#High-Performance AI Development

[sharon-ai]

AI Infrastructure Solutions: The Backbone of High-Performance AI Development

Artificial Intelligence is transforming industries across the world, and to accomplish that, it needs a strong foundation in the form of infrastructure support for complex tasks like deep learning, machine learning, and data analysis. Advanced AI infrastructure solutions form the core on which AI models are developed, deployed, and optimized.

What is High-Performance AI Infrastructure?

High-performance AI infrastructure refers to a specific hardware-software combination that caters to intensive computational needs of AI-related tasks, such as deep learning models training, and predictions. Computer systems of conventional type rarely provide the capability for handling such operations; thus, advanced infrastructure is highly reliant.

These comprise of:

- Powerful GPUs:

 These are designed with parallel computing in mind so that they can accelerate any AI task far beyond any standard CPU.

- Massive Storage: 

AI models require vast amounts of data, requiring scalable and fast storage solutions.

- Efficient Networking: 

High-speed communication for smooth data flow during training and inference processes.

This infrastructure allows businesses to complete AI tasks more efficiently, enhancing innovation and accuracy.

Role of AI Workload Optimization

AI workload optimization services are an important way of enhancing the efficiency of processes in AI. The right services would ensure that data processing and model training are all done effectively.

Optimizing AI workloads provides numerous benefits.

- Reduces Processing Time:

 Proper infrastructure reduces the time for training models and making predictions.

- Increases Resource Utilization:

 Optimized workloads use computing power as much as is available.

- Cost Savings: 

Resource consumption management reduces hardware expenditure and energy consumption.

Optimization helps companies harness the full potential of infrastructure with high performance, giving better results and higher efficiency.

Why AI Infrastructure is So Important for Deep Learning

Deep learning needs unique infrastructure to handle massive data as well as computing power used in training complex models. Without proper infrastructure, deep learning projects can become slow, inefficient, and costly.

With the right AI infrastructure, businesses can:

Train complex models: Deep learning models require large datasets and quite a bit of processing power. High-performance infrastructure accelerates the training process.

Scale AI projects: As deep learning models evolve, businesses need infrastructure that can scale with increasing data and computational demands.

GPU-Powered Infrastructure: The Boost for AI Development

GPU-powered AI infrastructure accelerates both the training and inference processes of AI models. GPUs are better suited than CPUs for handling the parallel tasks common in machine learning and deep learning, making them essential for fast, efficient AI development.

Benefits include:

- Faster Training Times: GPUs can process multiple tasks simultaneously, significantly reducing training time.

- Faster Inference Speed: Once the models are trained, they make rapid predictions, a must for real-time applications.

The Future of AI Infrastructure

As AI keeps advancing, the call for powerful infrastructure will go only higher. Whether optimization of workloads, making use of GPU-powered systems, or scaling deep learning models, this requires businesses to invest in the right infrastructure to not get left behind. At Sharon AI, we provide customers with end-to-end solutions of AI infrastructure, whether workload optimization or GPU-powered AI systems, to accelerate business with AI capabilities. Ready to give your AI performance a boost? Explore our AI services today!

[diagnozabam]

AMD construiește în Franța un centru AI de ultimă generație, în parteneriat cu G42 și DataOne

AMD și partenerii săi din Emiratele Arabe Unite și Franța au anunțat la AI Action Summit construirea unuia dintre cele mai performante centre de calcul pentru inteligență artificială din Franța. Centrul va fi construit în Grenoble, în parteneriat cu G42 (prin divizia sa Core42) și DataOne, și va deveni operațional până la mijlocul anului 2025. AMD și Inteligența Artificială: o infrastructură de…

[afeelgoodblog]

The Best News of Last Month - August 2024

1.Negative Power Prices Hit Europe as Renewable Energy Floods the Grid

European power markets are experiencing a notable shift as renewable energy sources, particularly wind and solar, become a larger part of the energy mix. On Wednesday, power prices in several European markets, including Germany, dipped below zero due to a surge in green electricity production.

2. Taiwan introduces ban on performances by captive wild animals

Live performances by wild animals held in captivity, including performances by dolphins, tigers, and other non-domesticated mammals, will no longer be permitted in Taiwan under new Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) regulations.

3. FTC bans fake online reviews, inflated social media influence; rule takes effect in October

The FTC voted unanimously to ban marketers from using fake reviews, such as those generated with AI technology, and other misleading advertising practices.

The ban also forbids marketers from exaggerating their own influence by, for example, paying for bots to inflate their follower count.

4. Chinese drones will fly trash out of Everest slopes

Come autumn, Nepal will deploy heavy lifter drones to transport garbage from the 6,812-metre tall Ama Dablam, south of Everest. This will be the first commercial work an unmanned aerial vehicle does in Nepal’s high-altitude zone.

The heavy lifter from China’s biggest drone maker, Da Jiang Innovations (DJI), will take on tasks traditionally handled by Sherpas. Officials believe it will help reduce casualties on Everest.

5. Swiss scientists have found a way to use the whole cocoa fruit to make chocolate and not just taking beans and discarding the rest.

Kim Mishra (L) and Anian Schreiber (R) cooperated on the new chocolate making process

Food scientists in Switzerland have come up with a way to make chocolate using the entire cocoa fruit rather than just the beans - and without using sugar.

The chocolate, developed at Zurich’s prestigious Federal Institute of Technology by scientist Kim Mishra and his team includes the cocoa fruit pulp, the juice, and the husk, or endocarp.

6. Six-year-old boy found in Vietnam forest after five days

A six-year-old boy who was missing for five days has been found deep in a forest in Vietnam. Dang Tien Lam, who lives in the northwestern Yen Bai province, was playing in a stream with his nine siblings on 17 August when he wandered into the hills and got lost, local reports said.

He was found on Wednesday by local farmers who heard a child's cry while they were clearing a cinnamon field close to the forest.

7. Lego plans to make half the plastic in bricks from renewable materials by 2026

Lego plans to make half the plastic in its bricks from renewable or recycled material rather than fossil fuels by 2026, in its latest effort to ensure its toys are more environmentally friendly.

The Danish company last year ditched efforts to make bricks entirely from recycled bottles because of cost and production issues. At the moment, 22% of the material in its colourful bricks is not made from fossil fuels.

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That's it for this month :)

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[astroeleanor]

°💸⋆.ೃ🍾࿔*:･Your 2H Sign = How To Make More $$$ 💳⋆.ೃ💰࿔*:･

Your 2nd house is the part of your chart can show you the best side hustle ideas to increase your income. Look at the sign on your 2nd House cusp, its ruling planet, and any planets sitting there. They symbolize out how you monetize.

The 2nd House is the House of Possessions: movable assets, cash flow, food, tools, anything you can trade. The sign on the cusp sets up your style of 'acquisition' (Taurus = slow‑build goods, Scorpio = high‑risk high‑reward holdings), while the ruler’s dignity and aspects describe reliability, or lack thereof, of income.

Planets inside the 2nd act like tenants shaping the property: Jupiter here inflates resources, Saturn conserves but can pinch, Mars spends to make, Venus monetizes aesthetics.

Because the 2nd is in aversion to the Ascendant (no Ptolemaic aspect), you often have to develop its promises actively: wealth isn’t “you,” it’s something you must manage. So, let's look at the kind of side hustles you can do to increase your revenue!

♈︎ Aries 2H: Physical, Fast, ACTION-Driven

(Aries rules motion, competition, fire, physical activity, force)

Personal trainer or group fitness instructor.

Manual labor gigs like junk removal, or yard work (physical and gives instant results.)

Motorcycle/scooter delivery (Uber Eats, DoorDash): speed + autonomy? Very Aries.

Selling refurbished sports equipment.

Pressure washing services, which is oddly satisfying AND includes aggressive water blasting lol.

Fitness bootcamps in local parks (Mars rules the battlefield… or, in this case, bootcamps)

Pop-up self-defense workshops

Bike repair and resale (hands-on + quick turnaround)

Car detailing (mobile service). You vs. grime. Who wins? You.

Sell custom gym gear or accessories.

♉︎ Taurus 2H: Sensory, Grounded, Product-Based

(Taurus rules the senses and the material world, it’s a sign connected to beauty and pleasure)

Bake-and-sell operation (bread, cookies) at markets. Taurus=YES to carbs and cozy smells.

Meal prep or personal chef (nourishing others = peak Taurus.)

Sell plants or houseplant propagation, you’re growing literal value.

Create and sell body care products: lotions, scrubs, soaps… (Venus-ruled.)

Furniture refinishing for resale.

Offer at-home spa services (facials, scrubs.)

Curate and sell gift boxes (Venus loves a well-wrapped present.)

Do minor home repair or furniture assembly.

Build and sell wooden plant stands or decor (wood + plants + aesthetic = Taurus.)

♊︎ Gemini 2H: Communicative, Clever, Multi-Tasking

(Gemini = ruled by Mercury = ideas, speech, tech, variety, teaching)

Freelance writing or blogging.

Transcription or captioning services.

Resume writing/job application support.

Social media management (multitasking + memes.)

Sell printable planners or flashcards (info = money.)

Offer typing or data-entry services, which are low lift & high focus

Sell templates for resumes, bios, or cover letters, Mercury loves a system!

Write email campaigns for small businesses, you can become the voice behind the curtain.

Teach intro to AI tools or chatbots (modern Mercurial real-world applications.)

Create micro-courses on writing or communication.

♋︎ Cancer 2H: Caring, Cozy, DOMESTIC

(Cancer rules the home, food, feelings. It’s the nurturer through and through)

Home organization services, give cluttered homes and their owners love.

Baking and delivering comfort desserts (cookies = hugs in edible form!!)

Make and sell homemade frozen meals, nourishing the body AND soul.

Offer elder companionship visits (heartfelt and so needed.)

Run a daycare or babysitting service. Moon=family.

Run a laundry drop-off/pickup service.

Custom holiday decorating (homes or offices), make it feel like home anywhere.

Help seniors with digital tools (basic tech help.)

Create sentimental gifts like memory jars or scrapbooks.

♌︎ Leo 2H: Expressive, Bold, Entertaining

(Leo rules performance, leadership, fame, visibility, and the desire to SHINE)

Portrait photography (kids, pets, solo, couples.)

Event hosting or party entertainment.

DJ for small events or weddings.

Basic video editing for others (help THEM shine!)

Personalized video messages. charisma = income.

Teach short performance workshops (confidence, improv) to help others own a stage.

Become a personal shopper.

Sell selfie lighting kits or content creator bundles.

Host creative kids camps (theater, dance, art.)

Make reels/TikToks for local businesses (attention = currency.)

♍︎ Virgo 2H: Detailed, Service-Oriented, Practical

(Virgo rules systems, refinement, discernment, organisation, usefulness)

Proofreading or editing work. Spotting a comma out of place or “their/they’re” being misused = Virgo joy.

House cleaning or deep-cleaning services.

Virtual assistant (email, scheduling, admin.)

Sell Notion or Excel templates. Virgo: spreadsheets.

Bookkeeping for small businesses.

Create custom cleaning schedules or checklists.

Offer “organize your digital life” sessions.

Specialize in email inbox cleanups.

♎︎︎ Libra 2H: Tasteful, Charming, Design-Savvy

(Libra = Venus-ruled = style, beauty, balance, aesthetics)

Styling outfits from clients’ own wardrobes.

Become a personal shopper.

Bridal/event makeup services (enhancing natural beauty = Libra.)

Teach etiquette, the power of grace

Curate secondhand outfit bundles.

Custom invitations or event printables that are pretty AND functional.

Offer virtual interior styling consultations.

Sell color palette guides for branding or outfits.

Create custom date night itineraries (romance, planned and packaged=Libra!!)

Style flat-lay photos for products or menus.

Do hair, make-up, nails, etc.

♏︎ Scorpio 2H: Deep, Transformative, Private

(Scorpio rules what’s hidden, intense, and powerful, alchemy, psychology)

Tarot or astrology readings.

Energy healing or bodywork.

Private coaching for money/debt management.

Online investigation or background research (Scorpio = uncovering hidden information)

Teach classes on boundaries, consent, empowerment, etc.

Sell private journal templates for deep self-reflection.

Moderate anonymous support groups or forums.

Specialize in deep-cleaning emotionally loaded spaces (yes, THAT kind of clearing.)

♐︎ Sagittarius 2H: Expansive, Global, Philosophical

(Sag rules teaching, travel, and BIG ideas)

Teach English (or any other language) or become a tutor online

Sell travel guides or digital itineraries, help others travel smarter=Sag

Rent out camping gear or bikes (freedom for rent lol.)

Ghostwrite opinion pieces or thought blogs, say what others are thinking!

Create walking tours for travelers or locals.

Sell travel photography.

Become a travel influencer on the side.

Translate travel documents or resumes.

♑︎ Capricorn 2H: Strategic, Structured, Business-Minded

(Cap rules time, career, limitations, long-term value)

Resume or career coaching, help others climb the “mountain of success”.

Freelance project management.

Property management or Airbnb co-host (passive-ish income.)

Sell templates for business (contracts, invoices).

Create accountability coaching packages.

Sell organizational templates.

Freelance as an operations assistant (the CEO behind the CEO.)

Build a resource hub for freelancers or solopreneurs (structure = empowerment.)

♒︎ Aquarius 2H: Innovative, Digital, Niche

(Aquarius rules tech, rebellion, and the future. But it’s also connected to community!)

Tech repair or setup.

Build websites for local businesses, or anyone else for that matter.

Sell digital products (ebooks, templates).

Run online communities or Discords.

Host workshops on digital privacy or tools. Collective knowledge (Aqua)= power

Build and sell Canva templates for online creators.

Curate niche info packs or digital libraries.

Help people automate parts of their life or business.

♓︎ Pisces 2H: Dreamy, Healing, Imaginative

(Pisces rules the sea, the arts, spirituality, dreams, and all things soft)

Pet sitting or house sitting, caring for beings + quiet time? It’s perfect for this energy.

Sell dreamy artwork or collages.

Offer meditation classes or hypnosis.

Teach art to kids or adults.

Custom poetry or lullaby commissions (very niche tho.)

Sell digital dream journals or prompts.

Make downloadable ambient music loops.

Create printable affirmation cards.

Design calming phone wallpapers or lock screens.

Offer spiritual services (tarot or astrology readings, reiki, etc.)

Thank you for taking the time to read my post!Your curiosity & engagement mean the world to me. I hope you not only found it enjoyable but also enriching for your astrological knowledge.Your support & interest inspire me to continue sharing insights & information with you. I appreciate you immensely.

• 🕸️ JOIN MY PATREON for exquisite & in-depth astrology content. You'll also receive a free mini reading upon joining. :)

• 🗡️ BOOK A READING with me to navigate your life with more clarity & awareness.

[purposeastro]

A bit More about 2025

We are moving towards a very negative and bad era for humans. Animals are already getting wiped off from the face of the earth which is a warning sign for humans. It's a god's way of telling that humans are next!

Things are going to move very quickly as the Jupiter is a slow planet but is moving quickly. 2025 is a total Mars energy. On 29 March 5 planets Rahu, Venus, Sun, Moon & Neptune with Saturn will be in Pisces sign. Pisces is the last zodiac Sign and rules over the water bodies. These 6 signs are aspecting on the first house. Jupiter is acting as a Hindering planet.

June to November there is high chances of War. Many changes in workplace will be seen. Everyone will get lazy. I'm feeling lazy for quite sometime too. There'll be layoffs in office and people will work from home. A lockdown due to a pandemic can occur. Mysterious diseases will spread. AI will take over people and replace humans. There'll be increase in people's loneliness that everyone will prefer to talk with AI more than a real human.

The person who never got angry will get angry and vice versa things will happen. There'll be fire in many places. People having pro skills will rise. It's high time to develop a skill which can be beneficial for this time. Agriculture will be on rise as the demand of items will increase with less supply due to war pandemic, etc.

War and natural calamities will fall together on humans. Due to Pisces sign all the water bodies will become active. People near the coastline are in Danger ⚠️ Tornados, flood, earthquake can happen.

There'll be increase in theft all around the world. Meat Eaters who want to stay alive please become vegan otherwise even god won't save 🙏 Work of Doctors will increase. Doctors, psychologist will be on the rise. Increase in road accidents too can be seen. North Node Rahu in Aquarius will expand AI to the TOP. Cases of divorce will increase. People will struggle more mentally.

People from all over the world will start going to India. There's lot of news about people visiting India. Trade, civil war. People will become more spiritual. People will get into yoga, etc. There will be a rise in Sanatan Dharma.

Dharma : Dharma is cosmic order or law. Dharma can best be explained as conduct that upholds universal natural laws, and when humankind follows these laws, it allows them to be happy and prevent suffering. It's a combination of morality and spiritual discipline that guides one in living one's life.

[crippled-peeper]

Genuine question, I was really surprised by your take on AI because of how many disabled people use it to be able to draw, paint, etc. If you don't mind, what's your feeling on that? Love your blog btw

I think putting AI on the same level as something like mouth painting or using body machine interfacing to create art is kind of (and by kind of, I mean deeply) insulting to disabled artists that existed and made art before AI became widely available for public use

To be completely honest I can’t think of a community of developers who hate disabled people more than the “generative AI” art crowd. Virtually none of these programs are accessible, and when they are accessible, they cause a massive amount of damage to the environment by consuming tons and tons of CO2 and water every hour of every day

My father is a high performance computing specialist working in the field of AI and like 75% of his coworkers are raging racist, misogynistic, ableist transphobes who have weirdly specific fantasies about global domination like it’s a bowl of cereal. I don’t think AI companies are inherently evil but they don’t attract good people with morals. Especially since this entire sector of the economy is based on blatant theft of others work

[creacherkeeper]

the reliance of college students on gen ai thing is particularly crazy to me as a college writing instructor whos also about to finish an educational psychology certificate because like one huge thing ive learned in my classes is that the american college system is pretty dogshit at teaching students when it comes both to content mastery and also preparing them for the workforce. like these kids are graduating college and going into jobs that they have their degrees in and dont know how to thrive in the workforce and Also dont really know much about the thing they got their degree in. and theres a lot of reasons for that that i could go over in depth but i'll spare yall

BUT the thing that college is like the most decent at is changing the way people think about knowledge itself. further education (high school to undergrad to graduate school) is a huge factor in what develops your epistemological beliefs (epistemology being the nature and theories of knowledge). like your epistemology does naturally change as you get older, but with further education you learn that knowledge itself is complex, ever changing, and interrelated, meaning you inherently trust "facts" less and actually perform critical thinking when presented with new information

but,,,,,, with that new study microsoft did on generative ai showing that usage of gen ai in the workplace can lead to the degradation of independent problem solving skills and that people who trust gen ai actively use less critical thinking to do tasks,,, and that giving yourself fewer opportunities for critical thinking degrades your ability to think critically at all even when it comes to important tasks,,,

like. all these students are using gen ai and sometimes their classes are actively encouraging them to use gen ai and i fear were losing like the one big thing american undergrad is good for bc lets be real its pretty dogshit at everything else

and considering the nature of the topic:

Bransford, J. D., Brown, A. L., Anderson, J. R., Gelman, R., Glaser, R., Greenough, W. T., Ladson-Billings, G., Means, B. M., Mestre, J. P., Nathan, L., Pea, R. D., Peterson, P. L., Rogoff, B., Romberg, T. A., & Wineburg, S. S. (2000). How people learn: Brain, mind, experience, and school. National Academy Press. (pp. 31-50) Lee, H.P., Sarkar, A., Tankelevitch,L. Drosos, I., Rintel, S., Banks, R., & Wilson, N. (2025). The impact of generative AI on critical thinking: Self-reported reductions in cognitive effort and confidence effects from a survey of knowledge workers. CHI Conference in on Human Factors in Computing Systems. https://doi.org/10.1145/3706598.3713778 Mezirow, J. (2000). Learning to think like an adult: Core concepts of transformation theory. In J. Mezirow (Ed.), Learning as transformation: Critical perspectives on a theory in progress (pp. 3-34). Jossey-Bass. Svinicki, M. D. (2004). Learning and motivation in the postsecondary classroom. Boston: Anker Publishing Company, Inc. Torff, B., & Sternberg, R. J. (1998). Changing mind, changing world: Practical intelligence and tacit knowledge in adult learning. In M. C. Smith & T. Pourchot (Eds.), Adult learning and development: Perspectives from educational psychology (pp. 109-126). Lawrence Erlbaum

[askagamedev]

What is your current opinion on Unreal Engine 5? Between Digital Foundry, content creators, and people on social media, everyone appears to be constantly attacking UE5 for performance issues (stuttering, frame rate, etc.). Is this criticism warranted, or is it more a case of developers still getting used to UE5 and its complexities (meaning it will likely improve in time)?

Everything improves with time as the engineers learn the details and optimize their work. This is true of every tech platform ever and won't be any more different with Unreal Engine 5 than it has been with UE4, 3, or anything else. That said... after having very recently worked with UE5 for enough time to get used to some of its foibles and having looked into some core engineering issues in a project utilizing some of the new tech introduced in UE5 (and the caveats and side effects of using that tech), I can say with fair confidence that (some) complaints about the performance issues are definitely warranted. These aren't global to all UE5 projects, but they are major performance issues we ran into and had to solve.

One major issue we ran into was with Nanite. Nanite is the new tech that allows incredibly detailed high poly models, a sort of [LOD system] on steroids. The Entity Component System of the Unreal Engine (every actor is a bag of individual components) allows developers to glom nanite meshes onto just about anything and everything including characters, making it very powerful and quick to stand up various different visuals. However, this also requires significant time spent optimizing that geometry for lighting and for use in game - interpenetrating bits and pieces that don't necessarily need to calculate lighting or normals or shadows unnecessarily add to the performance cost must be purged from those nanite models. Nanite looks great, but has issues that need to be ironed out and the documentation on those issues isn't fully formed because they're still being discovered (and Epic is still working on fixing them). We had major performance issues on any characters we built using nanite, which meant that our long-term goal for performance was actually to de-nanite our characters completely.

Another major issue I ran into was with the new UE5 World Partition system. World Partition is essentially their replacement for their old World Composition system, it's a means of handling level streaming for large contiguous world spaces. In any large open world, you're going to have to have individual tiles that get streamed in as the player approaches them - there's no reason to fit the entire visible world into memory at any given time with all the bells and whistles when the player can only see a small part of it. The World Partition system is supposed to stream in the necessary bits piecemeal and allow for seamless play. Unfortunately, there are a lot of issues with it that are just not documented and/or not fixed yet. I personally ran into issues with navmesh generation (the map layer used for AI pathfinding) using the World Partition that I had to ask Epic about, and their engineers responded with "Thanks for finding this bug. We'll fix it eventually, likely not in the next patch."

Most of these issues will eventually get ironed out, documented, and/or fixed as they come to light. That's pretty normal for any major piece of technology - things improve and mature as more people use it and the dev team has the time and bandwidth to fix bugs, document things better, and add quality of life features. Because this tech is still fairly new, all of the expected bleeding edge problems are showing up. You're seeing those results - the games that are forced to use the new less-tested systems are uncovering the issues (performance, bugs, missing functionality, etc.) as they go. Epic is making fixes and improvements, but us third-party game devs must still ship our games and this kind of issue is par for the course.

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[onlyonetifosi]

Behind the camera: chapter 1

<- previous series masterlist my main masterlist next ->

It was a warm summer afternoon in the small town of Monte Carlo, Monaco, where the Leclerc family resided. Yn and Charles, just three years old, were playing in their backyard, their laughter echoing through the air. Despite being twins, Yn and Charles had their distinct personalities and looks, yet they shared an unbreakable bond

"Charles, catch me if you can!" Yn giggled, running around the garden, her little feet barely keeping up with her enthusiasm

"Attends, Yn! I'm coming!" Charles called back, his eyes shining with excitement as he chased after his sister

Their playtime was always filled with joy and mischief, and today was no exception. Their older brother, Lorenzo, joined in the fun

"Lorenzo, regarde! Look at me!" Yn shouted as she tried to perform a somersault. "Je peux le faire! I can do it!"

Lorenzo clapped his hands, "Wow, Yn! That was great!"

Charles, feeling a little competitive, decided to show off too. "Watch this! Je vais faire un saut en hauteur! I'm going to do a high jump!"

Yn and Lorenzo watched in awe as Charles jumped, trying to touch the lowest branch of a nearby tree. He didn't quite reach it, but his attempt was still impressive.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the following weeks, Yn attended her ballet classes with enthusiasm, and her love for dancing only grew. Charles, on the other hand, developed an interest in racing from a young age. Hervé, a racing enthusiast himself, couldn't be happier to see his son's passion for speed and cars. He gifted Charles a small toy race car, which quickly became his most treasured possession

"Maman, look what I can do!" Yn twirled around clumsily, trying her best to imitate the graceful movements she had seen on TV. Her parents smiled lovingly, encouraging her tiny attempt at ballet

"Très bien, ma chérie! You're doing great," her mother praised, clapping her hands. "You'll be a wonderful little ballerina!"

"Charles, you should try too!" Yn beamed, hoping her brother would join in her enthusiasm for ballet.

Charles laughed and shook his head. "No, no, Yn. I want to be a race car driver like Papa! Vroom vroom!" He pretended to steer an imaginary car, and Lorenzo enthusiastically joined in the play

Pascale and Hervé watched their daughter with pride, celebrating every little step she took in her ballet journey. However, Yn's clumsiness soon caught the attention of the other girls in her ballet class, who began to tease and make fun of her

"Regardez-la, elle danse comme un éléphant maladroit! (Look at her, she dances like a clumsy elephant!)" one of the girls mocked, causing the others to giggle.

Yn felt her enthusiasm waning, her heart heavy with sadness. She couldn't understand why the other girls were mean to her, but she was determined not to let their words discourage her.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As the twins grew older, they started kindergarten, and Yn was excited to embark on this new adventure with her brother. However, things didn't go as smoothly as she had hoped. Charles, being the more outgoing and confident of the two, quickly made friends with the other children, while Yn struggled to connect with her peers

One day, after a particularly challenging day at school, Yn came home feeling downcast. She sat at the kitchen table with her parents, sharing her feelings

"Maman, Papa, pourquoi est-ce que Charles a toujours des amis, et moi, je n'en ai pas?" (Mom, Dad, why does Charles always have friends, and I don't?) Yn asked tearfully

Her parents exchanged understanding glances, and her father pulled her into a comforting hug. "Ne t'inquiète pas, ma chérie. Les amis viendront avec le temps. Tu es spéciale, tout comme ton frère." (Don't worry, my dear. Friends will come with time. You're special, just like your brother)

Yn nodded, trying to hold back her tears. She wished she could be as confident and popular as Charles, but it seemed like an impossible task

Months passed, and Yn tried her best to keep her feelings buried, not wanting to upset her brother or their parents. But one day, the weight of it all became too much to bear. Unable to hold back any longer, Yn confronted Charles during their walk home from school

"Charles, tu ne comprends pas. C'est difficile pour moi. Les autres se moquent de moi et je n'ai pas d'amis" she finally confessed, her voice quivering with emotion. (Charles, you don't understand. It's hard for me. The others make fun of me, and I have no friends)

Charles stopped in his tracks, finally seeing the pain in his sister's eyes that he had been blind to for so long "Je suis désolé, Yn. Je ne savais pas) he said, feeling regretful (I'm sorry, Yn. I didn't know)

They sat down on a nearby bench, and Yn poured her heart out to Charles about the loneliness she had been enduring. Charles listened attentively, his heart aching for his sister. He realized how selfish he had been, caught up in his own excitement without noticing the pain she was going through.

"Je suis vraiment désolé, Yn. Je ne voulais pas te faire du mal. Je serai là pour toi, quoi qu'il arrive" Charles said, his eyes filled with sincerity. (I'm truly sorry, Yn. I didn't mean to hurt you. I'll be there for you, no matter what happens)

Tears welled up in Yn's eyes as she hugged her brother tightly “Merci, Charles. Je t'aime” she whispered, feeling a rush of relief (Thank you, Charles. I love you)

From that day on, Charles made a conscious effort to include Yn in his circle of friends, and the two became inseparable. Yn also found solace in pursuing other hobbies and interests, such as drawing and storytelling, where her creativity and uniqueness were celebrated.

Their relationship grew stronger as they navigated through childhood together. Their parents often marveled at how inseparable they were, and even though they had their fair share of fights, their bond only deepened with time.

[mariacallous]

Russia—and China—had seemed to benefit from the Houthis’ attacks on shipping in the Red Sea because the militia spared their ships. But it turns out that Moscow has been more than a passive beneficiary. As the Wall Street Journal recently reported, Russia has been providing the Houthis with targeting data for their attacks. Now that Russia has crossed this red line of actively aiding attacks on Western shipping, other hostile states may start sharing military-grade data with proxies of their choice.

One of the U.N. Security Council’s five permanent members is actively supporting attacks on global shipping. It’s a stark violation of the maritime rules, which grant merchant vessels the freedom and right to sail not only on the high seas but also through other countries’ waters and through internationally recognized straits without having to fear, let alone experience, acts of aggression.

The Houthis, you’ll remember, began their campaign against merchant vessels in the Red Sea last November, when they struck a string of vessels linked to Israel, supposedly in support of the people of Gaza. When the United States and Britain, and then the European Union, intervened in support of shipping in the Red Sea by sending naval vessels to protect merchant ships (of all nationalities), the group began attacking ships linked to these countries, too.

And so it has continued. Each month, the group launches a handful of attacks against ships in the Red Sea. Mostly, the Western naval vessels manage to thwart the attacks, but several merchant ships have been struck, and two of them have sunk. But bar a Russian shadow vessel struck—probably accidentally—this May, Russian and Chinese vessels have been spared.

The group has been so successful thanks to missiles and sophisticated drones provided by Iran. Having high-performance weaponry, though, brings little benefit if one strikes the wrong target, and the Houthis lack the technology that would allow them to discern a ship’s coordinates. That’s where, it has now emerged, Russia has turned out to be a most useful ally.

Russian coordinates have thus helped the Houthis keep up their attacks even as Western naval vessels have been trying to foil them. “Targeting covers a wide range of complexity,” said Duncan Potts, a retired vice admiral in the U.K. Royal Navy. “Hitting a static target on land can be as easy as using information on Google Maps. At the other extreme, you have mobile entities like ships at sea. Hitting them requires much higher-grade, precise, real-time targeting data that uses information from different sources. Such targeting is quite complicated even for Western navies.”

Since ships are mobile, the targeting data typically needs real-time information. Though details of the data provided by the Russians are naturally unavailable, it’s highly likely that real-time data is included. Either way, Potts said, “this development is certainly significant and notable, but it doesn’t surprise me.”

The fact that Russia is giving the Houthis specific information about vessels’ exact presence in the Red Sea is making this strategic waterway even more dangerous for Western-linked ships. “If you’re a Western-linked merchant ship traveling through the Red Sea with whatever naval escort is available, you’ll not be signaling your position by using AIS [automatic identification systems, a maritime GPS],” said Nils Christian Wang, a retired rear admiral and former chief of the Danish Navy. “That means the Houthis would struggle to know what ships are arriving and where they are, so this data would be extremely useful.” (Western naval forces in the Red Sea escort vessels regardless of their flag registration and country of ownership.)

It’s not exactly clear what kind of targeting data the Russians have been providing. “The Russians might help the Houthis get the right maritime picture to make sure they don’t hit Russian ships, but they may also be providing data to help the Houthis hit Western targets,” Wang said. “It’s one thing to give data to help protect your own ships, another to give them data that help them attack Western ships.”

Either way, the group’s attacks have already caused a dramatic drop in traffic in the Red Sea and the Suez Canal to the north. Between May 2023 and this May, traffic through the Suez Canal plummeted by 64.3 percent, the Egyptian newspaper Al-Mal reported. The number of ships transiting the canal monthly dropped from 2,396 in May 2023 to 1,111 this May.

Most Western-linked vessels instead sail around the Cape of Good Hope, but this entails an additional 10-12 days’ sailing and a 50 percent cost increase. Only a small number of Western shipping lines and insurers still dare to send their vessels through the Suez Canal and the Red Sea—but Western naval vessels have to remain there to provide some degree of order. In recent months, the Houthis have been attacking these ships, too.

Russia’s provision of targeting data may be followed by yet more support for the Houthis. According to Disruptive Industries (DI), a U.K. technology company that specializes in the closed-source discovery of global risks, there is extensive and unseen Russian activity in Houthi-held parts of Yemen, and there has been for some time. (Full disclosure: I’m a member of DI’s advisory board.)

Sharing targeting data is directly participating in a conflict. That’s why Western nations have refrained from sharing targeting data with Ukraine, a nation defending itself against an invader. In September, Russian President Vladimir Putin himself weighed in on the issue. Western approval for the use of Western-provided long-range missiles that could strike Russia would mean involvement in the conflict because Western military personnel would have to provide the targeting data. “It is a question of deciding whether or not NATO countries are directly involved in a military conflict,” Putin told Russian state television.

By that point, Russia was already sharing targeting data with the Houthis.

“The Houthis’ attacks are certainly in line with Russia’s desire to remove the world’s focus from Ukraine,” Wang said. “One almost gets the suspicion that this is part of a manuscript. It’s so much in Russia’s interest to have these attacks happen.”

Now that the Kremlin has crossed this red line in the Red Sea without being punished for it, it may decide to share targeting data with other nonstate outfits. So may other regimes. Imagine, say, a Chinese-linked militant group in Myanmar or Indonesia targeting merchant vessels in nearby waters aided by targeting data from the People’s Liberation Army Navy. Western governments, shipping companies, and underwriters will need to pay close attention.

For now, the continuing strikes against Western vessels present a massive risk for Western-linked merchant vessels in the Red Sea and the Western naval vessels that are there to protect shipping. And the discovery that Russia is providing targeting data could convince the few remaining Western shipping lines still sending vessels through the Red Sea to give up on it (and the Suez Canal) altogether. One of the oldest routes of modern shipping could be abandoned—until Russia and the Houthis are bought to heel.

[quirkyfries]

Some more tsams/eaps headcanons because I’m bored in class

To expand on the AI chip thing mentioned previously: Ai chips come with a base, company-appointed personality and traits. Most Suns start off loud and naïve. Most Moons start off too curious for their own good. Suns fidget with their rays. Moons prefer auditory stimulation. Etc. It’s only when that base personality/programming is subject to an environment that teaches the base personality something—Our Sun learned to put up with things he didn’t like for a time, Old Moon learned that force kept Sun in the little box he needed Sun to be in to feel in control—that new information is stored into the chip. Eclipses do not have a set personality and are generally a hodgepodge of both depending on how they came to be. (For example, Eclipse and Solar have just enough Moon base personality in them to set them apart from Sun, but both are mostly Sun base programming. Ruin is a careful mix of both Sun and Moon programming because they were able to manually edit that, which resulted in a personality reset when they fully merged. (Lunar is a special case, Eclipse shoved most of his remaining Sun base personality off to Lunar, but because Eclipse is a mix of both, that code was inseparable from some Moon base personality.) When a personality has developed enough, removing certain parts of the base personality can affect the function of that part of the developed personality, for example, if Lunar were to delete some of his Sun base programming, he would find that experiencing things that stem from that programming disorienting, because the foundation that allowed the proper response to that stimuli is gone. In small bits, it’s possible to remove base traits like preferences, or entire personality traits so long as it’s done early in that AI’s development. There are workarounds to this. Dark Sun knows a lot of those workarounds, but that doesn’t mean he uses them often.

On material objects, Star power can act like radium with a shorter halflife. The same goes for negative star power. Visiting dimensions with high levels of either can result in contamination, such as Ruin’s dimension in the time it was accessible or Dark Sun’s pocket dimension without proper protections. Contamination is a residue of the power that fades over time if it is not removed. If certain components are contaminated, like processors or joints, their performance can be affected. [Note I’m not the most familiar with TSAMS’ established magic rules or most things about star power, I just have a general idea of it and this makes the most sense to me.] Also note I said material objects, this does not extend to software, where it acts differently.

It is possible to detect levels of Star power in dimensions with technology coveted by Dark Sun, Nexus, and Ruin, all for different reasons. By analyzing spikes or sudden drops in levels of a dimension, it’s possible to guesstimate where a dimension hopper with high levels of either power ended up. If Nexus were to drop into another dimension, Dark sun could figure out which one based on recent trends in Star power levels across the dimensions in his scope, in Nexus’ case the levels would drop because the negative Star power isn’t 100% negated by the present positive Star power. The closer the levels of Star power are to each other, the more stable the trends are, because they tend to cancel each other out. Think of a seismograph and detecting earthquakes, with the constant levels being the equal amounts of negative and positive power. The balance of these energies fluctuate in natural cycles. The Astrals are part of these cycles.

Take anything I say about the magic thing with a massive grain of salt, the most I know is the concept of magic pools and general applications of magic per individual users, and there might’ve been something involving golden Freddy idk. I like to imagine magic as metaphorical hula hoops. Everyone’s hula hoop is a little bit different in color, size, features etc, but the user must know how to use the hula hoop to be able to use their magic. Learning different ways to use the hula hoops is the equivalent of expanding what the user’s magic is capable of (Transmutation, teleportation, and summoning things are all different capabilities that can be learned, for example. Some are considered more complex than others.) in my head ruin’s hula hoop lights up with activity lol. Sun’s hula hoop makes groan tube noises. Being able to do different things/multitasking while using the metaphorical hula hoop is something that can be learned by users with more experience. Ruin is one of these users. Eclipse is also able to do this, but tends to combine it with technology. (Continued in a reblog)

[justforbooks]

The DeepSeek panic reveals an AI world ready to blow❗💥

The R1 chatbot has sent the tech world spinning – but this tells us less about China than it does about western neuroses

The arrival of DeepSeek R1, an AI language model built by the Chinese AI lab DeepSeek, has been nothing less than seismic. The system only launched last week, but already the app has shot to the top of download charts, sparked a $1tn (£800bn) sell-off of tech stocks, and elicited apocalyptic commentary in Silicon Valley. The simplest take on R1 is correct: it’s an AI system equal in capability to state-of-the-art US models that was built on a shoestring budget, thus demonstrating Chinese technological prowess. But the big lesson is perhaps not what DeepSeek R1 reveals about China, but about western neuroses surrounding AI.

For AI obsessives, the arrival of R1 was not a total shock. DeepSeek was founded in 2023 as a subsidiary of the Chinese hedge fund High-Flyer, which focuses on data-heavy financial analysis – a field that demands similar skills to top-end AI research. Its subsidiary lab quickly started producing innovative papers, and CEO Liang Wenfeng told interviewers last November that the work was motivated not by profit but “passion and curiosity”.

This approach has paid off, and last December the company launched DeepSeek-V3, a predecessor of R1 with the same appealing qualities of high performance and low cost. Like ChatGPT, V3 and R1 are large language models (LLMs): chatbots that can be put to a huge variety of uses, from copywriting to coding. Leading AI researcher Andrej Karpathy spotted the company’s potential last year, commenting on the launch of V3: “DeepSeek (Chinese AI co) making it look easy today with an open weights release of a frontier-grade LLM trained on a joke of a budget.” (That quoted budget was $6m – hardly pocket change, but orders of magnitude less than the $100m-plus needed to train OpenAI’s GPT-4 in 2023.)

R1’s impact has been far greater for a few different reasons.

First, it’s what’s known as a “chain of thought” model, which means that when you give it a query, it talks itself through the answer: a simple trick that hugely improves response quality. This has not only made R1 directly comparable to OpenAI’s o1 model (another chain of thought system whose performance R1 rivals) but boosted its ability to answer maths and coding queries – problems that AI experts value highly. Also, R1 is much more accessible. Not only is it free to use via the app (as opposed to the $20 a month you have to pay OpenAI to talk to o1) but it’s totally free for developers to download and implement into their businesses. All of this has meant that R1’s performance has been easier to appreciate, just as ChatGPT’s chat interface made existing AI smarts accessible for the first time in 2022.

Second, the method of R1’s creation undermines Silicon Valley’s current approach to AI. The dominant paradigm in the US is to scale up existing models by simply adding more data and more computing power to achieve greater performance. It’s this approach that has led to huge increases in energy demands for the sector and tied tech companies to politicians. The bill for developing AI is so huge that techies now want to leverage state financing and infrastructure, while politicians want to buy their loyalty and be seen supporting growing companies. (See, for example, Trump’s $500bn “Stargate” announcement earlier this month.) R1 overturns the accepted wisdom that scaling is the way forward. The system is thought to be 95% cheaper than OpenAI’s o1 and uses one tenth of the computing power of another comparable LLM, Meta’s Llama 3.1 model. To achieve equivalent performance at a fraction of the budget is what’s truly shocking about R1, and it’s this that has made its launch so impactful. It suggests that US companies are throwing money away and can be beaten by more nimble competitors.

But after these baseline observations, it gets tricky to say exactly what R1 “means” for AI. Some are arguing that R1’s launch shows we’re overvaluing companies like Nvidia, which makes the chips integral to the scaling paradigm. But it’s also possible the opposite is true: that R1 shows AI services will fall in price and demand will, therefore, increase (an economic effect known as Jevons paradox, which Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella helpfully shared a link to on Monday). Similarly, you might argue that R1’s launch shows the failure of US policy to limit Chinese tech development via export controls on chips. But, as AI policy researcher Lennart Heim has argued, export controls take time to work and affect not just AI training but deployment across the economy. So, even if export controls don’t stop the launches of flagships systems like R1, they might still help the US retain its technological lead (if that’s the outcome you want).

All of this is to say that the exact effects of R1’s launch are impossible to predict. There are too many complicating factors and too many unknowns to say what the future holds. However, that hasn’t stopped the tech world and markets reacting in a frenzy, with CEOs panicking, stock prices cratering, and analysts scrambling to revise predictions for the sector. And what this really shows is that the world of AI is febrile, unpredictable and overly reactive. This a dangerous combination, and if R1 doesn’t cause a destructive meltdown of this system, it’s likely that some future launch will.

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

[animentality]

not to be a boomer, but I do worry about the current generation of kids being raised with iPads.

first off. some of them literally can't hold a pencil because their parents never gave them physical toys to grip and play with, developing their fine motor skills.

you might ask why do we even need to learn how to write physically anymore- well, frankly, because if you're stranded on an island somewhere and you need to write HELP, you might not have the strength to hold a pencil, but you can at least hold a stick.

but on a more general note.

writing by hand helps you remember things better. it forces you to focus in a way that typing something word for word does not. a person can transcribe what a professor says without even thinking about it.

someone writing notes has to consider what to write and what to omit. it also activates more parts of your brain, forcing you to flex the parts of your brain related to learning and communicating, while also engaging the part of your brain dedicated to muscle control and precision.

but in general, I think the issue isn't even oh technology is bad and kids are getting dumber.

you can have PowerPoints AND take physical notes. that could help you learn even better than the olden days where you just had to remember everything that was thrown at you. or read very limited, out of date books.

the problem is that the generation that raised/is raising this generation of children just doesn't understand the true impact that all this technology will have on their kids. or they just don't care.

because our generation had the internet yes, but it wasn't widely accessible for most of us, sharing our computers with the entire family in the kitchen. it was also the internet in its infancy, where it wasn't quite so predatory, when it was lawless and disturbing, yes, but it wasn't weaponized by corporations trying to sell you things and steal your data, it wasn't flooded with bots and ai and all sorts of things that the human brain can't even distinguish as real or fake, especially when you're just a little kid.

that generation still played with physical toys. we celebrated when it snowed and we could stay home.

we also came from a gen that still, vaguely, cared about some form of community and had third spaces for kids to hang out.

90s children, who still had some memories of both playing outside on a playground and playing Mario Kart on the Nintendo 64 with their friends, who both went out to the mall and had a club penguin account.

we grew up with laptops and smart boards. maybe some of us had them in high school or college, but we still physically went to class and developed relationships. learned uncomfortable things about ourselves and others, the way humans do.

met new people and were exposed to new ideas, away from our parents. but not from some fucking influencer trying to sell us Sephora products.

we had to study for things, instead of just being able to Google shit for some bullshit online test.

which is also something that really concerns me. so many kids today can so easily Google answers for every test, and while tests don't ultimately matter in the real world, they still provide some basis for things that do matter.

like I'm just imagining medical students googling how to perform an appendectomy on the day of, and just using a YouTube tutorial to guide them through, and shuddering.

there are some things that the Internet can't teach you.

there always will be.

but I don't think my generation is really helping their kids find the balance that we were given naturally growing up.

the boomers and gen xers had fist fights and we had bullying someone online until they committed suicide.

and now kids use AI to spread fake nudes of girls.

but the laws haven't caught up with a lot of this stuff yet, and certainly won't while we have dinosaurs running our government. and culture takes even longer to change than laws.

I also worry because I know how badly covid affected kids worldwide. how they struggle to read and do math, because remote learning just isn't good for kids.

and I can't even blame them!! I literally teleworked for 4 years and even I can admit that I'm not nearly as good at focusing at home as I am in the office.

it's hard for kids with social anxiety and disabilities, yes I know, I know, trust me, I have social anxiety, and as a hybrid worker ATM, I highly doubt I'd be able to handle 5 days a week in the office.

but it's also not particularly good for kids to stay home ALL the time, entertaining themselves in their room and never being challenged, and never meeting people other than their parents.

the iPad is more of a symbol of that problem than the direct problem.

if your entire... world view is limited to what you can see on your iPad... I mean what a terrible world view you'll have.

you're a 10 year old using TikTok and all you ever see is the same opinion over and over until you can scarcely comprehend people who have an opposing opinion.

you see fake videos that seem so real. that must be real, and so comforting, aren't they, those videos that seem so real?

you let 30 year old influencers who are trying to grift people shape your world view.

and it's not even your fault.

your parents aren't doing anything to help you.

you're young and you're being barraged with entertainment and fake educational videos and how to guides that accidentally create mustard gas in your toilet.

your parents should be teaching you to find a balance between these things. they should be telling you what's real and caution you about the things you see.

they should limit your fucking time on the iPad actually. take you to a fucking park and let you roll in the mud or some shit.

and then when you're a teenager and a young adult, then you can start deciding for yourself what you believe.

but a lot of these weird millennial/gen z parents, man. just let your 1 year old scroll through vids on TikTok while you don't even talk to them or look at them once.

maybe it's because they don't see the harm in it, but I don't get it.

adults can watch TikTok all day and know, ahhh this is bad for me. I'm not doing anything I actually want to be doing.

adults can see other adults doing dumb shit and say ah you're sponsored. someone paid you money to say and do that. silly.

but kids are just kids.

they don't have discipline and frankly, that's not their responsibility. that is yours.

you should be teaching them that they can't have everything in life at their finger tips at all times, actually.

the iPad doesn't solve all of your problems, nor will it think critically for you.

so I worry about if humanity can really keep up with its own technology.

our species is still in its infancy, believe it or not.

so maybe these are just growing pains, and future generations will be able to look back on this era and know the proper balance.

but as someone living in 2024.

I wonder just how much pain is left before we really mature and either make it or break it.

[ozzgin]

Dear Ozzgin,

Is your new addition to the repertoire, the yandere android, a Mixture of Experts like GPT-4.5, or something else entirely? Would his performance / 'humanness' degrade if he were talking to another machine (an inhuman one, not designed to be Spacer-ly human) for a long time?

Any random lorebits on Spacers you did not include but would have had you felt less constrained?

Hah, okay, I see you've gotten into the technical aspects. I'm about to go on a ramble so I'll do a cut here for everyone else to not clog your feeds. Feel free to read if you're into this kind of stuff. :D

First, I just wanted to point this out because I've read your hashtags and comment: the CCD sensors were a bit of an asspull because it's one thing I'm more knowledgeable about, but I don't feel like it'd be a realistic choice, if I am to be nitpicky. They're expensive to produce and are mostly used for really high performance work (telescopes), but a humanoid robot wouldn't need such advanced digital imaging for daily life use. So, you know, it's arguable whether or not there are better alternatives when it comes to a mass-produced agent processing the immediate environment.

Now to your actual question: I've used the machine learning approach because this is currently our most advanced way of developing AI, but it would not be enough to explain the Android's perfect understanding of human speech. ChatGPT analyzes sentences and their meaning purely based on grammar and associations, but there's many examples of it struggling against anything more intricate than literal context. So yeah, that kind of sarcastic dialogue and implied meaning is wishful thinking of times far away sadly. I'm only wildly guessing he wouldn't struggle with today's impediments. There's a black box somewhere in there that fills the gaps and variables we don't have.

If at some point you find yourself with time to spare, I'd recommend reading the book directly. It's very interesting to see how people viewed the "future" back then, and you will detect a lot of optimism regarding computers - such as Daneel (the original Android) being a flawless human. Funnily enough, the book was published shortly before the Dartmouth Conference, so Asimov was this close to discover that language recognition is, in fact, a terribly tangled business and not as simple as they had originally expected.

I think I covered the basics when it comes to Spacers, but then again I cannot tell how easy it is to follow for someone that isn't familiar with the original work. I also didn't want to reproduce every fact, mot a mot, from Caves of Steel, especially since this is less about politics and more about romance. I'd suspect the people reading the story are not too bothered by the only briefly mentioned murder. Cause is less important when the effect is a tall robot boy with a crush on you 👀 if you feel me.

Anyways, I'm very glad you like the story, every now and then I'll insert little facts and technical details - as it usually is when you study Physics and CS but have no friends in the field - so it's definitely nice to have someone recognize the stuff! :)

[topazadine]

How to Build a Sustainable Writing Habit Through SCIENCE (Fuck Off, NaNoWriMo)

This is a lightly edited repost from a previous post on my mostly-defunct blog, topazadine.com. I feel like it's an excellent thing to highlight now that everyone's wondering what the hell do to after NaNoWriMo showed their ass as anti-creative idiots.

I have never liked NaNoWriMo and think, frankly, that it is a garbage tool for new writers. If you've done it and enjoyed it, that's great, but overall, it is not the best way to build motivation. At all.

But why is NaNoWriMo so bad? (Other than the current controversy.)

It encourages younger writers to think of writing as something they do during the months of October through November. Not something they do all year round, day in and day out. People will prep for weeks to do a whole novel in one month and hinge all their writerly hopes on that one singular month.

We won't even get into the fact that November is the absolute shittiest month to try to get a novel done because the holidays are coming up, and many working-class people are busting their asses off to get extra hours in before Christmas.

Writing is something you do all. the. time. It is not bound by a singular month. It is not limited to a certain time of year. And when you are working to complete a draft, it doesn't matter season it is. What matters is that you get it done.

So let me show you something better. But first, why should you listen to me? And why is my method an improvement over a shitty organization's AI-riddled contest?

I wrote the first draft of my novel, Poesy (104,323 words) in 39 days.

That’s an average of 2,647 words per day. It is also about twice as much as the typical person aims for during NaNoWriMo. I did not set out to get it done in any given time period, but I still completed way, way more than NaNoWriMo would require in just about the same amount of time (plus 9 days).

I didn't have a buddy group. I didn't have checkins. I just had me and my keyboard and my secret weapon, which I'll show you in a bit.

How is it possible to get so much more done without that external motivator?

Simple: I compete with myself.

You Need to Develop Intrinsic Motivation

What in the world is intrinsic motivation?

Intrinsic motivation is defined as the doing of an activity for its inherent satisfaction rather than for some separable consequence. When intrinsically motivated, a person is moved to act for the fun or challenge entailed rather than because of external products, pressures, or rewards. Frontiers in Neurobiotics

That is, in essence, what we do when we’re writing for fun; or, rather, it should be what we’re doing when we write for fun.

A lack of intrinsic motivation is why people who see novels as a get-rich-quick scheme tend to burn out when they realize that most writers make less than minimum wage. That's called extrinsic motivation, and it doesn't work well for things like writing, where there may not be any easily-defined goals or motivators. Most of us are not going to become rich from our writing.

Here's why extrinsic motivation is unhelpful:

Extrinsic motivation does not always work best; sometimes it can make us perform poorly at certain tasks. For instance, studies reveal that high stake rewards, like cash bonuses, can hinder cognitive capacity. This happens because they shift our focus away from the task and onto the outcome. We can become preoccupied with rewards and all the things that come with them, such as our social status, instead of just doing the work. Extrinsic rewards also tend to narrow our focus on a defined goal and reduce our ability to see other possibilities, hindering creativity. Studies find people perform worse on tasks requiring imagination and ingenuity when they are offered extrinsic rewards, such as higher pay. Nir and Far

And, well, note that "performing worse on tasks requiring imagination and ingenuity." Extrinsic motivation is literally the WORST motivator for writing specifically.

NaNoWriMo is extrinsic motivation, which is not anywhere near as powerful or sustaining as intrinsic motivation. You want to get the shiny achievement award, so you just bang out 50,000 words of slop because you want to say you did it.

You're not motivated by anything but the outcome. That does not a sustainable writing practice make.

But there’s something about intrinsic motivation I want to highlight, because it’s crucial to what I am about to show you: the challenge.

Sometimes writing is a total slog because we’re worrying about all the other things and not on the words themselves. We’re fussing about whether we will ever get published, if we’ve added enough tension in a certain part, if our mom is going to read our porn and realize what a freak they raised.

You cannot think about those things while actively writing.

Instead, you need to focus on the writing process itself. John Schinnerer, a psychologist and life coach, explains further:

Remember as you are in the process of achieving your goals that the enjoyment comes from the doing not the attaining. It is important to find contentment in the act of pursuing the goal while placing less weight on the actual fulfillment of the goal itself.  PsychCentral

So we know you need to find the challenge fun, and you need to focus on the act of putting the words on the page.

In other words, you need to make it a contest with yourself. Here’s how.

Use a Word Count Spreadsheet

Finally! We get to why I’m telling you this! It's free, it's easy, it can be done all year round.

A daily word count spreadsheet is an amazing way to stay motivated and to keep pushing yourself to write because you can literally see the wins rack up. Every day, the word count jumps significantly, which can be much more motivating than just “oh, I’m at 8,453 words.”

More importantly, you’ll start to want to beat your “high score” from the day before.

I’ve highlighted one of the cells so that you can see the simple formula that you need to set up: it’s just yesterday’s count minus today’s count.

Put that in one cell, then click and drag the bottom righthand corner of the cell, and it will populate the rest of the cells in that column with the adjusted formula (B4-B3, and so on).

This is very easy to create. All you have to do is copy-paste the wordcount from your document into your spreadsheet, make sure you have that super-simple formula, and you're done. I have severe dyscalculia and can still use it.

But you can see how much this really helped me:

Things started to really ramp up right at the end because I was getting so motivated by the word counts of the day previous. I wanted to beat yesterday’s high score and keep going.

At the beginning, I was writing maybe 1.9k words; by the end, I was an absolute demon, regularly breaking over 2.8k and then some. On the last day, when the rest of the family was in a post-Christmas hangover, my butt was glued to my chair, banging out those last few thousand words.

Psychologists and life coaches agree that self-competition, a type of intrinsic motivation, is one of the best ways to improve.

Michelle Gibbings, a workplace expert, explains:

When you compete with yourself, you don’t become fixated on what other people are doing; you set the direction and speed. You put yourself in the driver’s seat and control your progress, setting meaningful goals rather than focusing on the progress of others. Michelle Gibbings

Making a word count spreadsheet like this is the definition of setting your own speed and controlling your progress. You can decide on a threshold you always want to hit and then feel very satisfied when you go beyond that.

I set my threshold at 1.5k words every day so that I didn’t feel bummed out when I had an off day and couldn’t get a lot done, but I really wanted my average to be around 2k, so I’d periodically check how close I was to that. If I had a terrible day or was busy, then I’d want to make up for lost time and write more the next day so I kept my average.

Now, I live a life that is quite advantageous to consistent writing: I’m single, I’m childless, I work from home, and most of my hobbies are pretty low-key.

Your life doesn’t look like mine, and that’s totally okay.

There’s no need to match the speed I showed here.

What matters is that your schedule works for you, and that you are consistent.

If you’re a caretaker or have a strenuous job, then set your threshold at just 100 words and aim for an average of 500. However, you’ll be sad if your spreadsheet has a blank cell, so you’ll want to get down at least something, even if you only have 15 minutes to write.

Plus, it’s so encouraging to see the word count go up day by day: much more satisfying than just seeing it in tiny font at the bottom of a Word document or Google Doc.

Or getting some dumb t-shirt from an organization that is actively trying to murder creativity for commercial gain. (Oh, and they protected an actual pedophile from consequences for months on end while he continued to groom children. But that was last year's controversy.)

There’s another reason why this particular method works so well for writers, though.

Word Counts Banish the Urge to Edit

You know you shouldn’t, but you do it anyway. A single word here. A removed sentence there.

The first draft is just about getting everything out, not fixing everything that needs fixing. That part comes later during your five billion revisions where you tweak every single word.

Revising means you have less to work with, which means you have less development. You can get rid of anything that shouldn’t be there when you’ve gotten to that very satisfying “The End” page.

If you are motivated by the spreadsheet method, then you are screwing yourself over if you edit.

Your word count went down! It looks like you did less than you did! You’re losing! Best add more, and fast!

(I had to include my placeholder chapter names; it was obligatory.)

Use strikethrough! Now you know exactly what you’ll be getting rid of when you get to the end of your draft, but you’re not decimating your word count. I removed the entire beginning of the book; that scene is super cute, though, so I later turned it into its own one-shot on my AO3 page.

I prefer doing that because then, if you find that you actually wanted to keep that scene or move it elsewhere, all you have to do is copy-paste from the old version, remove the strikethrough, and you’re all good.

So that’s my tool. It’s really that simple.

But even though it’s so simple, it works wonders for your motivation and consistency, which are crucial for a good writer.

Are you going to give it a whirl? You may find it nervewracking at first, but I encourage you to sample this method, especially if you have a hard time getting motivated.

And if you enjoyed this article, maybe you'll consider purchasing my debut novel, 9 Years Yearning.

This is not the book I drafted last year; it is in fact a prequel of sorts to that first novel. However, it helps set the scene for Poesy (the sixth book in the Eirenic Verses) so that you'll be all prepped for the masterpiece.

9 Years Yearning is a coming of age romance that follows the life of two young soldiers as they go from sorta-enemies, to frenemies, to friends, and then finally to lovers. It is a short read; you can probably finish it in about 2 hours all the way through. Perfect for a weekend romp.

If you do read my book, please don't forget to leave a review!

Reviews are essential to success on Amazon as they boost visibility. (Yes, even bad ones.) Always leave reviews, no matter how short, to support indie authors!

[planet-gay-comic]

Knight and Squire – A Minnesong Remix of the 13th Century 🏰🐎💞

🎶 Watch the MusicVideo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z3sofm7Cqtk

Medieval Minnesong – Lyrics (Middle High German)

Min herze slæht sît dû bist nâh. (My heart beats since you are near.) Dîn ougen sint lîhte unde sîn. (Your eyes are bright and true.) Ich gedenke dîn in jêder stund. (I think of you in every hour.) Dîn hant ist mîn triuwe swert. (Your hand is my faithful sword.)

About Minnesong – Medieval Courtly Love Poetry Minnesong was a refined form of lyric and music in the High Middle Ages, flourishing between the 12th and 14th centuries. Originating in aristocratic court culture, it was dedicated to the theme of "Minne"—an often unfulfilled, idealized love for an unattainable beloved. These songs were typically performed by noble poets known as Minnesänger and soon became a highly respected art form, characterized by emotional depth and strict stylistic conventions.

By the 13th and 14th centuries, the poetry became more personal and expressive. Songs increasingly explored themes like friendship, loyalty, or spiritual longing—sometimes even with homoerotic undertones, though rarely named directly. The language was symbolic and ritualized: the heart beats, the eyes shine, the hand stands for loyalty—all classic motifs of the time. Music and words worked together to evoke emotion, longing, and inner devotion.

Knights and Their Squires – A Special Bond in History The relationship between knights and squires was one of the most intimate social connections of medieval times. A squire often served a knight for years—caring for his armor and horse, accompanying him on campaigns, and training under his guidance. Through this close daily contact, many developed bonds that went beyond duty.

Emotional Ties in Male Worlds In the all-male environments of knightly orders and warrior brotherhoods, deep emotional connections naturally formed. Medieval culture was highly homosocial, and the lines between loyalty, friendship, and affection were often blurred. While official records rarely mention same-sex relationships, poetry and courtly songs leave room for interpretation. Troubadours described intense devotion in language that today can read as romantic.

Historical Glimpses Figures like Richard the Lionheart and John of Bohemia are known for unusually close bonds with male companions. While it’s impossible to confirm the nature of these ties, historical accounts suggest strong emotional attachment. Similarly, knightly orders like the Templars or Hospitallers fostered close brotherhoods, even though their rules officially forbade such relationships.

Looking Back With New Eyes Despite strict medieval Christian norms, knights and their squires often shared a unique closeness—ranging from deep friendship to passionate loyalty. Today, their world invites us to rediscover the emotional richness of the past and to appreciate connections that may have been more complex than we once assumed. Even if many details are lost or later romanticized, their legacy lives on in poetry, music, and imagination.

Images: SD-1.5, SDXL, FLUX 1.1 - postprocessed Image to Video: Kling 1.6, Haiiluo Sound: SUNO AI v4 Cut and Remix: Video Deluxe 2025 plus Text and AI prompts: supported by GPT 4o