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Superb bean salad. Photo from a book in my collection: The Book of Kittens, edited by Brant House, 1951.

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I cannot stand the parodies of modern major general, they're overdone and simply not as good as the original. They've done them about everything, whatever topic, big or small.

And when i notice one of them my eyes will always start to roll.

The diction's always slurry when they rush the complicated words, and adding many fricatives will turn it so cacophonous. The slanted rhymes are silly and they keep just making more and more, please someone stop the parodies of modern major general.

The scanning of the lyrics in the meter is unbearable, they emphazise the syllables in ways that are untenable, in short in matters musical, prosodic and ephemeral, i cannot stand the parodies of modern major general!

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Musicals in Korea: Take One

The highlight (or embarrassment) of my video call with VIXX was Lee Jaehwan looking at all four musicals I went to in Korea and saying "Wow! Musical maniac!" I didn't even show him my drawer of Broadway Playbills. Actually I'm pretty sure Taekwoon imitating my dolphin squeak is peak embarrassment.

I do not have much experience with Korean musicals. I was, however, (un)fortunate enough to live by Broadway for two years and within two hours for several more. I've so far checked off 15 out of 41 Broadway theatres, and a handful of Off-Broadway theatres. I'm not a "theatre kid", so am coming at theatre as a casual enjoyer. I'd like to think I have some grasp on the pinnacle(?) of the american theatre scene, from smaller black box productions to Majestic classics and hyped up Best New Musical Tony winners.

I was blown away in Korea. 

Since finding info was a pain in the rear, I'm doing a quick write-up of my experience as a non-Korean speaker before I embark on Korean Musicals: Part Two. The four musicals I saw were: 22 Years and 2 Months, Les Miserables, Phantom of the Opera, and Ben-Hur. 

- - - - - -

Some general notes on ticketing:

There are two HUGE differences from purchasing theatre tickets on Broadway (or Toronto, or West End). The first is that the cast schedule is posted ahead of time. The second is that tickets are released in batches, known as 'Ticket Open', separated several weeks apart. A third, less major, difference is that there are often several purchase sites per show, and each purchase site will have a different "block" of seats. The full-price tickets are also much cheaper than Broadway… (although I got a little spoiled and this time looked at my fifth row off-to-the-side Jesus Christ Superstar seats of ~130 CAD and went 'this is kind of expensive'.) For the most part, I bought my tickets for these shows directly from the global interpark website. The other two common sites are Melon and Yes24. Some shows that are on Interpark (korea) will not be on Interpark Global, but may be on Melon. Last year the fee was 3,000KRW but this year it seems to have become 8,000KRW on Interpark Global. This is still much more reasonable than western ticketing sites.

Example cast schedule (may only appear on Korean version of Interpark). This one is for Tebas Land which only has two characters. Unless you're really interested in seeing a particular actor, probably any cast choice is a good one.

Example seating charts for Great Comet, R&J, and Hedwig. Each site takes a 'vertical' chunk, and has all tiers available. Some seats are reserved for box office.

Example of a Ticket Open announcement with the casting schedule announced at the same time. The tickets will go on sale at 2PM on November 6, for shows between the dates of December 17th to January 5th.

- - - - -

22 Years and 2 Months -  Link Arts Center, Bugs Hall, 401 seats

This was a smaller, local production, and I was lucky enough to attend Jaehwan's last performance. I failed at ticketing, but another fan helped me get a ticket! Ticketing is serious business in Korea and seats for shows for well known actors or idols can go in seconds, especially for first and last performances. Imagine trying to get tickets for, say, Aaron Tevit or Daniel Radcliffe--instead of the barrier to entry being ticket prices of 300$-700$, it's down to internet speed and fast fingers. 

In some ways, it's more fair! At least scalped tickets are still much less than for English shows… 

Tickets were will-call. I lined up at the box office, showed them my order number, and they gave me my ticket. I was there pretty early so went to take pictures with the cast board and look at the merchandise. Since it was the last show, several things were out of stock, but I bought a really pretty key-chain, a handkerchief(?), and a program book. The photobook and OST were only available to people who'd seen the show X number of times (five? I forget) which was kind of a bummer. Unlike many Broadway theatres, there's no bar to get an overpriced cocktail in a souvenir cup to sip on through the show.

I again have to stress that I speak zero Korean. The language barrier doesn't bother me, possibly because I was raised on a steady diet of Italian and German opera. I knew the rough gist of the story since it was based on a historical event, and had no trouble following along. The acting was phenomenal--not just the leads, but also the ensemble. No one was ever 'off'. The vocals were… everything. The set was simple, but the use of lighting and projections and sound design brought it to life.

And the sound design. Imagine not getting your ears blown out! Imagine actors enunciating! Imagine mics not cutting off, or speakers turned up to max! I didn't even need my auditory sensitivity aids! Twenty minutes in and I needed all my self-restraint not to message my friend to wax poetic on the sound design and the enunciation. I will give it to Korea that the theatres are all much, much newer, which definitely helps.

Plenty of washrooms, so no need to book it out the door to the washrooms during intermission. Merchandise booth was open during intermission as well. 

Stage door seems to vary from actor to actor and show to show, especially when it comes to idols. This is the only show I 'stage door'ed for. Fans lined up behind barricades and waited for Jaehwan to come out, fansite cameras at the ready, he waved and greeted us and then got into the van and left. He seemed very tired :( Probably because he had a concert in a few days to rehearse for.

The (packaged) MD from 22 years and 2 months.

- - -

Theatres in Korea (or at least in Seoul) are completely dark on Mondays. Some shows are dark on Tuesday as well, but nothing plays on Monday. In other words, I was forced to do non-theatre things, like go to Namsan tower… What a shame.

- - -

Les Miserables - Dream Theatre, Busan, 1700 seats

I'm basic. Les Miserables is one of my favourite musicals. (In no particular order, my top three were Camelot, Phantom of the Opera, and Les Miserables). Circumstances and sheer bad luck meant I'd completely missed its Broadway run and I'd resigned myself to hopefully seeing it one day on West End.

I was initially bummed out because Les Mis closed in Seoul just before I arrived. But! Thanks to the power of public transportation! It takes less than three hours to get to Busan! Where Les Mis was playing! And so, on Wednesday, I hopped on a 7am train to Busan, ate delicious seafood, and went to the matinee performance. The ticket for a 5th row seat was 180,000 KRW with a 3,000 KRW fee. 

Instead of there being one concentrated theatre district, several of the big theatres (arts centers) tend to be further out of the city center. Again, good public transit makes this a non-issue, but it is something to note. 

Other than 22 years and 2 months, the other three musicals were "big" productions. While I'd never seen Les Miserables before, I had the 10th Anniversary Cast recording playing on repeat, and was probably one of the few that actually enjoyed the movie???? Either way, I had high expectations.

Tickets again were will-call, the theatre was pretty big and connected to some other things and up an elevator, but again, showed them the order confirmation, and they gave me the ticket, and off I went to wait. 

Unfortunately, I met my absolute nemesis--school groups. Downside of matinee performances :( I've encountered school groups or summer camps at matinee performances on Broadway, but there were so many of them, they took up almost the entire balcony level, and, I am afraid to say, had all the decorum one might expect of a hundred or so middle/high schoolers. They laughed during 'On my own'!!!! (They weren't that bad. I just don't get along with school groups.)

Merchandise at Korean shows go HARD. None of that basic t-shirt or tote bag or magnets. Although I only ended up picking up a pin badge and a program book, mostly because I got choice paralysis and also had to schlep whatever I got back to Seoul. Playbills aren't a thing, similar to West End, but the program books are basically the most beautiful photobooks for a musical you want. They also have synopsis and cast introductions and all that standard stuff. 

The tiny amount of Les Mis MD (because I was already hauling a bunch of stuff around.)

I unfortunately forgot to take pictures with the cast board for Les Mis because I was too busy avoiding the Hordes Of Children.

Honestly, I don't know what else to say about Les Mis because it surpassed my wildest imaginations, Grantaire had the best delivery of his lines in Drink With Me possible, the stability of all the actors even while moving or while lying down was incredible, and Gavroche was so hecking cute. I cried so many tears. So. So. So. Many. Tears.

I was very excited and impressed and was relaying my appreciation of technology to my friend.

And then I had just enough time to go to Spa Land and still make the last train, and that was what I did in Busan. 

- - -

Ben Hur - LG Arts Centre, 1335 seats

So. Recall how my top three musicals were Les Mis, Camelot, and Phantom? I now have a new one.

Ben Hur.

Ben Hur is an original Korean musical based on a well known book with a well known movie that I did watch when young but mostly slept through. Mostly I remembered: chariots, and Jesus. Wikipedia here was a godsend. 

Ben Hur, by nature, is a big production. They had real horses in the play on Broadway! (They did not have real horses here, but the horses might've been more impressive.) If I ever wanted to see any sort of stage production of Ben Hur, it was not going to be in North America. Also, my little dumpling goober was playing the titular role so an otherwise very painful decision of which cast to watch was made for me. I could not imagine this loser gamer dweeb as Judah Ben-Hur but also, he's my soft loser dumpling gamer dweeb so. Yeah. (Kyuhyun. It's Kyuhyun.) 

This one I was waiting on Interpark and refreshing desperately for ticket open, and managed to get a seat in the 10th row. The ticket was 170,000 KRW with a 3,000 KRW fee. After absolutely botching two ticketing attempt, I was very thankful I got a good ticket! 

Again, tickets were "will-call". IIRC, instead of a box office, they had little machines where you put in your ticket reservation number and the ticket was printed from there. There was a lot of merch, and one thing I wish I got but did not get was a pair of Ben-Hur 'opera glasses'. Yup. In Korea they still use opera glasses, and people in the same row as me were using them too. Honestly, given how emotive the actors are, I can see why you'd want a good look at their faces. In addition to the program book and some keychains, I also got postcards of the dumpling and of another actor who I really want to see some day but didn't have time to. 

Anyway.

LG Arts centre is quite new and is also very big. I'm looking through old convos with a friend and I sent her this image with the caption "Broadway could never".

Look. I'm used to scouting out the bathrooms in any unfamiliar theatre so I know exactly where to bee-line to during intermission. Of course this is incredible to me.

There was no line for the bathroom during intermission.

Out of all of the musicals I saw, this one was the 'loudest'. Mostly because Ben-Hur is about the Roman occupation and there is a lot of whipping and fighting and in other words, there are many things that should be loud. But because sound design in Korea is great, there was a good volume range they could use, so even though it was 'loud' I didn't need to pull out my auditory aids at any point. Also: "if you've ever wondered what it's like to mic up opera singers, I think I'm experiencing that right now." 

I mentioned this in the Les Mis section, but the stability of the actors is incredible. I expect it of the idols, who've trained extensively to sing and be stable while dancing, but wouldn't expect it of a general theatre actor. There were several sword fights and other physical altercations that the actors sang through. I've noticed on Broadway and other English productions, more physical fights tend to be split into 'action' and 'singing'-- sing the lines, do some fighting, stand and sing lines, do more fighting, etc. It's incredibly impressive to watch Valjean choking Javert with a chain, or Messala and Judah having a sword fight and singing through it all.

I did not even attempt to stage door for this. I was actually so tired that I just walked some distance away, stared at the huge crowd waiting at the door, and called a cab. 

I really, really, really wished I'd bought an OST for this. It's an incredible show, and I have an ideal casting in my head that if it ever occurs, I will fly to Korea for. And I will watch it so many times. From so many seats. For as many cast rotations as I can afford. 

- - -

Phantom of the Opera - Charlotte Theatre, 1200 seats

Oh man. Phantom. This was my fourth time seeing Phantom. I'd seen it three times on Broadway, with three different Phantoms, three different Christines, and three different Raouls. This was the best Christine I've ever seen. Imagine my surprise when I open the program book and all I see for her credits is one ensemble performance from the 2018 production of Elizabeth. This is the difference that classical vocal training can make. Best Raoul, best Meg, probably the best Phantom also. Absolutely best in class. 

The Charlotte is gorgeous. It's new, and big, and has the loveliest staircases. There were several photo spots, including the cast board, a backdrop of petals, and a… chibi Phantom statue? It actually has fewer seats than the Majestic (1200 vs 1600) but there is actual leg room. I am so spoiled now.

Once again, the tickets were will-call. Went to the box office on the first floor, gave them my order number, got my tickets, and went to go look at the merch. Phantom has a special place in my heart for being (one of?) the first musical I ever watched live. I'd say that it's because of Phantom I became such a theatre fiend. So in addition to the program book, I ended up with a wine glass, a tote bag, two key-chains, and a magnet. (One of the keychains was for a friend!) Because of how big the Charlotte is, there were a few merchandise booths, with one on the first floor and one on an upper floor. 

My ticket was in the 16th row, and was 160,000 KRW with a 3,000 KRW fee. I didn't get ticket open, and actually got it for the wrong day at first (accidentally double booked with another one) but THANKFULLY noticed fairly quickly. Korea has no cancellation fee for the first few days, and then has increasing cancellation fees to a maximum of 40%.

I learned that the trick to not crying during Phantom, is apparently to cry your eyes out at three musicals during the same week first. Which is good, because it was so emotionally impactful I would have bawled if I'd seen it first. 

Set design was incredible. There are/were rumours that Phantom might return to Broadway stripped down, similar to how Chicago got stripped down--Phantom in Seoul was the opposite of that. It didn't have anything 'extra', but the set was meticulous and breathtaking, and again, I've seen this show three times already. This isn't because it's the first time I've seen the chandelier crash down from the second floor. I also appreciate Asia's dedication to pyrotechnics. Incredibly fun to see the Phantom shoot fireballs at Raul. I imagine that this would've been a pretty big fire hazard at the Majestic though, especially with how packed the seats are.

I'm not sure if there was stage door for this one, but again, even if there was, I was way too tired. Apparently I swore off three evening shows in a row after this, but looking at my calendar for the coming week, I've definitely got three days in a row of evening+matinee shows…

Phantom was the last show I saw in Korea. In the space of a week I'd been to a fanmeet and four musicals, and stayed out past 11 for 3 days in a row. I was wiped.

Not pictured: a wine glass.

Anyway. I'm about to do this again in a few weeks. The line up this time: Jesus Christ Superstar (twice), Tick Tick Boom, Lizzie, Eternity, and Tebas Land (twice). I can't wait.

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finished my lightweight mini travel planner for a grand total of 2.58$ CAD + tax (and the many sheets of printer paper sacrificed in the 'design')

pretty happy with how it turned out, and thinking of making another :)

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finished my lightweight mini travel planner for a grand total of 2.58$ CAD + tax (and the many sheets of printer paper sacrificed in the 'design')

pretty happy with how it turned out, and thinking of making another :)

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An Ode to the Artifacts of Inefficiency

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funny phrases to use when something goes wrong instead of jokingly saying "i'm going to kms":

i'm going to kill god

i'm going to delete my blog

i'm going to explode

i'm going to blow up this entire website

i'm going to become the joker

this is going to be my villain origin story

feel free to add on

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From a queer elder…

Being queer isn’t supposed to be palatable to non-queers.

We don’t tick little squares on a checklist of “queer enough”, we obliterate the checklist.

We defy societal norms that say our bodies, families or relationships have to look a certain way.

Queer is the insult we took away from oppressors. We’re here, we’re queer, get used to it.

The people who hate us will hate us regardless of how palatable we make ourselves.

Stop licking fascist boots by policing queers who are queer in different ways than you.

Oh, someone is bi/pan trans lesbian with he/him pronouns? So what! They’re welcome on the rainbow. Their identity doesn’t have to make sense to you, it has to make sense to them.

Our identities don’t make sense to non-queers. They see us as unnatural and disgusting, so why are you turning around and crapping that same garbage out at your own community??

Once you drive the visible queers underground, the same people who hate us all will target you next. Nobody will defend you because you drove away everybody who would have.

Enough already!

— sincerely, an old queer.

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What does the arab in your carrd mean? Is it like afab and amab?

.. i’m palestinian

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as a writer who aims to set up every story so you know how it ends well before the first third, this is both relatable and growing up on Chinese media really influenced me, huh

Currently reading a Korean webnovel instead of Chinese ones and this is making me conceptualize something, let’s see if I can put it in words…

My musings started with realizing that I’ve become very used to this cnovels thing where the main pairing is literally stated in the summary. Not the case for the k-novel I’m reading, and therefore I’m experiencing Pain and Suffering, — torn between my every instinct screaming that the author is setting up the OT3 endgame, and trying to lower my expectations to avoid disappointment. (And the novel is ongoing so I can’t even get spoilers for the ending :) girl help.)

As you may’ve guessed, I found myself strongly preferring the Chinese variant; but as to why exactly it was so important for my enjoyment to know the main couple… it took me a bit to figure out.

I mean, it’s not like I’m reading exclusively for romance, okay? Fannish activity-wise, sure, I tend to get fixated on ships (though even then, not all the time), but when it comes to reading (or any media intake, really), it’s not necessarily what I’m most interested in. Among my beloved titles, there are many where there’s no canon or fanon couple I'm attached to — and more than a few where there’s a canon couple that I neither love nor hate, just accept. So why did I get so attached to the concept of being, essentially, spoiled the endgame couple beforehand?

The key word that made it click was: promise. After all, it’s not like knowing the names of the characters that get together tells me anything about if they will be interesting or boring together, if they will be good for each other or make me scream “break up!” a million times. But it is a solid promise that these two people ARE gonna be a couple. 

And thinking about the word promise reminded me of discussions on plot twists that I’ve seen on here, about what makes a good plot twist and what makes a bad one — specifically, the phrase “narrative promise” that someone came up with. Basically, narrative promise is in the set up and the build up. If the plot twist betrays the narrative promise, it will not work, and it will be hated by the audience, who’ll feel like their emotional investment into the story was mocked.

The thing about the narrative promise, and why this term stuck with me, is that it’s actually applicable more broadly than just for shock-factor plot twists. For example: what is queerbaiting, if not betraying the narrative promise that the two characters are gonna be together? The fans see the narrative promise — the set up and the build up that would be unequivocally romantic for a het couple — and expect it to be fulfilled; only to be called delusional by the very creators that gave them this expectation. 

And this brings me to the next point: the catch of the “narrative promise” is that it’s never a guarantee. You can be completely sure the author is setting up X, only for them to turn around and do something completely different. (Possibly while calling you a little bitch for having the stupidity to invest your feelings into their creation, too.) After a while, a fan learns to manage their expectations. To not bet too much on anything, even if it feels like there’s no other way it can go. To wait until the end of the season or the last chapter before allowing themselves to get attached; to hold back on deciding whether something is good or not, lest they hype up something they will want to bury and forget later.

And this is where we circle back to c-novels, and to spoiling the main couple in the summary. Except I hesitate to call it “spoiling” because, as discussed, it actually heightens my enjoyment. For a simple reason: this practice takes the narrative promise from its nebulous, uncertain status to something concrete and real. Only for this one aspect and with the minimal-est amount of information possible, but still. That’s one thing I don’t have to guess about or doubt myself on (am I seeing things? is there a heterosexual explanation another way to read this? will the author simply kill off one of the characters before the end so that they don’t have to decide whether to make them explicitly queer?), and one thing I can count on (whatever else happens in the plot, I’ll still have this). It’s easy to invest emotionally into those characters and their relationship, when you have an assurance of their happy ending.

Ofc, I’m not saying that I don’t invest emotionally into relationships or characters other than the main CP — just that it is easier. And I would even say having this one(1) hard promise makes it easier to invest into other elements of the work, too, as it makes for a sort of safety net even if something else is disappointing or painful. 

Like, say you are invested in one couple with great chemistry and one side character. In case of a pre-stated ship, even if the side character dies, at least you still have the canon couple. So it’s not like all of your emotional connection to the book is lost, and you can probably bear with the loss of that character by writing everybody lives AU or something. But if the side character dies AND the couple you were invested in gets broken up or killed off or straight-married with other ppl… then doesn’t that make the entire thing into one massive disappointment? to the point that you might even regret picking up the book that made you care only to slap you in the face?.. 

So yeah, having even just one ship guaranteed is very comforting. And then I thought, well, doesn’t this apply to another type of fiction that I’m very familiar with?

Fanfiction?

Which, since very early on, has adopted the practice of putting the endgame ship in the header of the fic. And which, probably not coincidentally, is often a response to a broken (or at the very least not brought to its logical conclusion) narrative promise. And which always felt uniquely easy to read for me… 

See, prior to getting on this little thought train, I always assumed the ease was due to pre-existing familiarity with canon. You know, not having to learn the entire new setting, already having attachment to the characters… But now that I’ve connected these dots, I thought about times I read fics for fandoms I wasn’t familiar with, and originals formatted as fics — and really, wasn’t it always about the narrative promise made solid? 

Esp with how fics make it even broader than cnovels, by having extensive tags and ratings and such. Getting into a fic, you have a pretty clear idea of what may or may not happen in the story, even if you don’t know what exactly will happen or how. And a fic can fail to live up to the premise set up by ship/rating/tags — but not completely turn its back on it. 

(Well, normally. But in those exceptional cases where tags are misleading, at least you have something to point to when saying, “this is not what I was promised”. The ficwriter can hardly claim they don't understand why you expected [ship] to happen when they personally tagged their work as containing that ship — unlike the traditional media creators, who can always play the "you were totally misunderstanding my intentions the entire time" card.)

And having a solid promise like this, it turns out, takes lotsa pressure off starting a New Unfamiliar thing. I do, in fact, trust like that! So it’s no wonder that there were periods in my life when I would only consume fanfiction, because it was so much easier than extending trust to new titles. And it’s no wonder that what brought me back to being an avid reader were Chinese webnovels that use a practice very similar to what we have in fandoms.

I guess I understand myself better now! Still wish I knew if that k-novel's author is /j or /srs about the ot3 though.

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counterpoint: those of us who deleted fic and want it to stay deleted, a debate as old as time

my suggestion: contact the authors (if possible)

How to recover fic deleted from AO3 that’s NOT on the Wayback machine

Sharing this because I just found out about this and it blew my mind.

The short version of it is: The Wayback Machine is not the only backup/archive of AO3 content out there. It’s just the most user-friendly and immediately browsable.

THIS database on Archive.org contains most AO3 fics as text files, including plenty that are not Waybacked: https://archive.org/details/AO3_final_location

What you’ll need: A browser for .sqlite3 files such as DB Browser for SQLite, an archive manager (e.g. WinRar or 7zip), good internet download speeds, and potentially a LOT of free GBs in storage space.

Not needed but heavily recommended: A download manager such as HTTP Downloader (so you don’t lose the entire download the second your internet stutters).

1. Click here to get to the archive’s files. It’s going to look something like this:

ao3_current.sqlite3 and ao3_old_files.sqlite3 are metadata files. The .zip files contain fic, most of them in simple .txt format. The metadata files tell you which fic is in which zip.

The “current” metadata file is recent backups. The “old” metadata file seems to be fics archived until 2020ish.

2. First, download either ao3_current.sqlite3 or ao3_old_files.sqlite3. Now launch DB Browser for SQlite, then File > Open Database Read-Only > open the sqlite3 file. Now click on the Browse Data tab.

3. It’s going to look like this.

4. The “Filter in any column” field can be used for keyword searches in, well, any column of this table. Be warned, it takes a while to update, give it time, it’s indexing.

5. Here I searched for all fic which gets a hit for the “Avengers” keyword (usually fandom). You can also search for a specific title, author, description, etc.

Let’s try to locate the first fic on the list. Click on the field on the left - row 1, column 1.

On the right you’ll see the full content of that cell. The most important thing here is the start - ao3_01. This means that the fic is located in ao3_old_files_part01.zip.

6. Download ao3_old_files_part01.zip and open it with your archive manager. It’s 5.5 GB. This will take some time.

7. There are multiple ways to find the fic within the zip file. Probably the easiest way is to use your archive manager’s search/find function to locate the fic by keyword - author is a good bet here, or title if it’s unique enough - and extract that. This way you don’t have to extract the entire archive. Be sure to add a wildcard operator (*) on either side of the keyword.

8. Extract the file and you’re done. Note: It will probably be in .txt format, and might be in one giant block of text. Just select-all and paste it to a proper word processor to restore the paragraph formatting.

+ I suppose if you’ve got like a free TB of space you could just skip the metadata step and download all the zip files and unzip them and use a command line search tool for keywords, too. This will work with keywords like title, author and fandom that are part of the file title. The metadata file just contains additional info, like character fields, description, etc.

This isn’t a perfect remedy, there are still fics that got deleted before they could get archived here. But it seems more complete than the stuff on the Wayback Machine on average.

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chinese room 2

So there’s this guy, right? He sits in a room by himself, with a computer and a keyboard full of Chinese characters. He doesn’t know Chinese, though, in fact he doesn’t even realise that Chinese is a language. He just thinks it’s a bunch of odd symbols. Anyway, the computer prints out a paragraph of Chinese, and he thinks, whoa, cool shapes. And then a message is displayed on the computer monitor: which character comes next?

This guy has no idea how the hell he’s meant to know that, so he just presses a random character on the keyboard. And then the computer goes BZZZT, wrong! The correct character was THIS one, and it flashes a character on the screen. And the guy thinks, augh, dammit! I hope I get it right next time. And sure enough, computer prints out another paragraph of Chinese, and then it asks the guy, what comes next?

He guesses again, and he gets it wrong again, and he goes augh again, and this carries on for a while. But eventually, he presses the button and it goes DING! You got it right this time! And he is so happy, you have no idea. This is the best day of his life. He is going to do everything in his power to make that machine go DING again. So he starts paying attention. He looks at the paragraph of Chinese printed out by the machine, and cross-compares it against all the other paragraphs he’s gotten. And, recall, this guy doesn’t even know that this is a language, it’s just a sequence of weird symbols to him. But it’s a sequence that forms patterns. He notices that if a particular symbol is displayed, then the next symbol is more likely to be this one. He notices some symbols are more common in general. Bit by bit, he starts to draw statistical inferences about the symbols, he analyses the printouts every way he can, he writes extensive notes to himself on how to recognise the patterns.

Over time, his guesses begin to get more and more accurate. He hears those lovely DING sounds that indicate his prediction was correct more and more often, and he manages to use that to condition his instincts better and better, picking up on cues consciously and subconsciously to get better and better at pressing the right button on the keyboard. Eventually, his accuracy is like 70% or something – pretty damn good for a guy who doesn’t even know Chinese is a language.

* * *

One day, something odd happens.

He gets a printout, the machine asks what character comes next, and he presses a button on the keyboard and– silence. No sound at all. Instead, the machine prints out the exact same sequence again, but with one small change. The character he input on the keyboard has been added to the end of the sequence.

Which character comes next?

This weirds the guy out, but he thinks, well. This is clearly a test of my prediction abilities. So I’m not going to treat this printout any differently to any other printout made by the machine – shit, I’ll pretend that last printout I got? Never even happened. I’m just going to keep acting like this is a normal day on the job, and I’m going to predict the next symbol in this sequence as if it was one of the thousands of printouts I’ve seen before. And that’s what he does! He presses what symbol comes next, and then another printout comes out with that symbol added to the end, and then he presses what he thinks will be the next symbol in that sequence. And then, eventually, he thinks, “hm. I don’t think there’s any symbol after this one. I think this is the end of the sequence.” And so he presses the “END” button on his keyboard, and sits back, satisfied.

Unbeknownst to him, the sequence of characters he input wasn’t just some meaningless string of symbols. See, the printouts he was getting, they were all always grammatically correct Chinese. And that first printout he’d gotten that day in particular? It was a question: “How do I open a door.” The string of characters he had just input, what he had determined to be the most likely string of symbols to come next, formed a comprehensible response that read, “You turn the handle and push”.

* * *

One day you decide to visit this guy’s office. You’ve heard he’s learning Chinese, and for whatever reason you decide to test his progress. So you ask him, “Hey, which character means dog?”

He looks at you like you’ve got two heads. You may as well have asked him which of his shoes means “dog”, or which of the hairs on the back of his arm. There’s no connection in his mind at all between language and his little symbol prediction game, indeed, he thinks of it as an advanced form of mathematics rather than anything to do with linguistics. He hadn’t even conceived of the idea that what he was doing could be considered a kind of communication any more than algebra is. He says to you, “Buddy, they’re just funny symbols. No need to get all philosophical about it.”

Suddenly, another printout comes out of the machine. He stares at it, puzzles over it, but you can tell he doesn’t know what it says. You do, though. You’re fluent in the language. You can see that it says the words, “Do you actually speak Chinese, or are you just a guy in a room doing statistics and shit?”

The guy leans over to you, and says confidently, “I know it looks like a jumble of completely random characters. But it’s actually a very sophisticated mathematical sequence,” and then he presses a button on the keyboard. And another, and another, and another, and slowly but surely he composes a sequence of characters that, unbeknownst to him, reads “Yes, I know Chinese fluently! If I didn’t I would not be able to speak with you.”

That is how ChatGPT works.

[enpleurait]

The writers strike could impact your favorite show! A season might get cut in half causing the writers to send the main character to hell instead of saving him. He might have to be rescued by an angel the next season, whom he will have a homoerotic relationship with over the next ten years, shaping the culture of some blue website and changing the way people receive world news for years to come!

[enpleurait]

[enpleurait]

This is a phenomenon known as "hallucination" and is well documented in the AI field! The key is it's not only 'lying', it's doing it *extremely* confidently. Hallucination is being actively worked on, but with no known solutions and still isn't fully understood. So it'll be around for a while, and it's so important for the causal lay person to recognise this.

favorite thing ab chatgpt is that if it doesn’t know something it’ll just start fucking lying. like blatantly fucking lying.

my dad teaches english classes and he just got a final paper with this sentence: “In terms of style, both poets are known for their use of imagery, but O'Hara's tends to be more straightforward and concrete, while Stevens' is often more abstract and metaphorical — for example, in O'Hara's poem "The French / Window," he writes: "A cat walks along the garden wall / and the tree waves its branches / The French / windows are blah" (lines 1-4).”

the thing about “The French / Window” is that it is not a poem that exists. at all. like, it was literally just written by chatgpt then inexplicably named as a famous frank o’hara poem. and it’s so. fucking. funny. sooo basically heads up for finals season — those of you who use chatgpt, be warned, because you will quite literally be citing nonexistent texts and your professors will show it to their daughters and together they will laugh at you endlessly and you will deserve it