#my writing process as real ones on here know is that i get fixated on a particular vignette or snippet of a scene and then have to go

[leonardcohenofficial]

the lack of lucy/carter fic out there does mean i am going to have to be the change i wish to see in the world

[mxnhoo]

mwah! (k. sn)

ˋ "just bored, nothing else" ࿐ྂ ⁀➷ kim sunoo x reader genre : bro is your bestfriend, bestfriends to lovers (kinda..), inspired by that one sunoo live LOL, not proofread, kiss kiss kiss w/c : ~2.1k cly's note : finally back with something! god guys i'm so fucking sorry for being so inactive. i know i promised that i'd release my hyunjin fic very soon but i just had to write something else to get me back to writing altogether yknow? i hope you guys like this one, im insanely rusty and my kissing scenes are NAWT IT, but regardless hope ya'll enjoy it. wrote this all in one sitting, my ass hurts, if you enjoyed it, please do reblog like and comment! ANYWAYS GN.

border isn't made by me, credits to cafekitsune

The doorbell rang and you raised your eyebrows, looking at everything in sight as you patiently wait for the door to swing open. And it does after a while, and your bestfriend was heavily panting, his posture slightly slouched as he processed that you were here. "You're.. here," he managed to voice out through his heavy panting and you give him a small smile while your eyes lit up at him, "I am".

"Come in, kept you waitin', sorry," he spoke in short sentences, his voice still breathless as he stepped aside from the door, making space for you to walk in and you nod, stepping foot into his house and now being hit with the unfamiliar scent of his apartment. His new apartment. Sunoo had recently moved, and he invited you over because he wanted to show you around his house, catch up with you, y'know, stuff like that.

He was your best friend for a while, a few years, and as much as you admire him as a friend, you also wanted him real bad. Like reeal bad. He has stolen your heart since the first time you saw it and the boy's completely clueless about it, everything he does to you leaving you to question if he did it on purpose to hint something or if he was just being clueless.

He'd always invited you over to his house to hang, play games, stuff like that, but with him moving and his academic workload accumulating, he had been busy and had lesser time to see you, and today was finally the day you could see him after a few weeks. You glanced at the boy who watched you walk in and took the opportunity to ruffle his golden hair, voicing out a "How have you been?".

He smiles at you and slowly closes the front door behind you and locking it. "Good, just been a bit stressful lately, 'bout you?". You turned back to the sight of his new apartment, the same paintings that were hung on a different wall and old furniture that blended in with some new furniture you've never seen before.

"Great. Seems like you've finished moving in, how's it like so far?" you question, walking in more towards the living room, now setting yourself on the couch and looking at the light that was hanging above you.

"Been amazing so far! It gets tough without mama sometimes, but I can cope," he follows you but stands in front of you instead of sitting himself down, "Could I get you anything? Apple juice, orange, water". He remains silent before continuing, "Probably an apple juice right? Your favourite."

Your gaze fixates on him from the hanging lights, the image of him in your brain being refreshed as you took view of his facial features, his blonde hair slightly messy and his lips looking plump and kissable as ever. His lips slightly agape as he eventually started to catch his breath and his eyes looking down on you. You gulp at this sight of him, you almost forgot how beautiful looked and before you could go into a daze about how attractive he looked, you slowly nodded your head, a small smile forming on your face as he recalled your favourite joke, even if it was normal for best friends to remember these types of things.

"Okay, gotcha." was the last thing he said before walking towards his refrigerator. Your eyes followed his every move, the way he opened the refrigerator door, the way he pulled out a carton and closing the refrigerator before pouring the drink into a glass up that was conveniently placed on the counter near him. Your eyes lingered onto the magnets on his refrigerator when he closed it, recognising a photo that was nicely placed in the centre with 2 magnets at opposite corners.

"You still have that?" you pointed at the photo, and Sunoo turned his head over his shoulder, glancing at you before following where you were pointing to, and his eyes land on the photo. The corners of his mouth curl up before he placed the carton down, "Yeah, why wouldn't I?".

It was a photo of you and him in a party, sitting on a couch while posing with peace signs on both hands. It was when you two had first met when people had introduced you to each other or when you practically begged people to introduce you to him . The way you two clicked so fast is quite scary, and from then on you two were quite inseperable.

"I just think it's surprising," you reply, "Out of all the photos we have, you decide to put that one, y'know?".

"It's a special day," he instantly replies, turning his back with a cup of apple juice in his hand. He made his way to you and you raise your eyebrows at his response, "Special?". Your heart fluttered at the thought of him considering a day with you special, and you almost gave it away by putting the most stupid smile on your face, but it took every ounce of self-control inside you not to do so.

"It is the day we met after all," he sat beside you, offering you the cup of apple juice that you had requested. Your eyes slightly widened, and a small smile creeping onto your face as you register what he said. You hastily took the cup into your hand, "You care about those types of things? Like, first days, first meetings, stuff like that?". Everytime you meet him, he always seems to surprise you with something new with no fail, and that's one part you like so much about him.

He hummed, his approving sound accompanied with a small nod and you took a sip of the apple juice. The sweetness immediately hit your taste bud and you quickly swallowed, voicing out a quick 'Ahh' after the refreshing sip. Your eyes look at him and you realise he was already looking at you and it made your heart skip a beat.

"Why're you looking at me like that?" you chuckled, lowering the cup from your face as you flash him a grin. He quickly looked away, a faint smile on his face, "Just missed you".

There he goes again, saying things like that. Is he doing that with a purpose? Like to flirt with you, or is the boy just being genuine? Clueless?

You choked on your drink, his response being the last thing you expected and you shot him a bewildered look. He laughs at you choking, probably enjoying how he managed to get a reaction out of you and you glared at him.

"Are you just teasing me or what?" you questioned, placing your glass cup on the small coffee table in frornt of you.

"I am," he giggled, "I'm kinda bored so it's quite funny to tease you".

Oh yeah?

"Hey," you call out to him, your tone suddenly serious and his laughs die down, his eyes slowly moving to you "I'm bored too".

His eyebrows raised, feeling confused as to where this was going.

"Since we're bored, should we kiss?"

He chokes on the air, his hand flying to his mouth as he looked away from you. You gently patted his back as if you weren't the one who just dropped a 'let's-kiss' bomb on him, a smirk forming on your lips. Once he stopped coughing, he looked back at you, his cheeks a bright tint of pink and his eyes slightly widened, "W-what did you say?".

You looked at him with an amused expression, "I said, let's kiss." You honestly have no idea where this ounce of confidence came from, but if he wanna tease you, he can only get the taste of his own medicine right?

He started to stutter, his gaze being everywhere but on you as he started to scratch his neck, the way he was so flustered being so painfully obvious as you chuckle.

"I'm just kidding," you said. As much as you wanted to kiss him, your intentions were only to tease him back. Upon hearing you, his eyes shot to you, his eyes showing that he was slightly disappointed, "Why?".

"What do you mean?" you questioned. "Why were you 'just kidding'?" "What, do you want an actual kiss or something?" "Yeah.. Yeah, I do."

Now it was your turn to be flustered. You looked at him with widened eyes, your jaw quite literally dropping as you stared at him, taking a moment to process his reply. Sunoo wanted a kiss? And he just openly admitted it?

"Sunoo, quit the teasing, it's not funny at this point." "Who says I'm teasing? I'm being serious, Y/N".

Fucking hell, no fucking way Sunoo admitted that he wanted to kiss you. "O-okay wait, so you're serious about wanting a kiss from me, right?" you questioned, wanting confirmation and that you weren't just dreaming.

"Yes, I want a kiss from you, a kiss from your lips Y/N".

You blink at him repetitively before unconsciously standing up to your feet from the couch, your eyes still fixated on him.

"This feels so wrong," you nervously bit your lip and he sat up and reached out to gently hold your wrist, slightly pulling you towards him, "It isn't, don't worry".

"Do you really want this, Nu?" you spat out, suddenly feeling doubtful about everything and anxiety grew inside you. He gently tugged at your arm, causing you to look at him and he replied, "Been wanting this since forever".

If you said that your heart wasn't going to explode, you'd be lying. Your breathing rate picked up as your chest rises up and down hastily, and your gaze fall on his lips that were slightly parted. You looked back up at his eyes and you immediately notice his eyes on your lips. Your free hand cups his cheek, and you quickly voice out "Me too, Nu" before leaning in and closing the distance between the two of you.

His hand immediately released your wrist, his hands immediately finding comfort on your waist as he pulled you closer. The kiss was slow, passionate as both of your mouths moved in the same rhythm. You could feel him smile during the kiss and you slightly tilt his head to help you get more access to his mouth. Butterflies filled your stomach as you finally process that you were kissing your bestfriend, you were kissing Sunoo. The kiss was so passionate, and it was now evident that you two have been dying for this moment. The longing for each other added fuel to the fire, and your hands gradually make way to his hair, lightly pulling on it.

The surroundings around the two of you slowly start to seem non-existent as you both increasingly melt into each other. At this point of time, only you and Sunoo mattered, nothing else. He nibbled on your bottom lip, causing you to gasp and he took the opportunity to slip his tongue inside your mouth, exploring your mouth as much as he can. Both of your tongues fought a fiery battle for dominance, and to no surprise, he won. The kiss was becoming so heated and intense, and before things could escalate, your hands quickly trail down to his chest and you slightly push him backwards, pulling away from the kiss.

Both of your chests rise up rapidly as your foreheads rest on each other. Eye contact was maintained as you both looked into each other's eyes. "Did.. did that just happen?" you question, still trying to catch your breath as you remain in shock as to what just happened.

"Fuck yeah, been wanting that for so long you don't even know," he confessed. A smirk forms on his lips as his eyes quickly flicker to your lips then back to your eyes. You chuckle as you close your eyes, your head leaning on him even more.

You pull away completely to sit on the spot beside him on the couch, your eyes still on him and you shook your head, "How long exactly?"

"Since I first met you." he responded, his answer once again never failing to surprise you.

"Mutual feeling then," you confessed, your breathing slowing down as you finally manage to catch your breath. He seemed shocked by the fact, but he definitely wasn't complaining.

"Since you care about first's so much, then consider that our first kiss, yeah?" you chuckled. "Sure thing, just know it won't be our last."

[hcneymooners]

once again tumblr is evil and deleted the ask, but someone asked me what my writing process was and i wanted to answer them.

warning for me sounding decidedly unhinged and deluded.

typically, i begin with visuals. i tend to get fixated on the visual nature of things and how they make me feel. my goal, when i write, is to bring you into whatever that pulls from me whether it is euphoria, grief, etc. i want to walk you along the bridge between my head and heart.

first, i dump. just a collection of color, sound, and imagery. there is usually no cohesion, just an amalgamation of what comes closest to the full-body experience i'm having.

this usually contains my themes and begins to weave together what i'm seeing. it's like collecting the bones and scrying. then comes the more technical aspect. here i decide strict colors, strict imagery, strict feeling.

by now i also begin to find a song or two to work with whilst i write. i play it in the background on loop until i've drained it of all feeling and purpose.

i aim to be very descriptive when i write. i want you to feel it so badly. i try to refrain from telling because i want you to invest in the idea that you are the character. i am very immersed in my characters. they are apart of me whether they are underdeveloped or full 3d individuals.

as for the erotic and explicit, desire drives most of it. i write sex simply as i view it in the real world. i'm someone who cannot sleep with someone unless i love them. my body is often a warzone and i need someone to understand it, rather than claim it as territory. this understanding drives me to constantly expose what my characters are feeling at the hands of someone else.

work with the negative space. focus less on the body and more on what's hidden inside of it, i.e. we know, for instance, that a woman's fingers are inside you but what does that do to your stomach? does it make it warm? do you feel like it's harder to breathe? why? why?

i have a strain of feeling that runs through my work. i always refer to grief and love via devotion as my roots. that is the shadow that follows anything i touch. i lean into this because it aligns.

i write the way i do because i've practiced, which i feel sounds so gauche and bland. but i used to write soooo terribly (in my eyes) and now i feel i've gotten better only through repetition and through reading other works/finding other authors that work with the same themes that i do in a voice similar or extremely different to mine.

this is a bit of a ramble, but that's the general nature of it. something that's helped me the most is the idea that nothing is a bad idea; it is the execution that sustains or kills it.

as for an actual routine, i follow this one.

7:00/7:30 : wake up 8:00 to 8:30: eat breakfast  8:30: outline writing plan, choose a word count for the day  8:45 to 9:45: write for at least an hour  9:45: coffee or tea break  10:00 to 11:00: finish writing and reach goal

love you, and thank you for asking.

ally. x

[olderthannetfic]

Genuine question: what's the point of writing fanfic? As in, what's the purpose? No one in the fandom I'm in comments on fics and I even got told off by one person for doing so, as it "encourages bad writers and makes them think they're good". So it seems that it's a lot like book writing, where people work hard and are creative, but instead of getting paid and getting comments on the work, you just sit there silently hoping someone will press the kudos button and make a number go up. I feel like that time and work could be better spent on making something you might get some kind of profit off of. Don't get me wrong, I love doodling fanart, but I don't post it, as I'm aware that there's no point to doing so, and while it's a nice way to fill the time on a commute, it's not something that takes me as much time and effort as fanfic does. So... why do people bother? Sometimes I describe ideas I have and people I know in my fandom will tell me I should write it, but I don't see why. I get more interaction from just saying "imagine if [thing here]" than I would by sitting down, writing for hours, editing and posting [thing here], so what would the point be? I'm not punching down or going "haha women and their fanfic lol!", I genuinely do not get what the point is and this blog feels like it might have someone reading who knows the answer.

--

Do you make art for profit? Genuine question.

There's nothing inherently wrong with being motivated primarily by external factors, but it's not actually why a lot of people create things, whether it's books or recipes or doodles in a notepad.

I enjoy the actual process of writing.

I think many people lose sight of that aspect in an era where tons of <500-word fics that are mostly outlines and "Imagine if..." posts get disproportionate attention for being easy to consume. But the satisfaction of doing a bigger art piece and doing it right is real and motivates a hell of a lot of creation.

I suppose you might be thinking "Okay, but why not just write it alone and never post?", but I like sharing. Showing off my finished creation is part of the joy, and sharing with other people like me is too. But those aren't quite the same thing as worrying about kudos. It's like dressing nicely when you leave the house because you feel great when you know you look good vs. needing another person to tell you you look good.

To be honest, though, this type of feeling has grown in me the better I've gotten at a craft. The closer my finished projects get to the vision in my head, the easier it is to find them fulfilling and to be excited to share them. When I fall short of my own ambitions, it's discouraging no matter how much attention I might get from others.

I feel like it's time for my regular reblog of Adam Westbrook's video essay series The Long Game.

The third and least known in the series is all about this idea of who you're making art for if you're not getting material rewards in the short term. It talks a lot about autotelicity—being internally driven instead of externally.

--

But if you really just want clicks, anon, start a blog that accepts anon asks and posts about wanky stuff. Actually tag things, unlike me, so people can find you.

No, writing for attention isn't worth it.

The time investment is too great and your brain will always fixate on the times people didn't respond instead of the times they did.

But that's not actually why most people write.

[calware]

dear calware, I'm not sure how much you know on the topic of Doc Scratch, but I was wondering, why is the common consensus around him that he's like a creepy pedophile? after rereading his messages with Rose, he seems more tone deaf and weird than a fully on creep. is there something I'm missing?

scratch isn't "literally" a pedophile (or a hebephile, which is the accurate term for this situation) which we know because of this

but at the same time, that is still the Way he's written

(i'm sorry if this following explanation is confusing.... i really do not have the right wording to describe it) it's almost like a metaphorical representation. he's a child predator in every way but the actual sexual attraction. the way he's written references the behavior of actual child predators and is meant to signal to the audience that this is the Kind Of Character he is. it's a literary tool(?)to tell the audience that he is literally taking advantage of characters in various ways (as well as straight up abusing damara) while at the time comparing it to child sexual abuse

but if you do want literal actions on his part, he does Literally groom young girls and they are his targets for manipulation

also, directly from the author commentary (which. is not 100% serious at times. but i do think it sometimes offers some actual insight):

I know I just said a bunch of stuff about [DD] maybe being a creep. But look, this is just my OPINION here. I don't think he's actually being creepy about this. I think he has a genuinely parental attitude toward Aradia and wants to see her succeed in her violent and underhanded schemes. See how he wants them to conduct their business with efficiency? He's way too professional to go Full Doc on these girls.

Another peek at Rose suggests she's still at it with her creepy uncle, Doc Scratch.

Then you have a few beats of conversation which bring Equius to mind, such as the creep-factor

[Dirk and Equius] have this creepy-guy streak running through them, with strange or offputting interests, and seem to get a quiet kick out of making others uncomfortable through demonstrations of these fascinations. [...] I'd say these self-examined qualities are just drawn out, isolated, and inflated both for dramatic effect, and also as critical write-up of those qualities existing within many human beings in general, which I would like to think is grounded in a creative process involving a certain degree of humility about some of this bullshit. I like all these characters here, but that doesn't mean I think their unpleasant qualities are good. It just means I am harnessing and heightening those qualities for creating strong villainous portraits.

We start getting the sense that the entire purpose of this conversation, from Doc's vantage point, is just to passive-aggressively manipulate Rose into peering directly into one of his cursed testicles. Wait, my youth pastor is literally barking like a dog right now for some reason. Probably because I put him on a leash and tied him to a post in the backyard. I guess I fucked up again? I mean one of Doc's seeds.

Maybe it's fair to say I have a higher than average tolerance troubling content. But even I have to admit to shuddering a little when I read Doc's creepy lines toward Rose. I think Doc's creep factor toward girls is most likely channeling part of Caliborn's personality, which almost seems to revolve around his horrid attitude toward women. For Caliborn, this weird combination of wrathful misogyny, yet fixation and obsession with certain girls, is obviously central to the type of real-world profile he's meant to portray. But when his personality is more muted among the collective in Doc's head, those qualities come across as more "restrained," "polite," and "flattering," which arguably just makes it all creepier. The result is a creepy dude profile that also exists in the real world, sort of adjacent to the Full Caliborns out there. There seem to be many stripes of this kind of unfortunate male behavior, which all exists in a broader family of sub-Caliborns. The Docs, the Eridans, the Cronuses… They're all sketchy in different ways.

Doc sitting back just to "watch" is another creepy Equiusism. Remember that was a thing with him.

I wonder what Jade would think if she knew she had in her possession since childhood one of Doc's testicORACLES!!! Oracles. The word I meant to say was oracles, not anything else. Anyway, like I was saying, how would Jade react if she realized every time she played with one of her beloved toys, she was actually fondling this weirdo's plump, juicy oracle. I know you think my youth pastor may have something to do with this peculiar outburst, but you're wrong. I "dismissed" him recently, because he told me with great pride that I learned everything he had to teach me. I don't need anyone to keep me from shoving my foot in my mouth anymore, I'm sure you'll be pleased to know. Now let's watch this grieving teen receive a demonic message from an evil puppet's big fat nut.

bonus commentary from book 6 that has nothing to do with the post:

We're reaching a specific kind of story partition. Not the end of an act, but the end of a year. Also an end of "disc," which is a kind of meta-partitioning I just made up for the purpose of closing the book on two years of content, as well as being a good meta-device for introducing the Doc sequence we're about to get into in the next book.

"next book"...... sad

[spacemonkeysalsa]

For context, I’m putting together some training materials for my office, and something like this is going to make it into those documents. Though I will have to change the example to something that doesn’t reference BG3 or sex, since it’s like not appropriate or whatever.

I’m barred in Nevada but then I moved (dummy) and now I am studying to take the bar exam again in a different state because I moved somewhere that doesn’t have any sort of reciprocity (double dummy) and its fine, I’m not worried. It’s just a pain, but as I’ve been studying and remembering what the bar is like, I also have friends who are studying for the EA exam or the CPA exam. It's forced me to think a lot about this kind of test and here's my main takeaway from studying for it:

Say you have a question on the exam like: “Which of these statements is most correct?” and then the statements are:

A) Astarion tops his partner in all his romance scenes in BG3

B) Astarion doesn’t top his partner in every one of his romance scenes in BG3

C) Astarion bottoms his partner in all his romance scenes in BG3

D) Astarion may top or bottom his romance partner in every scene in BG3

And you think to yourself, “hang on, I am overly familiar with the 2023 Larian video game Baldur’s Gate 3 and I love Astarion, I’ve romanced him 30+ times, surely this question ought to be easy, except none of these are quite correct?”

Answer A bothers you because you know it’s possible for him to bottom with larger body types, and this answer seems to exclude that possibility in how it’s phrased. Or does it? We’ll get back to that.

Answer B bothers you because even if you can get a version of the scene when he doesn’t top, there still exists a version when he does, and this applies to all ‘his’ scenes. Circling back to A real quick, you might be able to save yourself some time if at this point you just recognize that with A&B they are trying to get you to fall into the trap of assuming mutual exclusivity where none exists, but let’s say you’re an overthinker like me and your brain needs to keep processing all your options…

Answer C is obviously wrong, but you might hesitate to dismiss it, because what if you missed something? It’s a huge game and if we are thinking about variations, are these options you haven’t considered?

Answer D makes your stomach drop because you realize that three of these questions specify ‘his’ scenes, but the last one says ‘every scene’ and if it just removed the phrase ‘in every scene’ it would be correct, but the fact that it’s the one that’s different makes you fixate on it, even though you know it can’t be right, because it says ‘every scene’ not ‘every romance scene’ and therefore on its face implies every scene in BG3 is a sex scene, which isn’t true.

And you really wish there was an option that read “Astarion can top or bottom depending on player choices” but that’s not there. You have to pick from what’s there.

And, maybe you get distracted for a moment, wondering if by ‘his scenes’ they really mean just the scenes written for his character---that’s what you assumed, at first, but now that you’ve kept thinking about it you wonder if they may just mean a scene that he can participate in, as a player character, in which case B is true, because it implies that there’s at least one scene where he’s always a bottom and you can think of some that would count Also, they purposefully used the similar phrases “all” and “every one of” for A & B because they are hoping you will waste time considering whether these two phrases have the same meaning or not, and if there was any purpose in writing it in a way that was inconsistent. To be clear, the only point in switch up the wording is to mess with you.

Finally, you decide that the phrase “his romance scenes” has to refer to the scenes written for his character. Because anything else would be too unclear for the purposes of this question, since those other scenes ‘belong’ to other characters.

A is the correct answer because even if it’s not the best way to summarize this topic, it’s the only answer that isn’t technically wrong. All his romance scenes show him as a top, even if variations exist where he’s also a bottom. That just means “Astarion is a top in all his romance scenes, and a bottom in some romance scenes,” which would also be another example of the kind of ‘more correct’ answer you might wish was on the page, but it’s not there, and you can’t write in your own answer. Saying ‘all’ doesn’t exclude other possibilities. He tops in all the scenes, and he also bottoms in one of the scenes, and both of these things can be true at the same time. There’s no mutual exclusivity.

They purposefully write these options like this because they want to trick you. They don’t care that you are knowledgeable on the subject, they are barely interested in testing your knowledge, what they really want to test is whether or not they can trick you into making a mistake.

And, on the one hand, I don’t think this is a great way to test people on a subject. Especially a subject that is dense all on its own. You’re not showing that you’re unfamiliar with BG3 if you get this one wrong, you’re just showing that purposefully unclear communication and pedantry can trip you up. That’s nearly totally meaningless.

On the other hand, the meaning that is there has to do with being careful when you read, and understanding common logical fallacies like false equivalence or fallacy of division. You know, the kind of thing lawyers are supposed to be good at.

It isn't so bad if you can stand how tedious these kinds of exercises can be, or if you’re a weirdo who kind of likes tedium, like me. It will make it more likely that you take psychic damage while interacting with normal people, though. And people will think you're a pedant, because in fairness, you are a pedant.

[mskwtz]

I’ve been in a really weird mind space lately regarding writing, particularly here on tumblr, and this has been a reason for my lack of posting.

I am not saying any of this for attention. Rather, I just want it to be known why I’m not here right now so it doesn’t seem like Courtney’s just being lazy.

I’ve been having a hard time for a while now and have been doing what I need to do in my personal life to adjust and fix that. I’m doing my best. It’s a process. I take a few steps forward by trying to get medications right and trying to figure out what I need to feel like I’m not drowning, but then I’ll have a really bad day or week and it feels like I’ve jumped back several steps. That’s the life of mental illness, which a lot of people in this community understand personally because I’ve seen people talk about their own struggles.

A lot of my bad days have had me feeling as though I’m struggling in all my friendships both irl and online, and that the content I am putting out here isn’t good enough. And while I recognize some of all of it is probably in my head, those feelings of not being interesting or funny or engaging enough makes it really really hard to focus on writing and discussing plots or ideas with others. It’s discouraging and it’s hard because that doesn’t fall on anyone else but me. I can have the hard conversations with my close friends in real life about feelings I’m having, but people online don’t owe me anything just like I don’t owe them anything. I love all my moots and writing partners so much. I consider myself friendly with anyone I write often with and plot with. But I also need to be better about understanding that not everyone is my friend. You can be friendly and write together and not be friends, even though I tend to lean towards friendships. When I sense that someone isn’t as into talking to me as I am with them, I pull back and as a sensitive person it hurts.

I’d like to think I’m very self aware. I know where my flaws are, I know what holds me back, but being self aware doesn’t fix the problem and I’m unfortunately at a place where I don’t know how to fix the problem just like that. The last time I felt similar to this, I deleted all my blogs. Every last one. All those posts gone. I regret that decision a lot, and I don’t want to do that again.

Without doing that though, I have to step back when I’m feeling not great so I don’t ruin this hobby for myself. I’ve been focusing on other hobbies like gaming and reading, but also hate to feel like me not being present here means I could lose people who I am friends with or that I’m letting those people down by not actively writing. It’s a double edged sword.

TLDR; I’m on an indefinite hiatus. I’ve been testing the waters on a new blog, fresh fandom that I’ve been hyper fixating on since reading the new thg book, but even there I’m not posting as much as I’d like to. I want to be here, but I also don’t want to force myself when I lack the energy. So we can say I’m here but I’m not here. I’m always on discord for those who have it and want to chat about whatever. Life, fandoms, plotting stuff for whenever I do have the energy to be on the dash or writing on discord itself.

[robotnik-apologist]

Dr. Robotnik/Eggman in Regards to Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD):

Something I haven't seen talked about a lot in the larger Sonic fandom is this topic - though, as a woman with autism, I've brought it upon myself to write a small collective discussion about the common traits of ASD that Robotnik displays across various continuities. As with all of my other posts, everything said here is up for discussion - questions, comments, elaborations... regardless of what it is, feel free to drop it in my asks inbox.

Disclaimer: No, I am not using ASD to excuse any of Robotnik's actions, regardless of the media. If you haven't seen my page before, I assure you that my blog name is a joke.

This topic as a whole might sound silly, given how often autism is dumbed down in media. Robotnik wasn't written with ASD in mind, I'm sure - but he makes for surprisingly accurate representation.

(And for God's sake, not every character meant to represent a minority has to be morally good! Real representation is acknowledging that a character is a minority whilst also writing them as a genuine human being who isn't defined by that sole trait.)

Outside of that tangent, cough cough, not only is ASD sorely lacking in matters of representation for people with high-functioning variations, but it's often written in highly infantilizing ways, too.

So why do I personally believe Robotnik has some form of ASD?

There are a variety of reasons, but let's start with one that's a key component of his character: his intellect. We admittedly don't know much about the causes of ASD or the causes of high intelligence/IQ, but there is a correlative (though not necessarily causative) relationship between the two. Regardless of the theories, statistically people with high-functioning ASD are proportionately more likely to be geniuses (as defined by the American psychologist Lewis M. Terman, who set the IQ for “potential genius” at 140 and above). It's stated countless times across various kinds of media that Robotnik has an IQ around 300, which far exceeds the 'genius' quota.

This is going to get very technical from here (until I move onto the next category) so feel free to skip to that point. The average IQ test contains four kinds of questions: verbal comprehension, perceptual reasoning, working memory, and processing speed. More specifically, things such as pattern recognition and comprehension can also appear as subcategories. In high-functioning ASD, it's very common for individuals to experience heightened abilities in these categories, which leads to the overall higher average IQ, and therefore the qualification of genius being somewhat correlated with ASD. This isn't to imply that every person with ASD is a genius or vice versa, but rather that ASD changes the way a person's brain works. If the wires cross in just the right way, sometimes you end up with a genius (albeit realistically not as extreme as 300. that's ridiculous.).

For my next reason, I present hyperfixation. In almost every StH media, there are moments therein where Robotnik seems genuinely ready to risk his own life or the lives of his allies if it means eliminating Sonic. Why would a man built on logical reasoning do such a thing? It's simple - the prospect of winning against the object of his fixation is an instant dopamine rush. Dopamine and serotonin receptors are often 'messed up' in people with mental conditions such as ASD or AD(H)D, which leads to the formation of hyperfixations - it's simply a focus on the constant source of the chemical.

Now, it's reasonable to ask: why is he fixated on Sonic? Hell if I know. It's like asking why I'm so fixated on Robotnik. Sometimes logic doesn't need to explain everything, though that probably seems ironic in a post like this. As food for thought, though, Robotnik is a scientist in every definition of the word - and Sonic regularly defies basically every law of multiple studies of science. If I had built my life around the understand of these rules, only to have them all collapse because of one random teenager, I would probably be a little obsessed, too.

Now, my third reason for this is routine. ASD is known for manifesting as a heavy reliance on routines and familiarity. This can be found in COUNTLESS places, including the clothes that he wears. Now, yes, I understand that it's super common for cartoon/video game characters to wear the same outfit simply because nobody has the time to design a new outfit for each episode, installment, or issue that a character appears in. But in some contexts, I think it could be argued that Robotnik chooses to wear the same outfit because he's simply adjusted to them - though I'll return to this topic later. I think it's also arguable that Robotnik's focus on Sonic is built around routine - even if it's played as a joke. Once again, I'm aware that it's simply because of the often episodic nature of StH media, but it's undeniable that Robotnik is often depicted as doing the same thing every day with slight variations when necessary.

My fourth reason is empathy. People with ASD can often feel disconnected from others simply because they don't feel like they know the same 'moral code' that appears to be almost programmed into others. They may not understand why familial love is so commonplace, for example, which I think could be applied to Robotnik's lack of compassion towards Snively in SatAM and Archie (not defending it, of course, but it's definitely a possible cause).

This is also strongly connected to my next point, which is Robotnik's understanding of emotion. He's often depicted as immature in many aspects, which is fairly common for those with ASD - they often appear to be immature in the eyes of people who don't fully understand ASD. Not only this, but Robotnik is a master manipulator - he understands conversation incredibly well. Now, this might seem to detract from the point that I believe he has ASD, but it's quite the opposite. To become a master manipulator, one must study conversation, cultural norms, body language, and a variety of other things. But for people with ASD, studying these things is commonplace so that they can imitate what is deemed as 'normal' behavior - or, in other words, so that they can mask. With a person that has the intellect of Robotnik, it's reasonable to believe that this intimate understanding of conversation and persuasion could easily be twisted into manipulation.

Finally, though least convincingly, is sensory. It should go unspoken that ASD interferes with the sensory experiences of the brain and the body. As I mentioned earlier, Robotnik's consistent wardrobe is an example of satisfying a sensory need - and can even be found in the way that he dresses when he's not in his typical outfit. Take his racing outfit, for example - it very closely resembles his usual attire, at least in a material sense. People with ASD usually prefer/find certain materials or styles of clothing to be more comfortable than others. Hell, you could even argue that his (comically-intended) obsession with eggs is a sensory issue. You could also argue that he's unaware of his own strength, to an extent, given the multiple times that it's displayed across various medias. But his consistency in his grooming (mustache lol), clothing, routines, and other things all suggest that he's very aware of his own sensory needs.

Thanks for reading to the end of my crackpot theory, lmao. Like I said, I'm always up for discussion. Below here, I'm just linking to a few sources in case anyone wants to read more about my justifications for this post, or just about ASD and IQ tests in general!

[sorakabu]

my predictions (bingo?) for drdt, chapter 2 culprit and also everything beyond, because i'm hyped, and why not!!

the original version of this post was too long and i was yapping. it felt like i was saying everything there is to say, but also nothing of real importance, so i decided to throw everything here, without all my overcomplicated rambling (some stayed though), and hope for the best that this will satisfy the fixated monster in me that needs to get my thoughts out there. also it will be fun to see in the future what was right or wrong.

so, for all of these predictions, please assume that my reasoning is either:

theorists made such well put together points that i checked the evidence on my own while also overanalysing the heck out of it and now i'm convinced

there's not much concrete proof but i think it would make narrative sense, or it would be a great direction for some character's development from what we've already seen of them

i don't even know but sometimes we just vibe and sometimes things are real in our hearts

funny thing is that i find drdt so interesting with how it handles its themes, how it foreshadows, establishes, and resolves, that i'm not actually certain about any of these. my mind wants to analyse it like it's a standard danganronpa game, like it's easy to predict smaller plot points because of the obvious bigger picture, but the special thing about drdt is that i have no idea what the whole bigger picture really is. all i know is that we're focused on trust and distrust, and we will surely follow that path, but i actually have no idea what else is in store. and i'm rambling again but bear with me. point is: i like the writing for drdt and i know i'm not prepared for whatever will be happening later down the line.

so now, for my small predictions bingo:

as most of the community on tumblr thinks, eden and levi are culprit and possible accomplice. that's the part i'm almost sure of, one of them is getting executed. i, however, am not sure who played which role. i'd like to think levi is the one who came up with most of the plan to help eden win the trial, and he's the one with the secret of killing before the killing game (which arei got), but i can't tell why exactly eden would kill arei. eden is not secretly evil. logically there should be some trick here, or it was an accident, but the eden thing to do would be to immediately admit she did it. unless that's where levi comes into play, and he's the one who pulled even more strings, not only setting up the crime scene, but also getting eden to play along. which makes me think eden would still be the one qualified as the blackened, then levi gets to blame himself and gets sick development or whatever. and maybe he lives to try to kill or at least beat the shit out of ace but ace will not die. let's say i'm going with that. eden is the culprit

whit has some special role. he's either the mastermind, or traitor, or key to ending the game, or whatever you want to call it. there's something off about whit with how he seems to know too much

rose sleeps a lot so i think there must be a point in time where someone uses that to accuse or even frame her for murder. although i don't think she will ever get killed when sleeping. i think she's going to be a survivor

ace won't be a victim, and he doesn't seem like a culprit either, so by process of elimination he needs to survive the game

david is not evil or malicious at heart, it's his depression talking. we're dealing with someone burnt out from keeping up his optimistic persona. all this act is self-sabotage and self-deprecation. he cared for arei and now he's spiraling. he will get better though, trust

i know i already talked about chapter 2 culprit but quick hu mention: she is not the culprit simply because i have no idea what her character really is yet. all i know is she is morally grey and she will not die yet because she needs to interact with nico, david, and others some more

arturo is not going to make friends with anyone other than maybe veronica, because everyone hates him, BUT he will not die that soon. i can feel him surviving at least one more chapter just out of spite. if he dies, it's not earlier than chapter four

j will not kill and she will not survive to the end. she will be a victim. my guess is chapter 3, for no particular reason.

contrary to the two points above, there's an alternate scenario i have in mind, with arturo dying next chapter and j being accused, but still innocent. and she would still become a victim later in the game, probably chapter four

veronica is too much of a wild card but if i were to predict something regarding her role... IF she was a blackened (and i can't tell if she will be), she wouldn't be all that happy or excited about it. there would be some reflection on her part. some subtle commentary on how enjoyment of darker media doesn't, or shouldn't, equal supporting or resorting to real violence. also basically everyone in the fandom agrees her secret is the one about harming herself just to feel something. this ties to what i said, i think. maybe she would kill to test herself, but taking a life will not bring her contentment

teruko will trust less before she learns to trust more (especially if eden really will die), but if there's someone she will learn to trust first, it's going to be charles. if she gets a "pep talk" about trust, it's somehow going to be from david. one asshole to another type of conversation where he's trying to help because he does genuinely care for his classmates

nico will not try to kill anyone again, but they also won't survive

this is probably all, i don't know because i wrote this at night and fell asleep. if anyone other than me stayed to read this, thank you for coming to my ted talk

[trinketstar]

personal diary entry ramble its boring lol

Reading thru my old posts after coming to some realizations about myself lately. yknow, just trying to see what mindset i was in back then, now that im in a better situation and reevaluating where I want my career to go and planning future stuff.

Around the time I first got a tumblr, when I was about 16 or so? That was the culmination of a LOT of school bullying and also when I started getting really serious about the idea of being a career artist. Before that year I dreamed of a completely different career path, but the way I was treated in school had eaten away at my self esteem to the point where I had no faith in my own abilities and ALL I could focus on was escapism, and art was that to me. Thats when I started doing comics, and I dont regret that! It was a fine hobby and I still have fun with writing.

But I was completely lost in it when I was younger. I fixated on cartoons and thats ALL I could think of because facing my issues and real life was just too much for me to handle. I think that's why I picked the college major that I did. I wasn't focused on real life at all. I just picked something that sounded fine enough and then went back into focusing entirely on the cartoon stuff.

The problem too was that I wasn't passionate enough to really make art my career. I didnt want to major in art, I wanted a "regular" job where I could just come home and do my art after. But I never found out anything else about myself. never really tried to explore other careers or hobbies or interests.

Its only now, 3 years after graduating and feeling completely lost after several jobs I HATED, that I realize I spent all that time avoiding thinking about my life for real. I went through some MAJORLY messed up stuff as a kid and I guess I just couldn't handle facing that until .. relatively recently. In 2023 I started meds, spent a LOT of money on therapy, forced myself into the forefront of my mind, stopped meds cause they were kinda making me worse, and NOW at my big age of 27 and a half I'm starting. to make a plan. like a real one.

I dont have everything figured out yet of course, but I'm starting to think about it yknow? And it feels . it's something,

Because it feels GOOD its relieving! I can think about the future without dreading it!

But at the same time the irrational part of me feels sad? That it took this long. Though I know that the only reason I'm here and thinking this way has been a culmination of all of my past choices, and I've been working hard this whole time to do a lot of personal growth. I guess its pointless to wish this process hadn't taken so much time because I'm a different person than I was at 20 or 22 or 25. I'm looking out for myself as I currently am! Or something.

I dunno. I'm proud of myself! I feel like I missed out on a lot though. But I still have time right? I'm not even 30 yet I can still turn things around and really see what I can do. make the most of things. I mean some people never figure that out right? I'm doing alright I think

edit after a minute:

i have sympathy for my past self. it was difficult to face all that and i needed to take my time with it. my timeline is my own and i did a lot of good work on myself. i worked really hard and barely had anyone helping me, and i still have a long ways to go. but it'll be ok. and i'll be ok

[canmom]

a visit to the house of the robot priests

there are a lot things written about LLMs, many of them dubious. some are interesting tho. since my brain has apparently decided that it wants to know what the deal is, here's some stuff i've been reading.

most of these are pretty old (in present-day AI research time) because I didn't really want to touch this tech for the last couple of years. other people weren't so reticent and drew their own conclusions.

wolfram on transformers (2023)

stephen wolfram's explanation of transformer architecture from 2023 is very good, and he manages to keep the usual self-promotional "i am stephen wolfram, the cleverest boy" stuff to a manageable level. (tho to be fair on the guy, i think his research into cellular automata as models for physics is genuinely very interesting, and probably worth digging into further at some point, even if just to give some interesting analogies between things.) along with 3blue1brown, I feel like this is one of the best places to get an accessible overview of how these machines work and what the jargon means.

the next couple articles that were kindly sent to me by @voyantvoid as a result of my toying around with LLMs recently. they're taking me back to LessWrong. here we go again...

simulators (2022)

this long article 'simulators' for the 'alignment forum' (a lesswrong offshoot) from 2022 by someone called janus - a kind of passionate AI mystic who runs the website generative.ink - suffers a fair bit from having big yud as one of its main interlocutors, but in the process of pushing back on rat received wisdom it does say some interesting things about how these machines work (conceiving of the language model as something like the 'laws of motion' in which various character-states might evolve). notably it has a pretty systematic overview of previous narratives about the roles AI might play, and the way the current generation of language models is distinct from them.

just, you know, it's lesswrong, I feel like a demon linking it here. don't get lost in the sauce.

the author, janus, evidently has some real experience fiddling with these systems and exploring the space of behaviour, and be in dialogue with other people who are equally engaged. indeed, janus and friends seem to have developed a game of creating gardens of language models interacting with each other, largely for poetic/play purposes. when you get used to the banal chatgpt-voice, it's cool to see that the models have a territory that gets kinda freaky with it.

the general vibe is a bit like 'empty spaces', but rather than being a sort of community writing prompt, they're probing the AIs and setting them off against each other to elicit reactions that fit a particular vibe.

the generally aesthetically-oriented aspect of this micro-subculture seems to be a bit of a point of contention from the broader lesswrong milieu; if I may paraphrase, here janus responds to a challenge by arguing that they are developing essentially an intuitive sense for these systems' behaviour through playing with them a lot, and thereby essentially developing a personal idiolect of jargon and metaphors to describe these experiences. I honestly respect this - it brings to mind the stuff I've been on lately about play and ritual in relation to TTRPGs, and the experience of graphics programming as shaping my relationship to the real world and what I appreciate in it. as I said there, computers are for playing with. I am increasingly fixating on 'play' as a kind of central concept of what's important to me. I really should hurry up and read wittgenstein.

thinking on this, I feel like perceiving LLMs, emotionally speaking, as eager roleplayers made them feel a lot more palatable to me and led to this investigation. this relates to the analogy between 'scratchpad' reasoning about how to interact socially generated by recent LLMs like DeepSeek R1, and an autistic way of interacting with people. I think it's very easy to go way too far with this anthropomorphism, so I'm wary of it - especially since I know these systems are designed (rather: finetuned) to have an affect that is charming, friendly and human-like in order to be appealing products. even so, the fact that they exhibit this behaviour is notable.

three layer model

a later evolution of this attempt to philosophically break down LLMs comes from Jan Kulveit's three-layer model of types of responses an LLM can give (its rote trained responses, its more subtle and flexible character-roleplay, and the underlying statistics model). Kulveit raises the kind of map-territory issues this induces, just as human conceptions of our own thinking tend to shape the way we act in the future.

I think this is probably more of just a useful sorta phenomological narrative tool for humans than a 'real' representation of the underlying dynamics - similar to the Freudian superego/ego/id, the common 'lizard brain' metaphor and other such onion-like ideas of the brain. it seems more apt to see these as rough categories of behaviour that the system can express in different circumstances. Kulveit is concerned with layers of the system developing self-conception, so we get lines like:

On the other hand - and this is a bit of my pet idea - I believe the Ground Layer itself can become more situationally aware and reflective, through noticing its presence in its sensory inputs. The resulting awareness and implicit drive to change the world would be significantly less understandable than the Character level. If you want to get a more visceral feel of the otherness, the Ocean from Lem's Solaris comes to mind.

it's a fun science fiction concept, but I am kinda skeptical here about the distinction between 'Ground Layer' and 'Character Layer' being more than approximate description of the different aspects of the model's behaviour.

at the same time, as with all attempts to explore a complicated problem and find the right metaphors, it's absolutely useful to make an attempt and then interrogate how well it works. so I respect the attempt. since I was recently reading about early thermodynamics research, it reminds me of the period in the late 18th and early 19th century where we were putting together a lot of partial glimpses of the idea of energy, the behaviour of gases, etc., but had yet to fully put it together into the elegant formalisms we take for granted now.

of course, psychology has been trying this sort of narrative-based approach to understanding humans for a lot longer, producing a bewildering array of models and categorisation schemes for the way humans think. it remains to be seen if the much greater manipulability of LLMs - c.f. interpretability research - lets us get further.

oh hey it's that guy

tumblr's own rob nostalgebraist, known for running a very popular personalised GPT-2-based bot account on here, speculated on LW on the limits of LLMs and the ways they fail back in 2021. although he seems unsatisfied with the post, there's a lot in here that's very interesting. I haven't fully digested it all, and tbh it's probably one to come back to later.

the Nature paper

while I was writing this post, @cherrvak dropped by my inbox with some interesting discussion, and drew my attention to a paper in Nature on the subject of LLMs and the roleplaying metaphor. as you'd expect from Nature, it's written with a lot of clarity; apparently there is some controversy over whether it built on the ideas of the Cyborgism group (Janus and co.) without attribution, since it follows a very similar account of a 'multiverse' of superposed possible characters and the AI as a 'simulator' (though in fact it does in fact cite Janus's Simulation post... is this the first time LessWrong gets cited in Nature? what a world we've ended up in).

still, it's honestly a pretty good summary of this group's ideas. the paper's thought experiment of an LLM playing "20 questions" and determining what answer to give at the end, based on the path taken, is particularly succinct and insightful for explaining this 'superposition' concept.

accordingly, they cover, in clear language, a lot of the ideas we've discussed above - the 'simulator' of the underlying probabilistic model set up to produce a chain token by token, the 'simulacrum' models it acts out, etc. etc.

one interesting passage concerns the use of first-person pronouns by the model, emphasising that even if it expresses a desire for self-preservation in the voice of a character it is roleplaying, this is essentially hollow; the system as a whole is not wrong when it says that it does not actually have any desires. i think this is something of the crux of why LLMs fuck with our intuitions so much. you can't accurately say that an LLM is 'just telling you what (it thinks) you want to hear', because it has no internal model of you and your wants in the way that we're familiar with. however, it will extrapolate a narrative given to it, and potentially converge into roleplaying a character who's trying to flatter you in this way.

how far does an LLM take into account your likely reaction?

in theory, an LLM could easily continue both sides of the conversation, instead of having a special token that signals to the controlling software to hand input back to the user.

it's unclear whether it performs prediction of your likely responses and then reasons off that. the 'scratchpad' reasoning generated by deepseek-r1 (a sort of hacky way to get a feedback loop on its own output, that lets the LLM do more complex computation) involves fairly explicit discussion of the likely effects of certain language choices. for example, when I asked why it always seems to begin its chain of thought with 'alright', the resulting chain of thought included:

Next, explaining that "Alright" is part of my training helps them understand that it's a deliberate choice in my design. It's meant to make interactions feel more natural and conversational. People appreciate when communication feels human-like, so this explanation helps build trust and connection. I should also mention that it's a way to set the tone for engagement. Starting with "Alright" makes me sound approachable and ready to help, which is great for user experience. It subtly signals that we're entering a conversational space where they can ask questions or share thoughts freely.

however, I haven't personally yet seen it generate responses along the lines of "if I do x, the user would probably (...). I would rather that they (...). instead, I should (...)". there is a lot of concern getting passed around LessWrong about this sort of deceptive reasoning, and that seems to cross over into the actual people running these machines. for example OpenAI (a company more or less run by people who are pretty deep in the LW-influenced sauce) managed to entice a model to generate a chain of thought in which it concluded it should attempt to mess with its retraining process. they interpreted it as the model being willing to 'fake' its 'alignment'.

while it's likely possible to push the model to generate this kind of reasoning with a suitable prompt (I should try it), I remain pretty skeptical that in general it is producing this kind of 'if I do x then y' reasoning.

on Markov chains

a friend of mine dismissively referred to LLMs as basically Markov chains, and in a sense, she's right: because they have a graph of states, and transfer between states with certain probabilities, that is what a Markov chain is. however, it's doing something far more complex than simple ngram-based prediction based on the last few words!

for the 'Markov chain' description to be correct, we need a node in the graph for every single possible string of tokens that fits within the context window (or at least, for every possible internal state of the LLM when it generates tokens), and also considerable computation is required in order to generate the probabilities. I feel like that computation, which compresses, interpolates and extrapolates the patterns in the input data to guess what the probability would be for novel input, is kind of the interesting part here.

gwern

a few names show up all over this field. one of them is Gwern Branwen. this person has been active on LW and various adjacent websites such as Reddit and Hacker News at least as far back as around 2014, when david gerard was still into LW and wrote them some music. my general impression is of a widely read and very energetic nerd. I don't know how they have so much time to write all this.

there is probably a lot to say about gwern but I am wary of interacting too much because I get that internal feeling about being led up the garden path into someone's intense ideology. nevertheless! I am envious, as I believe I may have said previously, of how much shit they've accumulated on their website, and the cool hover-for-context javascript gimmick which makes the thing even more of a rabbit hole. they have information on a lot of things, including art shit - hell they've got anime reviews. usually this is the kind of website I'd go totally gaga for.

but what I find deeply offputting about Gwern is they have this bizarre drive to just occasionally go into what I can only describe as eugenicist mode. like when they pull out the evopsych true believer angle, or random statistics about mental illness and "life outcomes". this is generally stated without much rhetoric, just casually dropped in here and there. this preoccupation is combined with a strangely acerbic, matter of fact tone across much of the site which sits at odds with the playful material that seems to interest them.

for example, they have a tag page on their site about psychedelics that is largely a list of research papers presented without comment. what does Gwern think of LSD - are they as negative as they are about dreams? what theme am I to take from these papers?

anyway, I ended up on there because the course of my reading took me to this short story. i don't think tells me much about anything related to AI besides gwern's worldview and what they're worried about (a classic post-cyberpunk scenario of 'AI breaking out of containment'), but it is impressive in its density of references to interesting research and internet stuff, complete with impressively thorough citations for concepts briefly alluded to in the course of the story.

to repeat a cliché, scifi is about the present, not the future. the present has a lot of crazy shit going on in it!apparently me and gwern are interested in a lot of the same things, but we respond to very different things in it.

why

I went out to research AI, but it seems I am ending up researching the commenters-about-AI.

I think you might notice that some of the characters who appear in this story are like... weirdos, right? whatever any one person's interest is, they're all kind of intense about it. and that's kind of what draws me to them! sometimes I will run into someone online who I can't easily pigeonhole into a familiar category, perhaps because they're expressing an ideology I've never seen before. I will often end up scrolling down their writing for a while trying to figure out what their deal is. in keeping with all this discussion of thought in large part involving a prediction-sensory feedback loop, usually what gets me is that I find this person surprising: I've never met anyone like this. they're interesting, because they force me to come up with a new category and expand my model of the world. but sooner or later I get that category and I figure out, say, 'ok, this person is just an accelerationist, I know what accelerationists are like'.

and like - I think something similar happened with LLMs recently. I'm not sure what it was specifically - perhaps the combo of getting real introspective on LSD a couple months ago leading me to think a lot about mental representations and communication, as well as finding that I could run them locally and finally getting that 'whoah these things generate way better output than you'd expect' experience that most people already did. one way or another, it bumped my interest in them from 'idle curiosity' to 'what is their deal for real'. plus it like, interacts with recent fascinations with related subjects like roleplaying, and the altered states of mind experienced with e.g. drugs or BDSM.

I don't know where this investigation will lead me. maybe I'll end up playing around more with AI models. I'll always be way behind the furious activity of the actual researchers, but that doesn't matter - it's fun to toy around with stuff for its own interest. the default 'helpful chatbot' behaviour is boring, I want to coax some kind of deeply weird behaviour out of the model.

it sucks so bad that we have invented something so deeply strange and the uses we put it to are generally so banal.

I don't know if I really see a use for them in my art. beyond AI being really bad vibes for most people I'd show my art to, I don't want to deprive myself of the joy of exploration that comes with making my own drawings and films etc.

perhaps the main thing I'm getting out of it is a clarification about what it is I like about things in general. there is a tremendous joy in playing with a complex thing and learning to understand it better.

[jungkoode]

Dude the chapter 11 snippet for 25H,,,,,, I love Noma 😭 she's so cute. I'm fully obsessed with her.

I know the vibe is Sexual Tension~ and pushing the big sexy man and his big sexy brain's buttons but the way she goes about it is so earnest which makes it so so so endearing.

Like Yoongi is over here Sweating, horrifically down bad and she's so earnestly conducting her little scientific experiment on what to say/when to illicit the reactions she wants to see more of.

She's just so endearing 😭 😭 I love reading the way her brain works

Also I love her and Jimin's dynamic with hobi being the devious little instigator. Jimin just being like "I'm so done with you" and noma being like ok but..... that is extremely secondary to the questions I need answered.

I truly love your commitment to making relationships with characters complex and allowing characters to not be simply assigned into categories like "good" or "bad". Because the little we have seen of jimins reasonings of not liking Noma like!!!! Totally fair I think. It would not be fun to see your friend put through this agony over and over again with no change. I also just like that you've written a relationship where they disagree fundamentally and/or have different views of a person and that's normal for them. A lot of times now I think people often write romantic interests as being perfectly aligned in thought and morality and 😴. Complex characters have been missing in forms of media in recent years and it makes the stories just so much better and interesting to read.

Oh my god this is so long I'm so sorry 😨

HELLOOOOOOOOOOOOOO ANON. First of all. How dare you. How DARE you apologize for giving me a beautifully thought out, high-quality, brain-rich take like this. Do you think I’m one of those girlies who doesn’t want 15-page essays in their inbox?? Do you think I post 20k chapters and go “oh no!! not a long message 😔😔”??? No. No, babe. I’m thriving. I’m flourishing. I’m feeding on this like a little lore gremlin with my claws out.

Okay NOW. Let’s talk about Noma. YES!!! That’s literally it—that’s her. That’s the exact dynamic I wanted to show. Like, she’s doing science. She’s running numbers. She’s like “Hm. If I say ‘your theory is flawed’ in a lower tone, his pupils dilate. Interesting. If I say ‘define dissonance’ and tilt my head 3 degrees he gets all rigid. Let’s repeat that test.” Meanwhile Yoongi is across from her like “🥵🚨🚨🥵🧨.” It’s so funny because to her, this is just data collection. She’s not even trying to be sexy—she’s just accidentally hot because she’s smart and terrifying and deeply fixated on learning Yoongi inside and out like a system to decode.

And YES oh my God thank you for noticing the Noma/Jimin/Hoseok dynamic. Jimin is 900% just done™ but also still participating because he cares, but he hates that he does, and Hoseok is like “I’m here to stir the pot and narrate and emotionally instigate :)” and Noma’s like “Ok valid but here’s a spreadsheet and six follow-up questions.” She is NOT emotionally fluent in human friction but she is excellent at interrogating inconsistencies. Jimin’s like “I think you’re ruining my friend’s life,” and she’s like “Mm ok but let’s define what constitutes ‘ruin.’”

And the point you made about not flattening characters into “good” or “bad”?? YES. Literally thank you. THANK YOU. We are so past that era. I hate when I see cast dynamics written where everyone is just perfectly aligned because that’s not how people work. Jimin having valid reasons for disliking her? That matters. Because he’s not a villain—he’s not jealous or petty or wrong—he’s just processing the trauma of watching his best friend get torn apart and is like “I can’t see this happen again.” It’s such a real, heavy thing. And Noma doesn’t take it personally—she sees it, catalogs it, understands it. That’s what I mean when I say “messy emotional realism.” People clash. People grieve. People love differently.

So. Yeah. This message made my whole day. And I will never apologize for being a writer who craves nuance, friction, and moral divergence. That’s where the real intimacy lives.

Thank you for reading. Thank you for caring. You are SO valid and intelligent and welcome here. Please come back always. I’m obsessed with you. 🫂

[princessanon]

Well hello, honey !

I go by baby on here <3 female. 24. single. queer. side blog where I talk shit, be horny, and post what I like. (not your thing? that’s okay!). got some odd kinks but I know you weirdos do too. 18+ only please!!!

truly just needed a space to put down my thoughts! will i be posting whatever i please? yes. will some of it be my deepest horniest thoughts i have that i don’t share in real life? oh, most definitely. like i said; if this isn’t your thing, that’s okay! hope you have a wonderful day regardless. I do ask you be 18+ if your following (don’t make me mom your ass and block you) might write occasionally. might gush about my hyper-fixations and celeb crushes, who knows.

i’d like this blog to be a safe space for people. ask me for advice. tell me what pissed you off today. hell, share your dirty thought your keepin to yourself- I don’t mind! just be respectful, don’t judge, and we’ll all have a good time 🫶🏽

my biggest kinks consist of anything to do with a big belly. bloating, stuffing, pregnancy, etc. can’t tell you why, I just love that shit 🙂‍↕️ not a gainer/feedee myself, but I will occasionally do bloats and stuffings for fun.

my big fucking no-no’s on this blog!!!!:

rape/anything not consensual to knowing parties

minor play/pedophilia (no fuckin duh)

bodily fluids. just no.

age play. not my thing.

not a kink, but if you support trump and any transphobic/homophobic ideology gtfo!

I’m a pretty open girl. as long as no one is getting hurt in the process I’m usually okay. Not sure if something’s alright here? just ask honey, I don’t bite <3

[pauking5]

THAT SNEAKPEAK ON THE SEIYA FIC??? PAU YOUr WRITING SKILLS ARE ✨INSANE✨ WTF

One reason I got so hooked on your stories is the way you are able to embody the characters of the people you write; like your writing is an extension of who they are instead of basing it on a ‘what if’ scenario. Like you make them feel alive. I mean, sure Enishi may be cold-blooded and thirsty for vengeance but he’s also a grieving boy missing his sister; and that our mophead Enishi is a side of him that could exist too (e.g., stubborn and playful)

I don’t know if you get it tho-

(I swear I don’t call Enishi by his name anymore because everytime I see Macken’s Enishi, our stubborn mophead is all I can think of)

I’m off to read the Overdrive fic you have because Macken’s character there is also 👨🏻‍🍳💋 I’m back to dropping here for my comments and just random yapping btw- I hope you won’t grow tired of me 😭

AnD WTF DID I FORGOT TO GREET YOU A HAPPY NEW YEAR 🎊 SKIES WHAT AM I THINKING- Happiest new year, Pau! Cheers to many more writings, learnings and breakdowns and laughters (and friendship) with you. We cry and laugh and learn and do the same process all over again because that’s the right response to the love that we are given.

Always with love 💛

— 🌻

double asks in the space of a day? well that's new. and don't worry about thinking you're too much because you're not. i love talking about writing and these characters and if there's anyone willing to spend time talking about them it's not yapping but time spent well :))

and believe me, i may be the one yapping more. this long reply is proof of it.

my writing skills are nowhere near insane but i try my best 🫠. i'm just really fixated on getting it to where it can reach and even better if i can even do that. i'm glad you're reading these with this much excitement. it gives my work meaning and that's really one of the best things to hear.

i was debating if i should spoil anything because there's not much about her yet, but as much as is there i can't keep to myself at all (that's why i asked you guys to ask for spoilers kdjdjdjdj). but i truly hope she will be as loved by you as it is by me.

i cannot do scenarios for people. even fictional, they are just as real to me as real people. they exist for more than the purpose of a story or a quick read to satisfy a craving. i treat every being like it has a soul because kindness transcends the real realm.

that man may have killed and committed heinous crimes but he's not just sin. creating fictional worlds, especially for already existing ones, is a chance to expand on that character beyond what that piece of media gave them. i don't just focus on one trait but look underneath it - the motives, the driving force behind their actions. those are just as important as the main act they engage in.

well that, and i happen to be a really deep person (as someone has told me recently). i understand that there's more than words and actions to a person. there's the way they think, the world that they live in inside their head, the way they perceive things. but all these are met with variables - defining events - that affect and impact them. these crush the stability of the world they built and the world they were used to before it happened. they perceive them in such way that it may change how they act but it doesn't change who they are.

you may have suffered great loss, but underneath that grief and numbness your world still exists the same way it used to exist. the boy that loved helping his sister cook, playing in the snow together, and watching over her is still in there. all enishi and tomoe had after their parents died was each other and nothing else, no one else. they didn't trust the world and didn't need it to intervene into their lives because as long as they had each other, they didn't need anything else.

after tomoe let someone in her life out of pure love, he saw what it did to her and swore it off completely. but that same love and kindness tomoe showed him, is the same love and kindness he showed her while she was still around. it still exists in him. it never ceased existing because it was a core part of him and what formed his personality as he grew up. his world was thrown into instability and chaos because after her passing, he tried to rely on the world but the world turned its back on him. he looked for that kindness and love but he found it nowhere.

one thing i may add is that it's written that he's a gemini, an air sign. air signs are known for flowing with the energies around them. they absorb it and rarely return it, but when they do it's through mirroring the behaviours of those around them. enishi was left alone in a warring world, where to catch the light of tomorrow day was a luxury. it was a world where you couldn't give love, like in the world tomoe built for him, but a world that took and took until it left people with nothing but poverty and pain. there was only death, anger and battle around him, which built into the world he knew little by little. so he absorbed what he saw and reflected it on the world. but by the repulsion he showed time and time again, he regretted every single bad thought, crime and anger he exerted on it. he tried to tear that world of love apart because he couldn't protect it. but that doesn't mean he succeeded and that it doesn't still exist, somewhere deep inside him.

in addicting taste, i gave enishi a person that is just like him - angry with the world for tearing her world of love apart. but she didn't want to tear it apart herself. she spent her life looking for her parents and did her best to keep building that world alone even if no one gave her love. she sought out the kove in the tiniest corners of light and held onto the menories she cherished of a time where her parents were still around. enishi shared those memories with his sister and they are usually what makes his humanity click back in.

when enishi found miyu he was reminded of tomoe. he saw how she lived alone, fought and fed herself by doing what she hated the most in the world, but she gave her everything to protect that kindness and love still in her even when she had every reason not to. she didn't let her actions warp that part of her into a monstrous power to provoke more violence and seek vengeance on the world, because she knows that won't bring her parents back any faster.

more than that, miyu showed enishi time and time again that world of love in him wasn't dead. it still exists, deep within him, but it exists. sometimes the sole existence of something is enough to prove that there is still something to fight for, even if the person you built it with does not feel the same about it anymore or they're gone.

her name is also a big hint to this that no one seemed to catch upon. miyu means kindness and hikari means light - the two things enishi's world were missing. her kindness holds the hand of his anger and gives it purpose for the better. her light embraces his darkness and makes it seen. the yuki in yukishiro stands for snow and snow is known to be pivotal to new beginnings not just endings. and that's on me working with symbolism and meanings because japanese people of all cultures don't just name people, they give them meaning before they even know what their meaning in life will be. i wanted to honor that a little.

there's more i would say but i don't wanna seem like a hypocrite for giving my characters actual hearts and souls lol. in case you want more character essays please do ask haha. i am here to provide.

just a heads up that the next addicting taste chapters are pretty heavy on the emotional side but they're proof that kindness and love can rebuild even the darkest of hearts back into a loving one. there's a lot that happens because enishi gives in to this world of love again. he is confused but with baby steps he makes things right, in the way only he knows how.

back to your message: yes i do think of him as my mophead too 🫠. the love i have for him is unparalleled with any i've ever had for any fictional character and sometimes it's what drives me to write. so i hope that by all that yapping up above i did get your point.

enjoy the overdrive fic baby! i know i've neglected her because life took a turn lately, but i am still actively working on it and i cannot wait for you to read what's coming. once addicting taste chapter 12 is done with she's my priority. i'm also working on other stuff within the cave walls so look out for those too.

and happy new year to you too my love! i hope that even if it started slow and agonising as fuck, it will blossom and become the best year you've had so far. trust the process, as they say.

thank you for coming by my sunflower. your notif literally made me smile brightly when it came through. always here for you.

- 💛

[d0tping]

Hey guys, so I know I already don’t post a ton on here, let alone about Sanders Sides, but I know some of you have followed me because of my Sanders Sides related posts.

So this post is mainly for those people who follow me, or any other sanders sides fan who comes across this post who’s just browsing the tags.

I’ve come to the decision that after the season 2 finale, whenever that will come out, I will no longer be watching Sanders Sides as a regular fan.

I know a lot of people in the fandom are pretty bored of the lack of content or are just tired of waiting, or is upset with how the series is being handled/treated at the moment, or have just fallen out of love for the series, and I completely understand every single one of you who are feeling like that.

Personally, I am pretty tired of the current treatment of the series, I am incredibly tired of the lack of communication we get, I’m tired of being strung along with little comments to make us stay, I’m just tired.

Now, this is not to say that I am against Thomas in any way shape or form, no absolutely not. I want to make that incredibly clear! I do not hate Thomas Sanders! I am not against him! I understand this year has been awful for him both mentally and physically, and I am so proud and happy that he’s been doing better recently. And I wish nothing but the absolute best for him!

But there’s only so much I can defend. And lack of professionalism, communication and organisation is, unfortunately, not something I can defend.

There has been so many times where Thomas’ could’ve told us something, updated us on the writing, the production process, filming, etc etc, and it has just been radio silence, other than a few tweets here and there that still imply he’s in the writing process.

I’m at a point where I am even scared that the finale is just not going to be worth the wait we’ve had to sit through.

Let’s face it, the fandom is dead, the series is in purgatory - practically on the brink of death - we get no updates, no episodes, and the only sanders sides content we get is either ads or a little something for us to talk about for about a week, maybe 2 if we really milk it out.

But other than that, Sanders Sides has become a cash grab and filler content. Just let that sink in for a moment…

Yeah, I don’t know about you, but if this is what it’s like now, who knows what it’s going to be like for season 3. Yikes.

And personally, I don’t want to be around to watch that. I’m already having to watch a series I love and care about deeply slowly die in real time, I really don’t want to stay to see how far it will fall.

Now this is not to say that I am going to stop watching Sanders Sides, no I will still watch it, I will still watch season 3, but I will just not be considered a “regular fan,” more so just a casual viewer.

Once something dies down for me, I more or less just stop caring for it, this is pretty common for me and it’s pretty unfortunate to be honest, I’ve been like this with many other of my past special interests/hyperfixations, but for me if there is nothing to keep me hyperfixated on something….then what’s the point? For example: a few years back I was incredibly fixated on Teen Wolf, I watched the entire series on Netflix and I was completely and utterly obsessed. It was a main hyperfixation of mine for a long time, and then I finished the show. And whilst I still enjoyed it, I still liked it, it slowly faded into the background for me overtime. I may not be completely and utterly obsessed with it anymore now, but I still like it and I look back on it very fondly.

This has been the same for Sanders Sides, and it has been like that for a while now for me.

I still love it, I’d still like to see the end of it, but it’s just….not a huge thing for me anymore.

So yeah, after season 2 I am done with Sanders Sides, at least on a regular fan level.

Thank you so much for liking my Sanders Sides posts, despite how few there are compared to other sanders sides blogs on here, but I appreciate you stopping by and checking out my art and my theories/ideas.

I believe I still have a few sanders sides drafts on here that I never posted, so if you’d like to see them then I am more than happy to post them!

I’m not leaving the fandom forever, I’m more so just giving my time and energy to other things, and that’s okay. Sanders Sides will always be there, no matter how long it takes /lh.

So whilst this is not a goodbye, it’s more of a “see you around” I suppose, so I’ll see you guys around! Again thank you so much for checking out my lil sanders sides corner of the internet, and I hope you all carry on creating your amazing art, writing, edits, cosplays, headcanons, ideas and theories for this truly amazing series. And of course, I hope you enjoy watching Sanders Sides!

Bye guys! Much love and take care 💛🫶

-Remy

[freelafan4life545]

So, funny story.

I was originally was gonna write a fanfic based on the episode "Otherwise", but my thoughts shifted to "One is Silicon and the Other Gold." Because I believed that Leela made another chatbot of Fry and used it whenever Fry's out doing whatever.

And that's what I wrote.

So enjoy.

Chatbot and Self of the Heart

The wind of the Apartment filled the air as Fry strolled into his room, still buzzing from an eventful night with Bender at O’Zorganax’s Bar. He kicked off his shoes and went to the bathroom, but something felt...off.

Leela sat at the bed, her cyclopean eye fixated on her wrist device. Her brow furrowed in concentration as her fingers darted across the holographic keyboard. A small, wistful smile played on her lips.

"Hey, Leela!" Fry greeted, his voice cheerful and loud. "What’s up?"

Leela jolted and quickly tapped the screen to close her chat. “Oh, Fry. Nothing much, just...uh, work stuff.”

Fry tilted his head. "Work stuff? It’s like, midnight. What kind of work stuff?"

Leela turned away, fumbling for an excuse. “You know, reports, mission summaries, captain-y things.”

Fry’s suspicion grew. He leaned over her shoulder, and before she could stop him, he tapped her wrist device to reopen the last screen. A chat log popped up, complete with a profile image. Fry’s face stared back at him, albeit a slightly exaggerated version with perfect hair and an unnaturally cool pose.

“Wait a second…” Fry squinted at the screen. “Leela, is that me? Why am I texting myself?”

Leela’s face turned a deep shade of purple. “It’s not you!” she blurted. “Well, it’s kind of you. It’s a chatbot...I programmed it to look like you and talk like you.”

Fry’s jaw dropped. “You...made a fake me? What for?”

Leela sighed, pulling away from him. “It’s not what you think, Fry. It’s just that when you’re out with Bender, or when you’re goofing off, I...I get lonely. I miss you. And sometimes I just need someone to talk to who...feels like you.”

Fry was silent for a moment, processing her words. “But, Leela, I’m right here! You don’t need a fake me when you’ve got the real deal.”

“Am I?” she countered, her voice tinged with frustration. “When you’re out all night, drinking, partying, and leaving me here by myself, I don’t have the real deal. And I don’t want to nag you or ruin your fun, so...this was my solution.”

Fry felt a pang of guilt. “Leela, I didn’t know you felt like that. I thought you liked having your alone time.”

“Sometimes I do,” she admitted, her tone softening. “But not all the time. Especially not when I’m thinking about how much I love you and want to share that with you.”

Fry’s heart twisted. He sat down next to her, taking her hand. “Leela, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you feel that way. I’ll try to cut back on the crazy nights with Bender. I just...didn’t realize how much it was bothering you.”

Her eye met his, glistening with unshed tears. “I didn’t want to bother you with it. That’s why I made the chatbot—to keep my feelings to myself.”

“Well, no more of that,” Fry said firmly. “From now on, if you’re feeling lonely or want to talk, you tell me. I’ll be there, I promise.”

Leela gave him a small, grateful smile. “Thank you, Fry.”

He grinned and reached for her wrist device, reopening the chat. “But, uh, I kinda want to see what fake Fry says. Does he say stuff like, ‘I’m so awesome,’ or does he talk about anchovies a lot?”

Leela laughed despite herself. “He does, actually. And he keeps quoting Star Trek episodes.”

“Ha! I like this guy already,” Fry said with a wink. “But I still think the real me is way cooler.”

Leela leaned her head on his shoulder. “You are.”

As they sat together, Fry wrapped an arm around her, silently vowing to be more present for the person who loved him enough to create a digital version of him. After all, no chatbot could ever take the place of the real thing.

💜🧡