notachaconne

[notachaconne]

Fanfiction is the reason I'm not as worried about AI (as a writer)

If you've been reading the internet at all in the last few years, you know, according to the CEOs with a vested interest in this being true, that the next Tolstoy is lying in wait in a server farm currently guzzling up so much power it's changing the climate somewhere in Nebraska. AI is going to write books so well that there won't be any need for authors anymore! People will be able to just put in prompts and magically vomit out the stories they have always wanted to their personal standards!

There are not-so-outrageous claims that publishers are flirting with AI-genned and possibly people-guided stories already. And several publishing houses popping up to publish all those amazing AI-generated stories! And I'm not going to pretend that the writer in me didn't feel a twinge of worry.

Are they coming for my stories? Are these server farms going to replace the hours and days and weeks that I put into having an idea, constructing a plot, filling in ALL the words that connect the plot, editing to make the work cohesive all while paying attention to characterization, prose, voice, pacing, world building, realistic dialogue, humor, continuity, theme, and all the infinite little flourishes and details that go into creating a story? Apparently, so say the AI company CEOs who are totally not trying to sell you snake oil!

These insta-stories that people seem to think are a huge market have a really interesting testing ground: fanfiction. Because if there's any place where there is an instant audience voracious for reading stories that often repeat the same themes and tropes and characters, it's here. Look up the two cakes meme if you don't believe me. It's the perfect market for AI slop, providing an endless stream of soulmates fics featuring our favorite blorbos.

But what have we seen in practice? At least in the fandom I'm involved in, the few folks who have tried to make AI slop happen have... had trouble. Not only do the stories get flagged by members of the fandom as being suspicious, but they get very little to no engagement. People aren't interested in these stories. They avoid them. I want to remind everyone that fanfic is free. It's a click and sometime scrolling AO3. The prompts one would need to feed into ChatGPT are really narrow, since you probably already have the tropes you want in mind and the names of the characters. It's exactly where one would expect AI slop to have an audience, and it just doesn't.

If these models have already used the entire internet to train (which they have, even when people have told them to STOP using their content), and the only people who seem to be claiming we're within arm's reach of artificial general intelligence are the CEOs who are trying to keep the venture capital money flowing, then... do I fear that they are going to be able to compete with human creativity? I don't.

Because it can't even get people who've trawled the depths of AO3, of FFN, and even of Media Miner in a desperate search for a bazillion Destiel soulmate ABO fics to turn to the slop that ChatGPT makes.

[notachaconne]

Ok sometimes this place is just batshit. The rest of us don't realise how unhinged some of these people are. I am talking about the "should cheating be illegal" thread. That "large harms" person actually could be serious and not doing performance art at all.

[notachaconne]

I love picking up my cat and then setting her back down in the exact same spot except I've rotated her 90° on the z axis

[notachaconne]

That.

It has come to my attention that some of you lot are so absurdly young you might have missed out not only on the magnificence that was David Bowie, but also on the Canadian Astronaut and his Space Guitar, the best Bowie cover ever made

[notachaconne]

Good Omens is the perfect show. Unapologetically queer, questioning religion, hierarchies, rules, established orders. Features two characters who don't have much and it's always at risk of being taken away but who fight; for their own peace and for one another, always. Despite them being ageless and theoretically immortal, they deal with fear and anxiety and pain and loss and grief. And all that because they allow themselves to. Because they think humanity, the things we have; love as we have it, is worth it.

[notachaconne]

I love how cheetahs understand that Camera Human is a harmless, friendly ape and can be trusted to watch over kittens

And I love that cheetah kittens have grass camouflage on their backs.

Invite the photographer to meet his puppies....

[notachaconne]

the singular unfortunate effect of getting really into discworld at a young age is that i formed a Certain Impression about the purpose of footnotes, and now i am entering academia and it is still my true and firm belief that the footnotes are for being funny in and NOTHING else

[notachaconne]

Ok I've been chronically online for about a decade longer than most of the people hanging around here have existed and I've seen a lot of comments that combine cluelessness with pretension, but that one is a doozy. You were not exaggerating.

the singular unfortunate effect of getting really into discworld at a young age is that i formed a Certain Impression about the purpose of footnotes, and now i am entering academia and it is still my true and firm belief that the footnotes are for being funny in and NOTHING else

[notachaconne]

In an incredible reversal, Builder.AI just declared bankruptcy after admitting that they were faking their AI tool with 700 humans

[notachaconne]

I did wonder about this because to me "gooner" has never had any meaning other than "a fan of Arsenal football club", which is what it normally means in Britain.

I thought the OP had misspelled "grooming", which would make more sense in context.

Children please stop calling the slightest hint of sexual desire “gooning” I’m going to strangle all of you

[notachaconne]

[notachaconne]

How do they rise up?

[notachaconne]

Language is universal

[notachaconne]

Wow, I want to know the implications for sickle-cell disease.

"Japan is the first country to begin clinical trials of artificial blood, a medical innovation which if proven successful, would solve one of the largest hospital challenges of our age.

Beginning back in March, a clinical trial organized by Nara Medical University will look to build on the success of an early-stage trial in 2022 of hemoglobin vesicles, small artificial blood cells that were confirmed to be safe and capable of delivering oxygen as normal.

The trial will administer 100 to 400 milliliters of the artificial blood cells to further test safety before moving onto broader performance and efficacy targets, all in the hopes that by 2030, the artificial blood could enter clinical use.

Whether high-income or low-income, every country has challenges meeting the necessity necessary amounts of stockpiled blood donations for emergency medical procedures.

In high-income countries where the 90% of blood stockpiles comes from voluntary donors, the challenge is getting enough of these donations, and crucially, enough from those with rare blood types.

In low-income countries where only 40% of needs are met with donations, the challenge lies in importation from abroad when donated blood packs are only safe for use for a few months. A useful proxy to understanding this shortfall is that of 175 countries included in a survey of blood donation and use practices by the World Health Organization, 106 countries report that all blood plasma-derived products are imported. These include things like immunoglobulins and coagulation factors which are needed to prevent and treat a variety of serious conditions.

Japan has a different challenge. The WHO found that the use of donated blood varied with income levels, reporting that high-income countries used more blood donations to treat those aged 65 and older, while lower-income countries used it to treat those aged 5 and under.

Japan has recognized that its long-since-collapsed replacement birth rate coupled with long life-expectancy will place a likely unsustainable burden of blood donation on a shrinking working-age population, making artificial blood a priority innovation.

Professor Hiromi Sakai at Nara Medical University has pioneered one method for its synthesis. Using hemoglobin—the oxygen carrying molecule inside red blood cells—from expired donations and encasing them in protective shells, removing the need of matching blood type for administration.

Another method comes from Chuo University where the hemoglobin is encased in an albumin-family protein, which has been used in animal studies to stabilize blood pressure and treat conditions like hemorrhage and stroke.

Either way, the necessity is there and it’s urgent for Japan and the world. If the country’s researchers succeed in this innovation, it will be a medical milestone of epic proportions."

-via Good News Network, May 28, 2025

[notachaconne]

“We’ve crushed fascism before and we’ll crush it again.” A 98-year-old WWII veteran demolishes a Tesla with a Sherman tank. (Love the replays from several camera angles.)

[notachaconne]

"mmh did you know that creator you like also posts 🔞 content? did you know that? don't you think that's weird? don't you think we should keep this space-"

no. i don't.

i booked a front row seat to the devil's sacrament and you're blocking the view

just go back to the 1660 new england hole you just crawled out of and eat barley for a week to atone for your sins or whatever

[notachaconne]

Why not just combine all the AUs as chapters of one novel and call it a new genre?

I'm writing a novel, and as a small break I want to write fanfiction about the novel. I think it would be great. I think people would enjoy reading the characters I made frolicking around in AU situations. I would have so much fun writing it! Unfortunately, this is unhinged, because people wouldn't even have the canon material yet and I don't think you can post fics for books that aren't finished or published yet on ao3. I would just like it to be known that even though it is unhinged, it would bring me joy.