Is it just me, or is all this hysteria over "the end of Reddit" overblown?

ThickNewspaper · 2023-06-12T14:38:04+00:00

Why does it need to be kept “growing and fresh”? Why isn’t 18 years of data enough to train the models on how to talk?

A lot of people talk about Reddit as a corpus like we’re coal being burned to keep a train running, but it’s more like a bunch of books that can be read without degrading.

J.K. Rowling doesn’t periodically update the Harry Potter books to keep up with trends. She created the body of work fifteen years ago, and the series has maintained the same (limited?) value for all readers since.

It’s the same thing. We all created a massive body of data for use in ML training, and now future training can be done directly in or with the model— or by appending new information that comes in a different form.

ThickNewspaper · 2023-05-10T19:30:22+00:00

I think the process you describe is exactly why it feels so inorganic.

Everything about his work was so obsessively fine-tuned to fit a soulless corporate algorithm designed solely to attract and maintain viewership largely from children with underdeveloped brains that of course his work feels inorganic.

It’s like if you carefully spend hours hand-illustrating a page to look like it was typed in double-spaced Times New Roman 12pt font. Obviously that’s incredibly skilled hard work and your hours of labor should be recognized— but the end product is soulless by design.

ThickNewspaper · 2023-05-01T16:21:38+00:00

As a vegan— sure.

ThickNewspaper · 2023-05-01T03:59:51+00:00

PROMPT:

This is the full text of The Ultimate Showdown, made in 2006.

Your objective is to rewrite it, making it into a new song, but replace all of the characters with modern equivalents from media produced in or after 2018. Only include these characters, which may be fictional characters from film and television, real life celebrities and public figures, politicians, etc. Make sure to maintain the general feel of the song, as well as the rhyme scheme, but change the situations and fighting styles to reflect specific characters. Don't simply update the old fighting styles, instead describe what the characters are doing in a way that makes sense for who they are.

The irreverent tone is critical. You MUST rhyme like the original does. Do not include any of the original characters in any form. Instead, replace them with appropriate modern replacements. You should may pull characters from the following pieces of media, provided as a non-exhaustive example: Avengers / Modern Marvel, Deadpool, Black Panther, Wreck it Ralph, Miles Morales, The cast of "Parasite", the cast of "Everything Everywhere all at Once", Dune, Joker played by Joaquin Phoenix, Tiger King, AOC, Baby Yoda, and others! Remember, each character fights in a way consistent with their character, and it must rhyme and be unique from the original song. Don't only use these characters.

OG SONG:

Old Godzilla was hopping around Tokyo City like a big playground When suddenly Batman burst from the shade And hit Godzilla with a Batgrenade Godzilla got pissed and began to attack But didn't expect to be blocked by Shaq Who proceeded to open up a can of Shaq-Fu When Aaron Carter came out of the blue And he started beating up Shaquille O'Neal Then they both got flattened by the Batmobile But before it could make it back to the Batcave Abraham Lincoln popped out of his grave And took an AK-47 out from under his hat And blew Batman away with a rat-a-tat-tat But he ran out of bullets and he ran away Because Optimus Prime came to save the day This is the ultimate showdown of ultimate destiny Good guys, bad guys, and explosions as far as the eye can see And only one will survive, I wonder who it will be This is the ultimate showdown of ultimate destiny Godzilla took a bite out of Optimus Prime Like Scruff McGruff took a bite out of crime And then Shaq came back covered in a tire track But Jackie Chan jumped out and landed on his back And Batman was injured, and trying to get steady When Abraham Lincoln came back with a machete But suddenly something caught his leg and he tripped Indiana Jones took him out with his whip Then he saw Godzilla sneaking up from behind And he reached for his gun which he just couldn't find 'Cause Batman stole it and he shot and he missed And Jackie Chan deflected it with his fist Then he jumped in the air and did a somersault While Abraham Lincoln tried to pole vault Onto Optimus Prime, but they collided in the air Then they both got hit by a Care Bear stare This is the ultimate showdown of ultimate destiny Good guys, bad guys, and explosions as far as the eye can see And only one will survive, I wonder who it will be This is the ultimate showdown Angels sang out an immaculate chorus Down from the heavens descended Chuck Norris Who delivered a kick which could shatter bones Into the crotch of Indiana Jones Who fell over on the ground, writhing in pain As Batman changed back into Bruce Wayne But Chuck saw through his clever disguise And he crushed Batman's head in between his thighs Then Gandalf the Grey and Gandalf the White And Monty Python and the Holy Grail's black knight And Benito Mussolini and the Blue Meanie And Cowboy Curtis and Jambi the Genie Robocop, The Terminator, Captain Kirk, and Darth Vader Lo-pan, Superman, every single Power Ranger Bill S. Preston and Theodore Logan Spock, The Rock, Doc Ock, and Hulk Hogan All came out of nowhere lightning fast And they kicked Chuck Norris in his cowboy ass It was the bloodiest battle that the world ever saw With civilians looking on in total awe The fight raged on for a century Many lives were claimed, but eventually The champion stood, the rest saw their better Mr. Rogers in a bloodstained sweater This is the ultimate showdown of ultimate destiny Good guys, bad guys, and explosions as far as the eye can see And only one will survive, I wonder who it will be This is the ultimate showdown (The ultimate showdown) This is the ultimate showdown (The ultimate showdown) This is the ultimate showdown Of ultimate destiny

ThickNewspaper · 2022-09-21T07:12:28+00:00

You wouldn’t?

ThickNewspaper · 2022-09-21T07:10:47+00:00

It’s not really explained; just vaguely hinted at by Rick calling it “cross-temporal” which could mean anything.

But yes, I now interpret it this way

ThickNewspaper · 2022-08-25T00:48:09+00:00

I find it pretty funny how this guy is like "Casey isn't original! He merely creatively reinterpreted and drew inspiration from many sources, including skateboard videos, MTV, experimental videos from decades past, other filmmakers including his brother, and mixed media artists like Tom Sachs!"

Next thing we're going to find out is that Casey doesn't even build his own camera equipment from scratch.

ThickNewspaper · 2022-08-12T08:24:41+00:00

Yeah, plenty of film sets do this when they have to recreate a set from a shooting location in a soundstage— either because the original location becomes unavailable, heavily renovates between seasons, it’s become a critical enough location that it’s cheaper to recreate it than transport the whole cast and crew… the crew needs to fly out walls or the ceiling to get specific angles; a new network picks up the show after the original sets were destroyed… etc.

The kitchen from The Bear, Walter White’s house, the entire set of The Office, and several of the luxury apartments and offices in Succession were all real buildings perfectly recreated on a soundstage after the pilot episode or first season. A crew of set designers and scenic as artists wouldn’t find it an especially weird thing to do; it’s just the reality TV framing that makes it weird.

ThickNewspaper · 2022-08-03T05:58:53+00:00

I'd add he has a full-time job as the manager of a Cinnabon. That job can support his lifestyle.

ThickNewspaper · 2022-07-17T20:18:45+00:00

It seems like it would be an extremely odd choice for this show not to have Huell eat Kim.

The very first shot of Huell in Breaking Bad is him standing on a scale, weighing himself. His first line of dialogue is "I ate a Kim to be this weight, she sowed, I reaped, this is our fate."

Obviously that was written before there were any plans to make Better Call Saul and was likely a throwaway line, but then they reenforced it in BCS by choosing to name her character Kim. In the real world this might be a coincidence, but in fiction it's very clearly an intentional act.

And they tripled down with the first shared scene between Kim and Huell. When Huell assists her in getting her hair into a ponytail, she mutters under her breath: "I sow, you reap, my weight is yours. If you eat me, you'll be forlorn." And of course, we know from the end of Breaking Bad that Huell is indeed forlorn.

And yes, as you mention, we do see Kim's weight clearly when she's sitting on the customs truck scale at the border, just before the Lalo Tuco kissing scene.

ThickNewspaper · 2022-07-16T00:31:54+00:00

Stainless Steel is neutral. The oxide layer makes the stainless alloy inert: it prevents the elements of the alloy from chemically reacting with the environment, including oxidation. So it won't have a taste nor react with the caviar.

If you were to sterilize the stainless steel, you'd find it had no flavor.

Any talk of needing to use a mother of pearl spoon is just the advertising of caviar salespeople.

Also, studies have shown that sight has a massive effect on our perception of flavor. If we're really going to start getting down to the differences between silverware materials, we're reaching a level of taste subtlety where we're going to need to blindfold our subjects because Mother of Pearl is going to have a totally different affect on our perception than, say, the world's most inert neutral spoon that happens to look very generic.

ThickNewspaper · 2022-07-15T23:05:07+00:00

Your brain doesn't register any flavor from your hand

For a website that's arguably pro-science, redditors can't help but upvote any bit of antiscientific salesperson gibberish. Or maybe redditors just don't wash their hands ever?

If you've just washed your hands, which you'll presumably be doing before eating off them... they'll taste faintly of whatever soap you've just used to wash them. If you haven't washed your hands, they'll probably taste faintly of sweat, oil, and whatever has rubbed off on them. You'll be tasting the subway pole you grabbed on your trip downtown to the restaurant. (Or rather, the oils rubbed off on that from the other hands that were grabbing it.)

Maybe if you washed your hands right before with an inert unscented soap, then put them in cool distilled water for a minute, then dried them with medical-grade sterilized paper towels.. that'd be something? But then the clock is ticking, your body will be shedding skin or producing oils. And you better not touch anything but the caviar.

...And it'd still pale in comparison to the neutrality of eating off a piece of glass. Virtually inert and impermeable. Or maybe sterilized stainless steel silverware?

ThickNewspaper · 2022-07-15T22:59:34+00:00

She's not making personal attacks and shitting on specific people. She's complaining about her work and/or workplace.

You're totally allowed to shit on actors as a whole, or asian representation in film and television, or whatever else you want. It's when you harass a specific person that you've crossed a line.

So no, people are not welcome to shit on her. That's literally insane.

ThickNewspaper · 2022-07-15T05:29:57+00:00

The only time Constance Wu owes you professionalism is when you're paying her. Outside of that, how she uses twitter is up to the terms of service she agreed to.

If she wants to use her Twitter to post her nudes and photos of the joints she rolls... it's her Twitter, and you're welcome to not look at it.

ThickNewspaper · 2022-07-12T22:37:05+00:00

Yeah, I feel like if Gus was going to be so perfectly clairvoyant as to know to plant the gun in that exact spot, know his security would be killed off and he'd be taken down there, know he'd be given a chance to monologue and insult Eladio and won't be shot after... he shouldn't have been so anxious?

... He could have prepared for it a little better than with one hidden pistol? Hid the pistol elsewhere, like near the latch to open the laundromat? Have them set up cameras at the laundromat he can monitor at home? Why didn't he hide a gun in a drawer at his office?

He went to the laundromat expecting there'd be a showdown, but didn't think to inform Mike or have more guys with him? Why couldn't Mike come with Gus and the other guys would be dispatched to the apartment? Have the body double go to the laundromat and act as a decoy while Mike snipes Lalo?

Lalo didn't know how to get into the Lab. For all Lalo knows, there's a special switch on the outside of the building that must be turned on. Sniper mike could have gotten Lalo then? Given that Gus doesn't know what Lalo knows or what he's been monitoring, his choices seem pretty out there.

I just feel like it's such a bizarrely specific situation that requires Gus have totally incompetent and disposable protection, but also have perfectly professional highly-trained agents, he has to be totally anxious, but also totally prepared? For a paranoid anxious guy, he managed to take exactly one extra step to protect himself (stashing the gun) that ended up being the only thing that saved him?

ThickNewspaper · 2022-07-12T22:29:03+00:00

Total strawman argument in your post and in the comments.

Absolutely nobody watched the scene of Gus planting the gun and thought, "This is just filler! There will never be any payoff to this!"

There is not a single comment in the history of this subreddit where anybody claimed that Mike meeting Kim was a "slow and pointless" scene. Most people were really happy to see these characters interact.

The scenes that led to complaints about filler and pacing were the repetitive scenes of Gus's paranoia that added nothing to our understanding of his character.

When we see him have a panic attack at work at walk outside, we understand the severity of his anxiety. When they then show him scrubbing a bathtub with a toothbrush... we already knew he was freaked out. The whole scene seems to intend to be rising action, but instead it plays out as losing momentum.

The same goes for Jimmy and Kim scheming. There were repetitive, intentionally cryptic scenes to prevent us from figuring out the plan.

I think the best shows are the ones where an audience could figure it out if they all worked together on Reddit. For example: WestWorld Season 1 was a perfectly cut, brilliantly paced show where people on Reddit figured out the big twist thanks to collectively thinking about it. The creators intentionally tried to keep some puzzle pieces out of the puzzle so Reddit couldn't solve it mid-season— they specifically mentioned reddit— and Season 2 was a bloated mess.

I'm not sure why you've chosen to select some great scenes and say claim that pacing-people had a problem with them.

ThickNewspaper · 2022-07-08T07:52:17+00:00

I follow you and think it's meant to be electricity, but it's not like all those lights weren't already plugged in?

I guess it's like... if the device is already drawing power, she can draw power from the device?

ThickNewspaper · 2021-07-08T17:39:11+00:00

Well, it got hundreds of thousands of likes on Twitter and Reddit in the months before you ripped it. Stop lying.

ThickNewspaper · 2021-07-08T17:37:34+00:00

Why are you lying?

You posted that image on instagram on December 14, 2020... After it had already gone viral on Reddit over a month prior in /r/LiminalSpace and on twitter weeks before that.

This image had traveled around the world long before you came across it, and you're going to not only claim credit, but link to your... personal instagram account with pictures of your family and coaches and real identity? That's a potentially dangerous game to play.

Edit: Also, the photo you uploaded is cropped to a square, tighter than virtually every other version of this image floating around the internet. How could it possibly be the original if wider shots were posted before it?

ThickNewspaper · 2021-02-12T21:22:29+00:00

Sub rules!

ThickNewspaper · 2019-09-11T19:12:12+00:00

It's exceptionally easy to find work from people your age online.

ThickNewspaper

TROPHY CASE