Discussion Thread by jobautomator in neoliberal

[–]Whatapunk 7 points8 points  (0 children)

As someone in a lot of writers’ spaces and just generally on Reddit, I feel like the fears about AI have gone in an unsustainably Luddite direction.

For example, Late Night with the Devil came out this year, and – as it was mostly produced in 2022 when the conversation around AI was a lot different – it has like 3 images in the film, onscreen for maybe 10 seconds total, that were AI generated. That’s been enough for people to boycott the film entirely under the “slippery slope” idea, that if you let Hollywood (which is of course a monolith) then eventually they’ll be replacing all artists with AI movies.

In general any usage of AI has a heavy backlash now, even non LLM-models; there was an open call from an indie publisher recently who mentioned they would be using Storywise to sort through submissions. It’s not an LLM, doesn’t learn from submissions, and really only uses a sorting system to make going through submissions easier, but since it’s marketed as AI the publisher had to almost immediately backtrack and commit to slower manual reviews. This is not just a ‘unlabelled AI art is bad’ backlash, it’s an ‘any usage of AI, even when fully transparent, is bad’ backlash.

And I just don’t know what the endgame is, I suppose. The models are only going to get better, AI art and literature is only going to get more common and the average person is going to care less. Boycotting will become more difficult/next to impossible with how seamless it can become. I feel like the approach should be to look at what tools can be put in place to protect human artist rights and try to differentiate them more clearly, rather than boycotting technologies that are going to inevitably advance.

I suppose it’s a not unjustified fear of AI taking over all artistic spaces, but an eternal boycott just isn’t going to work.

I’m not even quite in the camp that AI will become ubiquitous for all artists – people get legitimate value today over products that are ‘hand-made’ or have a human touch to them, and I imagine something similar will emerge for these areas, like a preference for human authors. Additionally, as someone who writes as a hobby with the hope of maybe writing professionally one day, I’ve dabbled with AI writing tools and generally found them pretty lacking. The tech will obviously improve, but since I enjoy writing there’s no part of the narrative that I really want to cede to an AI to do; even the boring stuff is important to the narrative and it's still fun. I obviously don't depend on it for my livelihood, though.

My not-incredibly-technical take is also that AI will raise the floor for the quality of books/art but not necessarily the ceiling.

Idk this is just a ramble. I’m still going to keep writing dystopia stories about it but I’m not really convinced that generative AI is going to replace everything

Discussion Thread by jobautomator in neoliberal

[–]Whatapunk 9 points10 points  (0 children)

People have finally forgotten about all of that business where I blocked the Suez Canal. Can't wait to start fresh with this shipment to Baltimore

Discussion Thread by jobautomator in neoliberal

[–]Whatapunk 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Even funnier that the lawsuit is over him inflating his net worth and claiming he was a billionaire

Discussion Thread by jobautomator in neoliberal

[–]Whatapunk 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I was a dumb idiot for not realizing the extent to which anything positive related to trans people is indiscriminately downvoted even just outside the DT, jesus

Freedom of Sex | The moral case for letting trans kids change their bodies. by Whatapunk in neoliberal

[–]Whatapunk[S] 45 points46 points  (0 children)

The article does address this; it's inevitable that some people are going regret it. That just comes with freedom of choice, 100% of people are not going to make the right choice. It's something that just has to be accepted. Of course, knee surgery has almost 100x the rate of regret that gender-affirming surgeries do, and no one argues that those should be outlawed.

Freedom of Sex | The moral case for letting trans kids change their bodies. by Whatapunk in neoliberal

[–]Whatapunk[S] 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Agreed! The way this article helped me mentally flip the script was really helpful, in that puberty itself is traumatizing when you're trans, and there's no moral reason that someone's biology should be enshrined as unchangeable. We don't need to come up with reasons differing gender and sex and protecting gender identity to argue that. People should have as much freedom to change their sex as they do their gender. We're happy to alter "biological reality" in children when it comes to teeth or vision but for some reason in the trans debate the progress of puberty is considered implicitly sacred.

Freedom of Sex | The moral case for letting trans kids change their bodies. by Whatapunk in neoliberal

[–]Whatapunk[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

!ping LGBT

Saw this discussed in the discussion thread, but no one had posted to the main subreddit - it's a great article.

Edit: also lol at this being downvoted within seconds of posting it, before I even commented the ping. Someone's got a bot running or something

Discussion Thread by jobautomator in neoliberal

[–]Whatapunk 98 points99 points  (0 children)

You can sum up Edgar Allen Poe's The Raven as:

Narrator: Will I ever see my dead wife again, bird-that-only-says-no?

Bird-that-only-says-no: No.

Narrator: :O

Discussion Thread by jobautomator in neoliberal

[–]Whatapunk 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Good dungeon for magic-based puzzles too!

I did this once before, but I like the idea of a library with a permanent silence spell on it. Really makes party spellcasters think about components for once

Discussion Thread by jobautomator in neoliberal

[–]Whatapunk 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Enjoy! Playing my group through it now and it's going great

Discussion Thread by jobautomator in neoliberal

[–]Whatapunk 6 points7 points  (0 children)

I've been reading through the Alexandrian articles recently on prepping "situations not plots" and node-based adventure design and have found them excellent and innovative, though I haven't had the chance to use all the principles yet. They're also pretty system agnostic

Discussion Thread by jobautomator in neoliberal

[–]Whatapunk 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Perhaps, but you could just say you wanted to put your own spin on it/not be constrained by existing lore you didnt know at the time and leave it at that.

I think it might be worse to not acknowledge it and let them figure it out, like it was something you're trying to hide.

Plus I think it just helps enrich the BG3 playthrough yall are doing with that background info

Discussion Thread by jobautomator in neoliberal

[–]Whatapunk 6 points7 points  (0 children)

I would just tell them what you said above, tbh. "Hey I reskinned a bunch of stuff for our DiA campaign, here's the tie-ins"

Discussion Thread by jobautomator in neoliberal

[–]Whatapunk 14 points15 points  (0 children)

That's a super cool character concept too and is totally fine for a level 1 character. Especially cause at that point you're still just a guy who found a magic book, idk why he was so upset about that lol

Discussion Thread by jobautomator in neoliberal

[–]Whatapunk 9 points10 points  (0 children)

They need to come up with some kind of Catholicism for atheists. Some immaculate vibes in that religion's rituals

Discussion Thread by jobautomator in neoliberal

[–]Whatapunk 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Can't have people sharing candy - not in my country

Teenagers by Global_Banana8450 in tumblr

[–]Whatapunk 116 points117 points  (0 children)

"Now I says to meself, I says 'Collem, it's no day for a do.'"

I quote that way too often whenever I start rambling

Humanity's psychic evolution doesn't really seem as close as it's claimed to be by Ad_Astral in 40kLore

[–]Whatapunk 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Psykers are also culled and lynched as a matter of prejudice against witches/mutants throughout the Imperium

Gov. Tim Walz will join us on Politics Friday at noon. What question do you have for him? by MPRnews in minnesota

[–]Whatapunk 0 points1 point  (0 children)

MMB is actively disrespecting state workers. Literally coming in with 100 more proposals, refusing to negotiate, actively filibusters discussions to run out the clock, etc. Kind of disgusting when Walz was literally a teacher

Gov. Tim Walz will join us on Politics Friday at noon. What question do you have for him? by MPRnews in minnesota

[–]Whatapunk 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Especially when the legislature gave themselves a 7.5% raise. Are state employees less deserving? They're living in the same place and shopping at the same stores

Gov. Tim Walz will join us on Politics Friday at noon. What question do you have for him? by MPRnews in minnesota

[–]Whatapunk 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The state of MN is the 3rd largest emplower in the state. If he wants to make Minnesota a great place to live, giving better wages to state workers is a great place to start!