. i'm glad i went to college, but in a different life, i think i could've made a better electrician than an electrical engineer. 

and at one step, when we were both hoisting the plate back onto the machine, his sleeve rode up, and i saw two bandaids on his arm. 

we finished the install, and i was ready to go back when marc actually stopped me. 

i got the shot, he said, almost embarrassed. like he'd been caught. and i knew he was gonna say something dumb about it, so i just cut him off by giving him a hug. 

i was relieved. hugging old men is kind of like picking up cats. if they like you a lot, they'll tolerate it, but that's about it. we sat there maybe three beats before his hands went up, and then he gave me one overly-hard thump on the back. in my experience, this is how old men tell you that they're done, so i let him go.

carla talked me into it, he said, almost defensive. his wife. his one good decision.

tell her i said thanks, i said back.

trump got the shot too, he said, less defensive, but oddly pleading. like he was consoling himself.

like he was nervous.

then it's gotta be safe, i said, and he looked up at me, strangely searching, strangely vulnerable. i don't know exactly what he was looking for, but i guess he found it because after a few moments his shoulders relaxed.

yeah, he said, one hand on the back of his head.

it's gotta be.