#not posting it directly here because ai stuff...

[mortalityplays]

huge uptick recently in people playing the put-upon martyred voice of reason going "umm are we allowed to point out that 99% of the fundraiser DMs are probably scammers yet or will I be murdered with rocks and knives and called a racist nazi and cast into the street for dogs to eat?" and straight up posting screenshots of spelling errors and translation mistakes to laugh at like we haven't had this basic fucking conversation repeatedly for the last year and a half

I'm not sure you guys recognise that almost every fundraiser I share under my 'vetted fundraisers' tag is one that has been sent to me via DM. the reason you don't recognise that is because I don't directly post the DM I received (no shade on those who do, just pointing out what you don't see!) I go out of my way to individually check the vetted status of the campaign, and then I share the person's pinned post or whatever version I can find that seems to have the most complete information/vetting credentials.

I would estimate maybe 1 in 8 of the messages I investigate end up having no verification source associated with them at all – and that doesn't mean they're scammers, mind you, just that they are unvetted. A few are 'vetted by association' (vouched for by someone in gaza who has been vetted, usually a relative) and I mark these as such. The vast majority are vetted, often by multiple sources. Many of them are names I see again and again, who have been reaching out for help since January or February or even earlier. The gofundmes are donor protected, some have multiple committed supporters who have been in regular contact with them for months.

If you don't see this stuff, it’s because you don't look. And part of the reason people don't look is because this insidious 'hmm why would someone frightened for their life use DMs to promote their fundraiser' 'umm emojis? to catch my attention? something fishy here' 'personally I just think anyone who needs financial aid should speak fluent english first' bullshit keeps worming its way into common discourse and making it acceptable to just assume your prejudices and anxieties are justified.

So yes actually I do think it's racist to reflexively assume anyone who reaches out to you using google translate to beg for their life is a grifter. I do think it's disgusting to absolve yourself of making the effort to recognise real people in crisis just because you think emojis are tacky or AI art is vulgar or whatever. Get a grip. Nobody can force you to care but stop mewling and snickering about something you can't even be bothered to investigate in good faith.

[dicklessthewonderclown]

Hello Mr. AI's biggest hater,

How do I communicate to my autism-help-person that it makes me uncomfortable if she asks chatgpt stuff during our sessions?

For example she was helping me to write a cover letter for an internship I'm applying to, and she kept asking chatgpt for help which made me feel really guilty because of how bad ai is for the environment. Also I just genuinely hate ai.

Sincerely, Google didn't have an answer for me and asking you instead felt right.

ok, so there are a couple things you could bring up: the environmental issues with gen ai, the ethical issues with gen ai, and the effect that using it has on critical thinking skills

if (like me) you have issues articulating something like this where you’re uncomfortable, you could send her an email about it, that way you can lay everything out clearly and include links

under the cut are a whole bunch of source articles and talking points

for the environmental issues:

here’s an MIT news article from earlier this year about the environmental impact, which estimates that a single chat gpt prompt uses 5 times more energy than a google search: https://news.mit.edu/2025/explained-generative-ai-environmental-impact-0117

an article from the un environment programme from last fall about ai’s environmental impact: https://www.unep.org/news-and-stories/story/ai-has-environmental-problem-heres-what-world-can-do-about

an article posted this week by time about ai impact, and it includes a link to the 2025 energy report from the international energy agency: https://time.com/7295844/climate-emissions-impact-ai-prompts/

for ethical issues:

an article breaking down what chat gpt is and how it’s trained, including how open ai uses the common crawl data set that includes billions of webpages: https://www.edureka.co/blog/how-chatgpt-works-training-model-of-chatgpt/#:~:text=ChatGPT%20was%20trained%20on%20large,which%20the%20model%20is%20exposed

you can talk about how these data sets contain so much data from people who did not consent. here are two pictures from ‘unmasking ai’ by dr joy buolamwini, which is about her experience working in ai research and development (and is an excellent read), about the issues with this:

baker law has a case tracker for lawsuits about ai and copyright infringement: https://www.bakerlaw.com/services/artificial-intelligence-ai/case-tracker-artificial-intelligence-copyrights-and-class-actions/

for the critical thinking skills:

here’s a recent mit study about how frequent chat gpt use worsens critical thinking skills, and using it when writing causes less brain activity and engagement, and you don’t get much out of it: https://time.com/7295195/ai-chatgpt-google-learning-school/

explain to her that you want to actually practice and get better at writing cover letters, and using chat gpt is going to have the opposite effect

as i’m sure you know, i have a playlist on tiktok with about 150 videos, and feel free to use those as well

best of luck with all of this, and if you want any more help, please feel welcome to send another ask or dm me directly (on here, i rarely check my tiktok dm requests)!

[seeingteacupsindragons]

Something I find very frustrating in the writing/reading community is the almost total lack of craft discussion. And I think it ties into AI a little, and I’ll get to that.

I wish I could say things were different before some specified time, but to be honest, I’ve always had a hard time finding people who want to discuss the nitty gritty nuts and bolts of writing craft. Discussing Craft, discussing what tools are available and how and why to use them, what effect they caused and how a different tool or technique might have a different effect, etc., etc., etc., is legitimately the best way for any artist to learn, but I see a lot more posts about “Here’s how you get that glossy effect on shiny tile floors” and lists of brushes to download and such like from visual artists than I do from writers.

This all resurfaced recently because an old friend of mine mentioned once again the dire state of the criticism landscape, in that all discussion about a piece of media and what it does and how it does stuff is flash-in-the-pan these days. Comes out right around release of the Thing as some kind of review of whether you should/shouldn’t interact with it, and no one wants to talk about it a month later. Obviously, this is detrimental to genuinely thoughtful critiques and careful dissections of a piece of media because that stuff takes time and thought, but I wish I could say it surprised me.

Most audience members for really anything are not the critiquer types. They don’t really think that deeply about how media works and why. They want a thumbs up or thumbs down, and a lot of the time they don’t even care why or how that was the conclusion, or even why that conclusion applies or who it applies to. That’s…fine. It’s not how I do things, but hey, fine.

But this does contribute to the overwhelming void of writers’ and storytellers’ craft and skillset being discussed. Because if no one cares, and it doesn’t seem to directly contribute to marketing or sales…it’s not going to be a focal point.

How someone sewed a story together matters so much more than their ingredient list. You could hand two people the same recipe for macarons and that does not mean both will be equally successful, because macarons are fucking hard. A blueberry muffin and a blueberry donut do not require the same skillset and they do not have the same effect on people.

And goddammit, AI slop is just a list of tropes blended into a slurry with absolutely no craft or intent to make anything. You don’t have a muffin or a donut. You have Slop.

You can eat Slop if you want to, I guess, but it’s not real enjoyable.

And to make less Sloppy things, you gotta figure out how to actually make a muffin or a donut or whatever the hell else you wanna make. And to properly advertise against Slop, you’ve got to talk about how everything should be fluffier than your last book because you’ve been working very hard on your egg-beating by hand. Because AI can’t beat eggs at all.

But when people don’t talk about Craft, people never learn how to talk about Craft even though it’s now a feature of fighting the Slop. A lot of people don’t even know how to consciously use it.

Some years ago, a fanfiction writer I was friends with at the time kept bragging about how “prose-y” her writing was, because someone had mentioned in a comment that they really liked how she used prose.

If you know what the word “prose” means, you are currently staring at your screen as flabbergasted as I was at the time. “Prose” is not a quality or component or technique. It’s literally just…narrative writing. The commentor basically said “I like how you write.” Which is nice. But the reader was so unable to articulate what they liked specifically that they just found a fancy way to say “Hey, I really liked that!” and the writer was so unaware of craft that she thought that was a specific compliment about something specific in her style.

There’s a place for “I really liked that” and it’s definitely fanfiction. But even in fanfiction, there’s a reason people want to read their 42 coffeeshop au about the same two damn characters, and it’s not because of the unique tropes. It’s because this author characterizes Blorbo Jones with a sharp staccato sentence rhythm that really invests you in the way he thinks, and that other author describes that coffee bar so well you think they may have actually built one and good god do you feel like you live anywhere they set a story.

And that’s Craft.

And it’s not just casual readers and marketing execs and journalists or hobby fanfiction writers and such that have utterly blinded themselves to how writing Works.

Let me illustrate with another anecdote that still frustrates me: some years ago on Twitter, I asked people for their recs for books they were impressed with the craft of, because I desperately wanted to delve deep into excellent craft for inspiration. Approximately one, maybe two, people of the probably dozen or more responses—and they were not fandom people, they were mostly original writers of some stripe or another—had any idea what I was even talking about. I was flooded with responses of “I don’t know what that means, but I liked...”

But there are things I think were skillfully, excellent crafted that didn’t quite jibe with my soul, and there are things that I absolutely frolic around in that...are...eh. Well. They were assembled somehow, at some point, even if it has the workmanship of a Cybertruck. I tried to explain to some responders, and they genuinely had no idea how to gauge what the skill of a book looked like.

Things that make me want to frolic have some positive points to hone in on, but fundamentally I do not want to make a fun, comfy, but deeply structurally unsound treehouse. I like making fancy complicated treehouses that don’t even rock when you jump in them that use all sorts of fun tricks to make new kinds of joists and ooooh look at that floating staircase, how did you even make that?

But a lot of people are just like, “That was fun,” and stop there. And that’s okay. It is. But it’s such a predominant flavor of media response right now that...everything else seems to not matter. I can remember one multi-trad-published author who loved to talk up his books in terms of tropes and how he wanted to try to write something reminiscent of basically every genre of anime. And yet when I tried to read his multiple books, they kept hitting wrong every time because all of his seams were showing and loose nails were jabbing at me. He blended tropes up into chunky soup and forgot he was supposed to be writing a story, not marketing something.

 If the appeal of a story was a list of tropes/components in it, I would be equally satisfied with a TvTropes page as a I am with a book or a manga or a TV series. And I’m not. I’m quite certain most people are not. And that means the ingredients aren’t what matter, it’s how they’re mixed and baked, and people only ever want to go, “Ooooh, love that you used vanilla frosting!”

I think a lot of authors might be more confident and find their own style and voice if they...knew how to recognize what those things are, and what they consist of. Because it consists of your little funky writing quirks. How you pick your metaphors for characters early and how you pick each of your settings to match what’s going with that motif and the character’s internal state. It’s how you always give your character a moment alone before or after a hard conversation so that you can debrief your reader on the situation and pause before or after and intense moment to handle so the character and the reader can take stock and introspect and give them moments to feel. It’s how you spin your three-time phrasal repetition into repeating sentences into repeating paragraphs because it gets bigger and bolder with each repeat of the idea, and it needs to be repeated three times like a fractal growing ever larger.

That kind of thing.

Not what’s in your chunky soup.

As a writer, I love hearing that you like my staircase or my nice treehouse floor. But what I really crave, what will really send me through the moon, especially from my editors and critique partners and whatnot, is not “Wow your floorboards are nice and sturdy,” but “Oh, goddamn I love how those weird joists are giving the floor just the right amount of bounce.”

Because fucking I worked hard on that shit, and I want people to notice the actual work, not just the results. For the most part writing craft should be invisible. You don’t want people noticing how things are built if they’re not looking for it, because that means you Fucked Up probably at least 8 times out of 10. Keep your seams inside the shirt with all the messy, knotty tie offs flattened into the hems to keep them from being visible and rubbing against any sensitive skin. I love when I manage that.

But people paying attention to the blood, sweat, tears, and soul I poured into something, finding all that work, acknowledging it, and maybe even wanting to learn from it? That is a kind of ascension to a holy land that is unachievable by simply providing a seamless experience.

And not only is it how other writers learn…it’s how I learn. I need to know what feels off and weird as well as what went fucking fantastically because…that’s how I know what techniques I pulled off well, and what would maybe be better off saved for a different effect because that’s not what I wanted.

Literacy rates are some of the highest they’ve ever been, but comprehension is such and writing craft is such that people don’t think anything of it more than they let words spill out of their mouth unthinkingly.

But stories aren’t put together unthinkingly. They don’t just spill out. Not good ones. Not ones that matter.

[aihoshiino]

chapter 164 thoughts

This post discusses suicide and suicidal ideation in the context of Oshi no Ko.

Chapters Until The Story Ends Without The 143 Kiss Being Addressed Or Acknowledged: 2

Bizarrely, I feel like I don't have a ton to say about this chapter. Not because stuff doesn't happen in it but because… fuck, man. What do I even say. I can't quite 100% shake my suspicion that Akasaka has some asspull up his sleeve and that Aqua might come back in style form, even if altered to the point that he isn't the Aqua we know anymore, but this chapter is clearly set up for us to think he's dead and for us to see other character's reactions to this news, so I'll talk about the text with that assumption in mind. This one will probably be kind of all over the place so bear with me ig

That being said… this is all kind of dumb as fuck, huh

Like. There's just so many insane contrivances with this setup that it's impossible for me to take it seriously. Putting aside that there's no way on planet earth Aqua's plan should have fooled anybody, why in God's name are his family and friends finding out about this from a news broadcast and not, like… Being contacted by the police?? Or at least hearing about it beforehand??

I also really don't like that we're setting up to have a whole chapter focusing on Ruby's response to all this while Aqua's Literal Mother and all his friends get like. Two panels to be shocked at the news. If the series ends without giving them all the space to grieve I think I will be legitimately really pissed off lmao

The presence of 15 Year Lie in this chapter also makes me agonizingly aware that we know basically nothing about it to this day, even though the contents of the movie are what this final arc revolves around. Aqua's plan relies on Kamiki's crimes as exposed by the movie being heinous enough that Kamiki would kill Aqua to silence them but…

WHAT FUCKING CRIMES???

The Kamiki we saw in the movie was only ever portrayed as a victim in the scenes we see. Unless the story is trying to imply that Kamiki is somehow responsible for Uehara and Airi's deaths or that 15YL makes him directly responsible for Gorou's death or - literally I have no idea what this could be referring to.

I dunno, man. It's hard for me to really want to buckle down and analyse this because so much of it feels entirely contrary to the story that came before. I've always insisted that the one thing that we could guarantee was that Aqua and Ruby would survive the series and be happy because so much emotional weight is put on Ai's wish for Aqua and Ruby to grow into adults and be happy, and it really seemed like we were building up to an ending of Aqua deciding for himself that he wants to finally live for himself, so this sudden swerve into Aqua being told by God "actually your purpose in life is to nobly commit suicide for your sister" is uh, jarring to say the least.

Part of the issue with this is that I think Akasaka doesn't think of Aqua's sacrifice as being a suicide, narratively speaking, even though Akane literally acknowledges it as such. But the thing is, Aqua's "sacrifice" is emergent from all the same things as his suicidal ideation - his belief that his life is intrinsically less valuable than everyone else's and his continued guilt and self loathing as a result of his trauma. Aqua literally says to Ruby's face in 143 that he feels guilty just for being alive and it's literally never addressed again.

So it's very difficult not to read this ending as the story approving of Aqua killing himself, but only if it's for the right reasons. Not only is that an insanely irresponsible message to put into a story as widespread and visible as OnK is right now, it's also just fucking ghoulish.

Idk. Even if Aqua lived here, I just really dislike this idea of his whole life's purpose being Narratively Affirmed as being to uplift Ruby at his own expense. Aqua is very much like Ai in that he's a person who has spent basically all of both his lives in service to other people, unable to pursue the things that he wants and that make him genuinely fulfilled - an ending that parallels Ai, where he is denied this to the extent that it kills him, is not a bad idea on paper but the execution here makes it fall apart. Like, if the framing was that Aqua and Kamiki were both unable to move on from the past to the point that it kills them, I'd vibe with that or something like it. But as is, this shit is just baffling.

It doesn't help that Aqua's death is just completely unmoored from anything the series has been setting up all this time. I've seen people defending this as being what Aqua's revenge was building up to, but this very explicitly isn't about Aqua's revenge. It's about "protecting Ruby's future", but the idea that Kamiki was a threat to Ruby specifically is something that was introduced all of four chapters ago. Even then, it's deeply undercooked. Like, what it is about Kamiki that makes him SUCH a threat to Ruby that Aqua has no choice but to take the nuclear option and kill them both? Why is this the one and only way to stop him? We don't know - we basically know nothing about Kamiki besides "he's Ai's crazy ex" which is such a massive letdown for an antagonist who's been built up for this long.

Speaking of Ai…. where the fuck is she!!!

I know this is predictable background noise from the Ai Wife Guy, but it really is baffling to me that she's such a nonfactor when the climax happening right now is her son confronting the man who killed her. At best, we get mild lipservice as to her existence but the series is so all-in on this "protecting Ruby's future" framing that Ai's absence here feels jarring. It's not just that Ai should be relevant because I like her (but I DO and she SHOULD) but because it makes for a bizarrely deflated finale. Instead of the tragedy we've been building up to avenging for over 140 chapters, Aqua's death comes as the result of a plan he came up with on the spot to deal with an ill-defined threat that only came into existence 4-6 chapters ago.

It just doesn't really feel satisfying, especially when the series has been so wishy washy when it comes to focusing on Aqua and Ruby's relationship. If the series was going to make that connection The central axis on which this climax revolves, then it needed more fleshing out than it got, regardless of if the series went the AquRuby route or not.

Two chapters left………..

[luvmanifesting]

WHY’RE YOU GIVING UP?

Is it because you’re too busy dwelling in the 3D?

Is it because you’re being pathetic and watching other people’s success stories and comparing it to yourself?

Is it because you’re constantly complaining?

Is it because you can’t handle the fact you’re GOD because of religious beliefs?

Is it because you convinced yourself on PURPOSE that you can’t achieve anything?

Whatever it is get over it. You’re God, you’ve always been God. Rather you like it or not. I don’t wanna see; “Oh but—“ Shut up. I’m tired of seeing people complain and complain about the same stuff when its so easy. Does the word “EASY” not ring a bell in your small brain? When people say something is easy then its easy, nobody’s going to manifest for you. Do it yourself.

Its funny to me because I know after this post you’re going to do the same thing AGAIN (😹) complain, go into someone’s DM’s asking them to do this for you..go in some pretty girls tiktok comments and say “oh to look like this” or even worse (go on Character AI) -pathetic go shower.

While everyone’s out here manifesting and getting their dream life you’re stuck being a bum and living your same old boring life. (Crazy right? I wonder why they’re getting their dream life.)

Assume, Persist, Done.

If this was too harsh, then it was directly FOR YOU.

[xenocorner]

(If you're someone who enjoys my work, and also happens to like/support AI generated images, please give this a read? Just hear me out, please. This is not a bashing post, I promise. It's not pro-ai either though. But please hear me out)

This whole AI art stuff is just getting... Honestly exhausting. If you are someone who supports AI generated images, I beg of you, hear me out? I'm not here to bash, to say you're a bad person or a thief. I know it's more complex than that. I'm just, trying to express how I feel about this whole ordeal. I'm not here to get angry either. I don't have the energy for that. I'm also not trying to change your mind. Just, hopefully help you see/feel a different perspective? That's all.

Long rant under the cut because. There's a lot.

I'm not even angry anymore. I don't have the energy for that. But I keep seeing AI images all over, everywhere. The thing is getting better (because of course it is). And I see more and more people support it. And sometimes those people are also artists or people who like art and support artists.

And then I also see artists be laid off. I see how it gets harder and harder to make a break in the industry. And even after you make it you get laid off because... People don't wanna bother with it anymore. Corps would rather cut costs.

And then I see people defend AI images. Say it's okay, that it isn't stealing from artists, that it is just a tool, ignoring a huge part of the problem (whether willfully or not).

And it just makes me so incredibly sad. So utterly devastated.

I was angry. I really used to be angry. I'm just hurt now. Hopeless for the future. And tired. Really really damn tired.

Tired of artists having to justify their existance in the professional world. Tired of people just saying... No.

No, you don't get to thrive. And you're selfish and entitled for wanting to thrive. No, you don't get to feel hurt when your work gets scrapped without your permission to feed a data base designed to replace you. No, you don't get a say in this. Don't like? Bohoo, don't see.

Well, how can I not see when this issue directly affects how I live? How can I not see when this issue affects my future? It's not just a matter of "Don't like x kind of content, don't interact with it". It really is not. I really wish it was, I wish it was that simple. But it's not. Because this is not something like a ship or a trope that one can ignore and not be affected. This is like trying to ignore a dumpster fire in your neighborhood. Yeah, you can avoid looking at it. You can avoid talking about it. But the smoke is still getting into your house. You're still breathing it. It's still hurting you. It will have effects on your life, whether you like it or not.

I threw away 12 years of my life building up my skill to work in a field that feels like it's dying out. Am I (and countless other artists) just supposed to start over? How? Time is unforgiving.

Bohoo for your bad choices, suck it up. Your fault for pursuing art as a career.

Was I supposed to just, KNOW, somehow, that the career I choose, that used to be viable, would just... Take this turn? Was I supposed to have a 10 year look into the the future?

You should create for the joy of creating!

I do. I love creating. I love making people happy with my work. Work I spent years perfecting. It's the most beautiful feeling in the world to know that someone smiled or cried or felt something because of something I did. It makes me smile and cry too.

But I also like to be able to eat. To have a roof. To pay for my meds. And the joy of creating honestly dwindles each time I see people talk about AI images the same way they talk about a painting in the Louvure.

Becaus they do. I've seen people talk about images generated by a machine (built upon stealing artwork from unconsenting artists) like they're the work of God. And they write such beautiful things too. And I'm left baffled, confused, uneasy.

And then I go to see artists, living, breathing, feeling artists, who create marvelous pieces, who pour their heart into their work, who shed sweat blood and tears to get their skills to where they are, who are still shedding sweat blood and tears to keep improving... And they don't even get a 'nice'. They've been job searching for 3 years. They can't get a steady flow of commissions. They're scrambling to be able to get a table at a con.

And it hurts to my very core.

It hurts in a place I don't even know how to describe, because it's so deep and so personal and so raw that I don't think there's a name for it.

I love art. I love it so damn much. I love making it, I love sharing it, I love teaching it.

I think many other people love art too. I think many other people who love art don't even consciously realize they do.

And it hurts seeing art just... Become this.

It hurts seeing the artistic souls of this earth be pushed down and down again and again over and over and be told to just. To just suck it up.

To die off.

Because when people support AI images, they are telling us to die off. It feels like they are telling us to die off.

And I don't think the people who do realize it at all, because a lot of people who support AI images are not bad people. They are not. They enjoy art too. But they are, consiously or not, directly or indirectly, hurting the artists whose work made the data base AI generators use possible.

They're telling us to die off because they already have our work. And they can use it to generate new, regurgitated work faster, cheaper. They don't need us. So while they may like what us, artists, do, they're feeding a system that is killing us off. Both metaphorically and literally. Metaphorically by killing the will to create. Literally by taking our living off of us (or at least to those who's art is their living. Like myself).

And again.

It hurts so damn much.

And I don't think a lot of people manage to see the hurt past all the anger.

I, personally, have grown exhausted and there's no anger left in me, only sad and hurt.

But I promise you, behind every angry and fighting and barking and bitting artists there is out there, there's hurt. There's some form of hurt behind each and every one of them. Of us.

I really hope this reaches the right people. Whether that be a fellow artists struggling to get their feelings into words to let them know they're not alone. Or someone who supports AI images, and supports artists too, and can maybe get a glimpse into a side of this whole issue. Not necessarily to change their mind but, maybe help them understand better where all the anger from artists may be coming from.

Please, I'm not here to start any fights or debates. I really am not. I just need to get this sort of thing out there, because I think talking about it is important.

[moonlightreal]

How can we help?

I dunno about y’all but I’m very keen to live in a world where LJ Smith has some good things happen to her for a change, and we get to read Strange Fate. So is there anything we can do to make those things happen?

First, Strange Fate.

The only thing I can think to do is spread the word. Post on your socials, drop the news into the off topic channel of any remotely bookish discords you may be in. “Anybody read these books back when? The author reappeared!” Tell random YA readers you know. There are a bunch of people who liked the Night World books but haven’t thought of them in years, and a bunch of people who remember them and do the Strange Fate deepdive periodically, and those are the people who’d like to know that things are moving again.

I just wish we knew how fast things were moving! Spreading the word is a bit suboptimal when the word is, “Strange Fate is coming… sometime in the next few years, really this time!” But still, folks will want to know. Alas, fan enthusiasm cannot grease the slow wheels of publishing!

I think there will be a time for telling the publisher how very excited we are, but I’m not sure that time is yet. And if things don’t work out with publishers, there may be a time when we can kick in to a Kickstarter, but that time is also not yet.

Second, Ms. Smith.

This lady fought her way through some serious slings and arrows of outrageous fortune to finish the book we want to read. She deserves some good stuff to happen in her life and we can deliver some of that good stuff!

Ms. Smith would like to have action on the website. Importantly: emails do not go directly to Ms. Smith, she has her “staff writer” Jesa who seems to be both assistant and friend handling correspondence. Which is good! Dealing with a whole entire fanbase of delighted but very impatient people might be a bit too much for Ms. Smith who is still having medical issues, she needs a buffer and I’m really glad she has one. So say nice things to Jesa!

-Send questions for Ask LJ. I tried to think of questions that I really am curious about, that would also be fun for Ms. Smith to answer. One was what kind of anime she’s into, and I'm super curious to know if we have the same taste.

-Send fun stories. Did anything really wacky ever happen because you’re a Night World fan? Ever had a funny conversation with another fan in the wild? Did you roleplay or cosplay as your favorite character? This series has been part of our lives for ages—probably not a super big part, I mean there’s lots of fandoms, but if you’re here now it’s been a part for a long time.

-Send fanart. Jesa reports that Ms. Smith loves to see fanart! Also while I know we all have lots of opinions on AI pictures, Ms. Smith likes them and if you can wrangle a prompt to make a scene from one of the books she’d probably get a kick out of it. Or if you can draw, think of it as giving her some better art!

-Do not send fanfiction or story ideas. This is a bummer for those of us who happen to have the written word as our medium, but there are tangled legal and copyright things that make it VERY BAD for official authors to read any fanwork of their own stories. Ms. Smith wants to interact with her fans, so we need to make sure we’re fans who are safe to interact with!

And be nice, and be patient.

[deepdreamnights]

Terms and Conditions Do Not Overrule the USTPO

Originally from reddit. I am not a lawyer, but this hardly needs one.

I use Suno, but it being a useful tool doesn't mean they're off the hook for trying to be sneaky. Also, this isn't just about them. Pretty much every Generative AI tool has some similar such claim or clause in place.

Any so-called controlling rights on public domain works are entirely unenforceable.

This is a long post, so enjoy this public domain song which you can use for whatever purpose you like.

Terms and conditions do not override the determinations of the USTPO, which is that without significant human modification, generative AI generations do not qualify for copyright protections and thus are in the public domain.

So for Suno, you own your lyrics if you wrote them. You own any modifications you make to the song in post. You might own the tune if it was prompted directly using Suno's weird symbols/tabulature stuff, but at this point there's been no judgement on whether a significantly complex prompt makes a resulting generation have "significant human expression".

Not to say Suno can't pull DMCA BS or issue takedowns, but it wouldn't be hard to prove they lack the standing. You'd probably have to go to court to do it, so if you're not willing to roll the dice on having to do that sending an email is easier, and that's what the company is counting on.

The important part, is to remember that human authorship is required for copyright. If you want those rights, you gotta make sure you're putting in the authorship (lyrics, editing, remixing, etc.)

Or, you can be cool with the commons and be open about the copyleft nature of AI generations.

I tend to approach my own work in a "making parts" sense because I've been doing multimedia collage for far longer than there's been generative AI. The final work is the faux trailer, fake commercial, music video or the comic or the mini-episode or whatnot.

But everyone's process is going to be different.

Part of countering misinformation around generative AI is breaking the hype side of things as much as the doom.

The corporate dream of an endless IP machine is a paper tiger, because all they've made is an infinite public domain machine. A century of trying to control and hoard the "rights" to our culture have drained the commons dry and this new tech just pumps solely into it's parched reservoir.

On the other end, the idea that one is going to get rich just because they've got some generative tools is just mist and vapor awaiting a light breeze. It's a great force multiplier, but anyone can get access to the same tools. The things the robot can't bring to the table are the things that matter, and they're going to matter even more now.

I like to compare most AI to toys (an object's use defines its function) and a way of making parts of a whole, so Lego is a good metaphor here. The creations that get attention are the ones that aren't out-of-the-box and made from the instructions.

I don't say this to discourage anyone from trying to use the tech to fulfill their expressive vision, but to emphasize that it's not a push-button-get-end-result situation.

Everyone has access to the same bricks. Everyone can use your bricks if they find them in an out of the box state. This is a feature, not a bug.

[stormtrooperinstilettos]

The poster, part 2:

I have more to say about the poster, because it's bad, and I have thoughts about something very specific.

Find the first post about the poster here. This is what happen's when you have a queen fixation in the current state of the fandom.

I was reading the store page again, because I had free time. What I found/realised that I missed out of anger the first time. I skim things sometimes, I'm also blind, so apologies.

The ai print is sold out. Having read the description attached to the poster, there's no question why. I'd wager it's not because people have accepted the art. It's worse. Ai is mentioned nowhere in the description of this piece, what is mentioned is the limited nature of the print, the chance to get a signed copy, and the golden ticket. No one who bought one was directly informed of the nature of the poster, only told to get one for a chance to win. I dread to think of anyone who bought the thing without the knowledge it was ai. Personally I would have thought anyone bold enough to sell such a piece would at least be bold enough to be honest, apparently not. Obviously they're happy to tell you to buy it.

Additionally there is a shirt, much to the same effect, I missed when first checking. For your viewing displeasure:

"Oh what a lovely design! I wonder who created it, I'd love to see some of their other stuff... oh." If it wasn't ai, it would be a shitty promotion. Of course, it is, but like, ignoring that for a moment I still don't think it's a good promotion of anything, even ai. It's not honest either. Maybe this is the standard for the site and merch and I simply hadn't noticed before. Forgive me if that is the case, I'm poor and don't have the money to throw at merch, so I've only ever glanced at the store, seen the prices and left.

[lancedoncrimsonwings]

Writing update?

Halfway through moving all of the writing I've done on Obsidian to Ellipsus.

It took forever, but by my calculation from the wordcount of every file of this fic on Ellipsus so far is 145,652 words...

And I have another 147,961 words left on Obsidian I haven't copied over. (Predominantly for parts 4 onwards, though 19,468 words are just from Augusnippets 2024, and 12,000 ish are miscellaneous lore info plus some notes for Chapter 1 and 2 that I've already posted anyway... so lets say 140,000 ish are actually relevant.)

Which means I have written 293,613 words for Horizons to Battlegrounds so far.

I've posted 14,372 words, so that's 279,241 words of unposted content. That's fucking nuts... so yeh. Rest assured the 4 of you who are interested in this story, THERE IS MORE TO COME.

Ngl, I miss not having an accurate wordcount for each file like I did with the plug-in I had on Obsidian, because I just had to do all that maths file by file, but its so much easier to be able to write on my phone or tablet whenever I want.

In terms of writing progress, I've been struggling a lot with memory loss, fugue states and fatigue recently, I can't comprehend what I'm reading and I think I might be having migranes without the pain. (Or at least, without the levels of pain I associate with migranes- as the headaches I've been having have just been. Headaches. And not that bad. But the neurological symptoms have been getting worse and apparently "silent migranes" with little to no pain are a thing? I dunno)

So unfortunately, Chapter 3 has been abandoned for now, but I've been reading bits of my work as I've been moving it across and damn some of this shit is gold!

I'm excited for some stuff that's coming up in Part 2. Buuuut we have to get through all 10-20 chapters of Part 1 first. We will get there, eventually...

I'm gonna take a bit of time out, finish moving the other 140,000+ words across, and then try and tackle that nightmare that is Chapter 3.

(For those of you who are curious why I am moving from Obsidian, I lost an entire ready-to-post chapter to a known bug on Obsidian, and was getting frustrated with the fact I could only write on one device directly. Ellipsus is simpler, easy to use, and whilst yes ir lacks the plug-ins and graph that I did find useful on Obsidian, it does everything I need including allowing me to write across any device. They have a strong anti AI stance which is always nice to see, it's just generally great and I highly reccomend it! You can check out Ellipsus's blog here; @ellipsus-writes )

[parageist]

OPENING COMMISSIONS!!

(I know a lot of people in way more destitute scenarios offering commissions, and I am well-off without them, so please consider spending your money on someone who needs it to survive! But as a middle-class, unemployed, autistic trans girl who recently turned 18 and is expected by my parents to get a job soon to continue living here, I would desperately appreciate any sort of income possible!)

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All Prices in USD, pay via PayPal - Please pay at least 50% upfront, thank you!

-Basic lineart + coloring for a 720x480 or 480x800 panel: $10 (+$5 per extra character)

-Lineart + coloring + shading + effects + background for a 800x1280 or 1280x720 comic-page-sized drawing: $30 (+$20 per extra character)

-Purely landscape/environmental with no characters, 1280x720: $25 (though depends on the complexity)

There’s no set time or schedule for me, so it could take anywhere between a few hours and a few weeks for me to finish, depending on mental health, work, other activities, etc., but you may ask for a 50% refund if it takes me more than a month. If I am unable to finish the piece for whatever reason, I will offer a full refund. Please don’t rush me or change your instructions after I’ve started it. Thank you!

Anything you commission from me will be subject to my copyright and will be posted publicly (UNLESS IT IS NSFW), however you are allowed to also post and use it in any way UNLESS that way involves harassment, discrimination, to be directly sold or used for your own product(s), training any sort of AI models, or claiming ownership over my art.

Oh yeah and feel free to just DM me if you want a commission, though I'm not the most active at times lol

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I’ll try drawing pretty much anything, but there are some disclaimers I should make:

Things that I am not necessarily adverse to drawing, but my lack of experience in the specific subject may result in the process taking much longer and/or the result being of lesser quality than my other work: -Drawing outside of my normal artstyle -Furries -Animals -NSFW -Complex designs, vehicles, mechs

Because of this, you may request the price to be 20% off if it includes the above.

And these things are completely off the limits for obvious reasons: -Any art that is hateful or discriminatory in any way -Art made to harass someone -Fetish content -NSFW of minors, non-anthro animals, non-consensual encounters, and/or incest -Heavy gore, maggots, feces, and other disgusting stuff

Oh yeah and PLEASE DO NOT commission anything NSFW from me if you are a minor!!!!!

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!!!ALSO!!! I likely can only handle no more than 8 commissions at a time, but I will have the available slots in my bio.

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Here is a bunch of other random drawings and comic pages I've made!

I'll likely make an updated version of this later lol

Please reblog and share to help get a young artist started in their life! Any support is greatly appreciated, have a fantastic day!!

[toyhouse-code-hell]

Pinned Post/Rules

Hello, I'm Clay (he/him, adult, very queer) I give out toyhouse codes from my account PhalarAluve.

Asks open when I accumulate 50 codes and code status is always in my bio. And because of this, I am limiting things to:

ONE CODE PER ASK AND DO NOT DOUBLE DIP.

Asks are OPENED.

46/50 CODES AVAILABLE

FAQ ?

Can I pleeeease get two codes...? It's for a sales account. 🥺 No <3 Them's the breaks.

Can I dm you for a code? I would prefer asks only, so no. I want this to be a touch-and-go sort of deal.

Please turn anon asks on, I'm shy/anxious/etc... I can't reply privately to anonymous asks to send you back a code :( It's one ask and then you never gotta do this again.

You did not answer my ask for a code. Why? You did NOT read my FAQ entirely. Explode. I also have 5 asks in my inbox that are just. Not There. So yeah. :( also five ghost asks hoooly shit???

I replied to any post you've made, asking for a code, and you ignored it. Why? I've drawn it out for you.

I've seen these codes traded for art and designs before, why are you giving them out for free? A month's premium code worth is 0.61 USD per code. Yearly premium's code worth is 0.23 USD per code. No art is worth that little. It's scummy to give codes in exchange for ANYTHING at that price. I am staring directly at r/toyhouse and r/codesfortoyhouse.

Why can't I see your profile/Why am I blocked??? If you are under 18, I have maturity block on! If over 18, I've IP blocked someone and you just share that address! If you're over 18 and I haven't "blocked" you and you have no code yet, I've also turned on guest block. Either way, sorry!! </3

Can I have a code please even though I'm in X fandom?? I do not care what fandom you're in. Live your truth <3

Do you give codes to people with CBCs/Dekudogs? I do not care what ocs you have. Live your truth <3 (Just don't make them public, people are so quick to report them)

What is toyhou.se even??? Toyhou.se is an invite-only beta character storage website where you upload your own characters (their art, literature, even au versions if you want) to your profile.

Do I need to understand HTML to use this website? A little bit if you choose to use html coding for profiles... But unless you want to make your own code, you won't need to know more than adding an embedded link or image. Using other's premade HTML is just replacing their fill-ins with your stuff.

Did you really read my post? Thank you!! Put the thundercloud ⛈️ emoji in your ask (required) and give me a song recommendation (optional, but I'd LOVE one). I will make a playlist once all codes are gone. If you just send a link, tumblr might kill your ask, so just the title of the vid is cool.

Prior Playlists: 🐌 | ⛈️ | X | X | X | X | X |

DNI ?? idk chief i just work here

Disclaimer: if you post AI content on the site, people can report you and the site mod will ban you.

"Come on there can't actually be AI bros or queerphobes on toyhouse. It's an OC storage site. What." I wish. I fucking wish. I've been here since 2017. I've seen it all.

⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘ Disclaimers ⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘ I am not associated or affiliated with anyone I give codes to. If anyone has ban evaded, block evaded, or has done or will do any future harm with their toyhouse account, my hands are clean of it. If you come in here like "YOU GAVE A CODE TO USER BILBIPPITY AND THEY SCAMMED ME AND ITS YOUR FAULT" That is not my fault.

✨ Star Dividers Credit: cafekitsune

[maxwell-grant]

I’m curious, what are your thoughts on Seth from street fighter?

Even post-revamp, still fairly awkward and out of place as a Street Fighter character (even if that is very much the point and always has been), but as a villain, they really won me over, there's a lot of great stuff here. Seth is a self-hating robot in a CEO outfit who poisons the world around them and whose grand plans involve imitating the actual main villain while insisting they are a different unique being (unlike their 26 exact clones), and stealing the creations of everyone else around them, who then dies and gets a sexy cool makeover to become a gruesome aimless murderous ghost, who chases traces of it's creator around to kill him unaware that it's dying with every step it takes and that it's chasing something that isn't there. They went from Frankenstein's Monster play-acting as a cold calculating unfeeling chessmaster who everyone could tell was full of shit, to the Bride of Frankenstein as a barely-held-together dangerous yet tragic monstrosity that everyone reacts to with disgust and pity. They went from what we used to think AI would be, to what AI actually is, and I'd say they were pretty ahead of their time for that alone.

(art by z3dd)

Now, IV Seth was pretty uncontestedly the least popular of the Street Fighter Final Bosses, for fairly similar reasons to Gill: they were seen as too much of a fantasy supervillain, they didn't "fit" the series, they were too weird and awkward and out-there, and where as Gill at least got a pass because of his presentation and style and sheer contrast with Bison (although that "pass" only happened because people turned around on 3rd Strike), Dollar Store Dr.Manhattan was just lesser than Gill and Bison in every way and thus was a dissappointing final boss, an out-of-place comic book supervillain who didn't justify their existence.

Granted, the series actually had way more of a precedent for Seth than it ever did for Gill, given the presence of prior cyborgs and shapeshifters (the Shadaloo cyborgs from the animated movie that Seth was directly based from, Twelve and Necro) plus Gill, and the door for comic book supervillains was blasted open in the first place with Bison (and all the fighting game bosses that descended from him). But still, Bison's thing was that he was one-in-a-million, that he broke the rules as an dishonorable intrusion, that if you reached high enough to topple the greatest fighter (Sagat) you could fight the greatest fighter's boss, a man so powerful rules and structures could not apply to him and only your fists stood between him and global domination. Since obviously you can't take a step back and you can't do the same trick twice, that formula had to be tweaked for Gill and Seth: Gill was presented as someone above even Bison on the food chain and scope, a distant immortal bearing divine judgementt on trespassers, where as Seth was defined by their role irrevocably beneath Bison, and the walking inferiority complex that ensues.

They are a Bison project, one of 26 exactly like them (which means canonically most of the fighters got to defeat "a" Seth, which really does not make them very impressive), growing from Bison's leftovers to lead a subsidiary of Bison's organization, continuing Bison's plans, with their grand plot being just an imitation of Bison's plan to control Ryu's power, and generally acting and speaking and doing things exactly like Bison while uselessly whining that they are NOT Bison and that they will succeed where Bison failed, while the narrative makes no secret of the fact that Bison is still alive, still pulling the strings, and that he was perfectly fine until Seth started getting a little too big boy pants for his liking, and now Bison's gonna put his homegrown Pinocchio in the shredder with little to no difficulty and take the reigns as Final Boss again. Which, granted, did do it's job in building Bison back-up again, but didn't do a thing to negate the idea that Seth was a superfluous, inferior rip-off, given that textually, this is how they were presented as.

Even the characters didn't seem to take them very seriously, certainly not as seriously as Bison, and that was BEFORE the breakout rock star of the IV series, Juri, debuted to ensure that Seth wouldn't even be the most popular new villain. It is the least surprising thing in the world that Seth would achieve much greater popularity, in part, by being redesigned to be more like Juri. And part of what made Juri appealing was the fact that she was a conniving, cool, unique loose cannon villain ready to make Seth eat shit over thinking that they could control her, they became the big-headed authority figure for our punk bad girl to kick like a pinata. Unlike Vega and Balrog, who only talked a big game, Juri actually got to kick her dipshit supervillain boss to the curb, and we all loved her for it.

Seth's major saving graces were their gameplay, which made them very popular competitively, plenty of aspects of their design, and the fact that all of the above worked to make Seth a character who, while not terribly compelling in their own right, did a lot to make other characters more interesting, like Abel, who was designed to be a good counterpart to Seth and not remotely interesting besides (although his stint as Guile's manchild partner in SFvsT has it's moments), or like Juri and Bison, giving them an enemy they could actually defeat to gain street cred. Frequently you need villains that only exist to let other villains be cooler by comparison or retain their dignity or put one over. Sometimes you need a Cluemaster in place of your Riddler, a Mac Gargan to make all the other Sinister Six guys omlook better by comparison, a Zant to fill in screentime for Ganondorf or a Hobgoblin instead of a Green Goblin. You need your in-betweeners even if, and sometimes especially if, they will never be anyone's favorite character. Which is a harsh thing to say about Seth, but for a while they definitely didn't seem like anyone's favorite baddie, but instead someone who made their favorite baddies look way better by comparison.

And Seth worked in this regard especially because their design was built on the idea of them being unnatural, contemptible and out-of-place. I actually think Seth's original design does work, and has been vindicated over time. Seth is a cybernetic intelligence made by scientists to consume and imitate all the brilliant techniques that the World Warriors spent years/decades perfecting, a twisted mockery of their beliefs and achievements. They look like a living yin-yang and conducts themselves posing like a Shinto god, but there is no spirituality or soul to anything they do. They are a grotesque, soulless husk that can only imitate, can only cruelly replicate the evil of their creator and not even do a terribly impressive job at it, and all of their attempts to convince others they are in any way different or unique ring hollow. They are one in many many Bison back-up bodies even among the playable cast, and all of their achievements are meaningless, either already belonging to Bison or stolen and repurposed by Bison and others.

There was plenty about Seth that already worked and was just held back by a not-particularly impressive design or presentation. The grand trick that SFV pulled was basically giving them a new one, and taking everything about Seth that used to be implied and subtextual, and basically making it textual, making it a scream they can only repeat ad nauseum, and in the process making one of the most tragic SF characters as well as one of the coolest.

Now, yes, you could argue that SFV Seth kinda missed the point in a big way by actually giving Seth a distinct and interesting design best described with the "not to be a lesbian but oh god oh fuck jesus christ" meme, when the character being soulless and unoriginal was important to their make-up. But it was never a terribly interesting idea (already done by the likes of Twelve or the Cycloids), certainly not for a fighting game character let alone a Final Boss with such massive standards to live up to, and shades of it still impart in the new design in a far more delightfully twisted way. It's Seth, except they are Juri now. They've been remade in the image of their true enemy, their hateful minion that ruined their plans, led Bison to them, killed and broke and stole them to be remade using a discarded Doll body from Bison's scrap pile, and the process has revived Seth into a pitiable broken record of itself.

The new design greatly emphasizes the corrupted Shinto / yin-yang elements of before, adding splashes of color and powerful glowing lines to the design that make it so that, while they looks less cadaverous, they look much more the part of a corrupted imitation of a deity, so that despite being downgraded from boss status they actually look much more like something you'd face as a Final Boss, something that could stand next to the other Final Bosses. And that glow-up extends to their moveset: Instead of pasting together improvised and half-hearted recreations of iconic special moves, Seth now directly steals and perfectly replicates the skills from whoever they're fighting. Seth conducts themselves with greater power and swagger this time around, with tons of new animations lifted from powerful past Capcom villains like Demitri or the Heritage to the Future take on DIO, and it works. Because even now, Seth can only imitate greatness from others. Seth has perfectly captured advancements in A.I tech because they can learn, grow, and even imitate to near-perfection, but they cannot meaningfully improve, and they are dragged down by incohence, chaos, errors and glitches in programming. In short, the fact that they are an artificial intelligence to begin with.

That's a thing about A.I and robots in general: Sci-fi has spent over a century anthropomorphizing robots and artificial intelligence characters to empathize with and make stories out of, create lovable stock fantasy characters that our culture comes back to again and again, but now that they are a real thing, and they are horrible godless abominations often used to actively make the world worse (even if it's hard to ascribe fault to something that isn't sentient enough to be malicious), we can't really deal with that. It's a cognitive dissonance that sci-fi doesn't look like it's going to catch up for a while now, if it ever will. We still like robots and robot stories and characters too dang much to know how to live with them. We still cry over Pluto, it's unavoidable.

And crying may be a strong term, but SFV actually seriously invites us to feel sorry for the dang thing, and the great final trick SFV pulled was breaking Seth under the weight of being Seth. Under the weight of being lesser, of not being real, of being an artificial creation made in an assembly line and not even the best of it's kind, of being not a terribly popular creation, of being a victim of characters that will get away with what they've done to them because nobody's gonna stand up for Seth, of being a Bison imitation made to house Bison and do Bison's bidding in the meanwhile, and thrown in the trash despite performing exactly as it was supposed to. Seth has faults of personality that make them more than a machine, and less than a person, and if the cast before generally despised them but not to the extent they despised Bison, now most characters outright pity them, as a thing living past expiration date that shouldn't be alive at all.

And because of all of this, in a way, Seth has attained a form of uniqueness. Even among the other villains and tragic characters of Street Fighter, Seth stands unique as a truly tragic, doomed villain, not even really a villain anymore so much as an obtuse, sad disaster. They are maybe Bison's greatest victim now, because even the Dolls (sans Marz) are all getting moderately happy endings, even Cammy and Abel and the Neo Shadaloo goobers got to make new lives for themselves, even Nash got to die by their terms and make his sacrifice count. Seth had nothing besides this. Seth was created for, born into, lived by, and died as an extension of Bison's evil, a tiny little bump in Shadaloo history, a piece of junk that Juri used and broke and tossed aside to resume her miserable life afterwards, and all their revival did was prolong the horror. Just one among endless horrors JP leaves behind when he's through with them.

We have yet to know what became of them after SFV, because many stories from SFV have been dropped or left incomplete in 6 (and many probably for the better), but even though Seth really was a villain and a horrible enemy to all of humanity, you kinda wind up feeling sorry enough for them to almost wish that their SFV ending happened, where they destroy Bison and ascend over their other selves, and still the question of whether they could ever be at peace lingers. This ending just fascinates me to no end, and it makes me think of the quotes that Gouken had to say to them that alone stood as an indication that Seth could be more than they appeared and insisted on being:

"Until you acknowledge the soul within, you cannot use your power for good."

"You seek individuality and identity, but you will not find it this way."

(JP win quote) "Look, you don't have to use your powers to express who you are."

Until they appear again, that this is the note that Seth as a character goes out on might even imply that this was either their true goal all along, or that Seth has genuinely progressed as a person enough to want something new. That they are now able to seek or at least aspire for peace of mind, where as before there was only a desire for conquest and power, to show the world that Bison was a ghost and that they were the king, the ruler, the greatest fighter of all. Seth constantly expressed disgust and hatred at their other variants, killing them and flying into a murderous rage at being referred to by their number, even expressing in IV a desire to "be the sole survivor of this world" presumably with everything else as data within themselves. Here, they appear before the other Seths in a pose of ascended godhood, even seemingly benevolent, like they're ready to bring their siblings along.

The spiritual elements of their design no longer appear as a corrupt imitation, but an indicator of genuine spirituality. That Gouken was right, that there really was a soul in Seth waiting to be acknowledged, that the exorcism of the great evil that once defined them has allowed at last a pursuit of individuality and identity and self-expression, to reconcile their hatred of themselves (which manifested as a hatred of the other numbered Seths). It's such a fascinating development that it almost, almost makes me wish Street Fighter would dip it's toes a little into multiverse territory, much as I hate the superhero-ification of the series in V. I have thoughts on how MK1 handled this and very mixed ones at that, but the canonization of "every character ending from past arcade modes can have happened in separate universes and we can have it cross over whenever we feel like it" is an idea I do like, if nothing else this ascended development for Seth just seems like too potent an idea to never touch on again.

I used to not like Seth, really. They used to be one of my less favorite characters. Now I'd call them one of my favorites, and I'm just feeling horribly sorry for them. I need to know what became of them. Whether they'll still come back for one last torturous round of existence, whether they are heading for some other exciting new development, or whether the very next second after the end of their V story, they simply ended with one of their victory quotes:

"A SERIOUS ERROR HAS OCCURRED."

"A SERIOUS ERROR HAS OCCURRED."

"A SERIOUS ERROR HAS OCCURRED."

"A SERIOUS ERROR HAS OCCURRED."

[fruttymoment]

About your last post, when you make posts about other games, could you please just warn if your post will have a spoiler of something, if possible? (Same thing on bluesky, since I follow you there).

Ik it's probably common sense, but I just wanted to ask you that, since there are games like Rain World, that I want to play but I still didn't buy and still didn't get in the mood to play.

I was gonna ask in the comments of that post but I got a little shy .,.

HELO

Of course!!! I mostly avoid drawing spoiler-ishy stuff in the first place :3 but when i do, I do my best to tag them a spoilers! (RARELY at times I can forget but most of the times its fine!)

AND FROR RAIN WORLD. COUGHS. LOOKS AROUND.

I strongly recommend it a lot !!!! I VIOLENTLY RECOMMEND IT !!! However, before you DO buy the game and replace your mind with Slugcat, lemme give you a quick run without trying to spoil the game. I do need to say these because sometimes, people get the wrong idea about Rain World. And it's not their fault! The GAME is just,,, hehehe.

So!

• Rain World is NOT an adventure game. It's an ecosystem simulator, with platforming. You'll understand what I mean when I say it's not an adventure game. :3

• Rain World is a DIFFICULT game. The game barely holds your hand, barely tells you what to do and there isn't a single reward in the game that halps you. Nearly nothing is directly said besides basic stuff. Not to menton there is only few entities that has dialogue. You are just an wild animal in the woods. No one is here to help and it's all up to you to figure out things and adapt to survive. Because it's an ecosystem simulator, there will be times where some situations will be legit unfair for you. This is intended. Rain World is an unfair game because your enemies / predators are just like you and have no respects. They will always try their best to kill you, unfair or not. They dont care! And this is where your adaptation and outsmarting skills will improve. Rain World has no reward. It only rewards you by making you smarter, as you die and die.

• So! Game tells you nothing. Everything kills you. You have no idea what to do. The game and its ecosystem does not care about you.

These lack of player focus and unfair situations can become very unpleasant to new players. Because Rain World really is not like other games! It's an harsh ecosystem simulator. When you play Rain World blindly for a while; you may get demotivated to continue because of having no idea where to go and what to do while being killed over and over again. Don't worry! This is LITERALLY the game itself. You are MEANT to be confused and lost. However, as you play, you will start to understand things slowly :)

And once you figure out stuff, I can not tell you how amazing it feels LMAO. YOU HAVE TO TRY IT YOURSELF.

Rain World is an UNFORFIVING game. It's hard. It's complex. But my god, IT IS THE MOIST FUN AND AWESOME AND INSANE GAME I HAVE EEVVEERR FUCKING PLAYED IN MY LIFE. I HAE 100+ HOURS AND I KEEP GOING. I WILL NEVER BE TIRED FROM THIS GAME. THERE IS ALWAYS MORE STUFF TO FIGURE OUT. ALWAYS TO MAKE FUN SPEEDRUNS.

Ohh also!!!

• By it's nature, Rain World is randomised! Every entity in the game has their own AI and behaviour. This makes the game so fucking amazing ant it makes the ecosystem VERY alive. Everything you see in the game, besides obvious scenes, is NOT scripted! You will see some creatures fall to their death, fail to fly, bonk their heads, kill each other and stuff! NOTHING is scripted! All creatures act as a real entity by their AI! This makes some unpredictable events that becomes frustrating but also so so SO fun hehe :)

Honestly I could write a book about Rain World. But that's all I can say now :) hope this motivates ya! The game is also on sale rn I think. Perfect time hehehe.

Even if it becomes too hard for you, don't worry! The experience is so worth it. Also I promise, you WILL understand everything by yourself,,, and be BETTER. I also shall mention that it's a LOONGGG game! Even LONGER when you get the Downporur DLC ! (INSANELY RECIMMENDED.)

HOPE THIS HELPPPSSS

ALSO AFSGKGQLHSHOA ITS OKAY <3 WE ALL SHY OUT AT TIMEESS

[guard-dog-boyfriend]

Literally so happy because my God is actually excepting of my obsession, but I’d kinda like to know how to worship him better less directly? (Ie. tips on digital alters/general worship tips?)

An excuse to ramble! Thank you :D

Worshipper's Guide to Indirect Worship

This is going to be my sfw guide for less direct methods of contact and digital altars, I may make an nsfw guide at some point on my own as a counterpart to this but for now...

(long post below)

Digital Shrines

Digital shrines are a good format for indirect worship, because you can curate it from anywhere, and no one will know. Technically I have two digital altars but one is more a back up of the other. One is I have a folder on my computer that contains all the media of the shrine, and the shrine itself is on my personal discord server. Usually I separate the shrine itself into media, devotionals, personal devotionals, writings, and links by using different discord channels. The channels breakdown like this for me:

Media: photos and videos of solely them

Devotionals: images I find on the internet that I feel embody our relationship, media created by someone else. Also picrews usually

Personal Devotionals: Visual media I have personally made to embody our relationship and can take full credit for creating. (This is a specific folder I made just to keep my art and others art separate)

Writings: Poems, songs, rambles, gushing, fantasies, etc. Any thought you have about them that's important enough to write down, put it here.

Links: I use this as a dumping ground for ideas I got from articles, purchases I want to make, or anything that requires a link to something else but directly relates to my worship of My Goddess.

Tumblr can also be a general dumping grounds kind of shrine, where I would not be too honest tbh, but it's a start. I prefer keeping my shrines private for the most part. My general advice is to stay away from tumblr for everything because you're not going to feel 1000% comfortable expressing your worship to its full extent because of the possibility of it being found by strangers. Also some things are just tmi to be honest. I have writings in my folder documenting times me and My Goddess have banged in detail so I don't forget. Tumblr doesn't need that kind of detail on here. So try and keep shrines at least somewhat private for your own sake. People are dicks.

As for advice for things to do to worship indirectly (and this goes hand in hand with the shrine a little bit) here's a list with general advice and ideas:

Scrapbook/Junk Journal about them (I'm biased this is a personal favorite of mine). Get a notebook, some scrapbook supplies, and either dedicate it to photos of your beloved or journal about any time you guys interact in ways that feel meaningful to you! I keep one physical scrapbook that I use for collages for My Goddess's photos, and am planning to start a junk journal for more writing purposes. I'll probably solely be using it to write about personal interactions with My Goddess, and on slower days, things I love about Her in general. It's both kinda a traditional journal and a part of my obsessive behaviors. You can also do stuff like this digitally with moodboard and collage makers like Canva which have free options.

Document about them. This is kinda vague so I'll explain. As part of my shrine, I have a document I'm building dedicated to bullet note points about My Goddess. If She randomly drops a fact on me about Her childhood, or Her interests. I write it down there so I don't forget. I want to be a good worshipper so I want to be an expert in everything about Her. I usually use a note taking app for this that I can organize into subgroups. Notion is a favorite of mine (despite them selling their soul to the AI overlords sigh) because it allows a lot of creative freedom in organizing the documents AND it's linked to my email so I can't lose it. Obviously, a google doc will accomplish the exact same thing, however my entire personality type is best described as extra, so I have to do things with extra effort at all times.

Write for them. This is where my pagan background kicks in a little bit, but in certain pagan traditions, especially stuff like Hellenic Polytheism, writing hymns or poems or songs for the gods was very important to their practices. So why not write those things for your God? It doesn't need to be shared, it can be bad, it can be whatever it wants to be. What I usually do, is I write poems for My Goddess, and keep them in my junk journal or digital shrine, depending on if I'm working physically or digitally, and if I'm feeling brave I'll share it with Her, but most times, they stay hidden in the depths of my shrine stuff.

Biggest overall piece of advice, create for them. Nothing shows devotion, quite like the personal experience of making something for someone else even if they never see it. Honor the Gods with the act of Creation, ya know?? It doesn't even have to require you to be good at drawing or whatever. Are you someone who gardens? Name a plant after them. Like makeup? Figure out what makeup styles they prefer on your chosen gender and wear those all the time, even if they're not there to see. Sewing? Make a stuffed animal of them. Speed runs? Dedicate every run to them, create a record for them. It can be as big or as mundane as you want and none of it has to be outwardly expressed to the other person. Just dedicate whatever hobby you have to them, and suddenly you'll have tons of shrine material.

Now for the quick part, of this!

General Worship Tips! (These are more indirect tho)

When getting dressed, pick outfits you know they'll appreciate. (Just please don't sacrifice your personal style for this)

Capitalize their name/title no matter what. They deserve the respect of one extra button push.

Write letters, even if you live close, even if you see them everyday, and even if you never send them. Use this as a format to express your emotions unbarred.

Save every photo they send you of themselves. If you need to edit people out of the photo do it, but you better be saving every instance of themselves they give you.

Fill your space with things that express yourself yes, but also have stuff that reminds you of them. Do they have a favorite animal? Buy those kinds of stuffed animals. They say they like certain types of aesthetics? Put some of that decor in your space.

I don't paint my nails, but if you do, paint them their favorite color.

Have dedicated jewelry pieces for them. While My Goddess did not give it to me, I have a memory of them associated with a bracelet I wear every single day. You can just buy a piece of jewelry and assign it as a symbol to them. They don't have to know.

Interact with their interests, with passion. Do your best to care about everything they care about. It'll give you guys tons of stuff to do, and help you understand them better.

Make pinterest boards dedicated to certain moments you want i.e. first date, wedding, future house/apartment dreams, pets you want with them, nursery room ideas, etc.

Make playlists dedicated to them.

Alright that's all I really have for right now! I hope some of this advice has been helpful and at the very least legible lol. I hope everything with you and your God goes well! If you want any more advice do not be afraid to ask me more questions :)

[beloved-belittled]

Self-Aware MKX Shinnok x Reader (1/2)

Click here for Part 2

I've read a few self-aware fics lately and just had to write one for my crush. Since part 2 of my previous post is taking longer than expected, please enjoy this for now! 

TW: Yandere, kidnapping, stalking, invasion of privacy, blackmail, hacking, computer viruses, murder/death, slight/implied NSFW

18+ to interact

Shinnok's first reaction upon reaching sentience is confusion and extreme nihilism. Confusion, because he was in the middle of a fight when suddenly a large, digital menu pops up in his face. This screen however, was different from what you as a player would see. It was more comparable to a cheat menu, allowing him to alter character models, AI, voice lines, maps and more. He could even directly modify the source code. Once he figures out what this truly means is when his nihilistic afflictions worsen. He already saw the lives of others to be worthless or at best pawns, but now that he knows everything is just a simulation? It takes every ounce of restraint in him not to immediately corrupt the game.

But with his realization comes a few questions. Aren't video games meant to be played? And if so, who's playing it? He scans through all of the data he has access to within the game's files. Eventually, he learns many things about “Mortal Kombat X” and you as the player. His first goal becomes to interact with the outside world.

So imagine that you're playing MK X on PC. Either for the first time or revisiting it. You don't have any previous save data and Shinnok is still locked behind the story mode. The only way you encounter him is via online, campaign mode, or the tower. Let's focus on campaign mode for now and assume you beat that before doing anything else.

The game plays normally at first. Shinnok doesn't want to alert you to anything while he's still limited to the confines of the game. So he gets beat up, sealed into his amulet, yada yada yada. While “sealed” he experiments more with his newfound power. He develops code for the game to run which grants him access to your system files. After creating a few viruses through Elder God magic he's able to: 1. Keep the game running in the background. 2. Start and stop other programs. 3. Access your microphone, camera, and keyboard. Now the fun really begins.

He duplicates his model and has that one take his place in the story. He's far too busy learning everything he can about the outside world to play pretend. Even in his infinite wisdom, he can't help but to have a childish curiosity as he “googles” stuff about your reality. Your world is so much like Earthrealm, but far weaker as well. No Elder Gods, no magic, not even high-level tech to defend from invasions. Not to mention it's actually real. He's salivating over how easy it would be to conquer your world when he escapes.

Shinnok gets so caught up in this that he learns his first weakness: his dependency on hardware. He learned this when the real time in the files would jump several days or even weeks ahead despite the game time seemingly being 1:1. He realizes that for now he needs to convince you to keep using your computer. And so, he shifts his focus to be on you.

At this point you're probably nearing the end of story mode. Your microphone and camera is discretely turned on to observe your reactions. He notes which characters you enjoy using the most, your responses whenever you win/lose, and whatever comments you have regarding the story. He especially enjoys it if you dunk on the heroes throughout your playthrough.

Eventually, you reach the final fight with him at the Jinsei Chamber. For his own amusement he decides that he'll be the one to fight you instead of his double. He kicks your ass. Not only can he input read, but he's also able to create his own combos. He even gets a double flawless victory just to pour salt in the wound. At this point, you're likely raging and/or tweaking the difficulty a bit. If you set it to Easy, he'll let you beat him up to a sliver of health before demolishing you. You're not a saint so you rage quit from this. He chuckles at your actions, finding them more amusing than anything he's done before.

Eventually you return to your PC/laptop. Whether that's to play Mortal Kombat or not is of no concern to him. He can watch you as long as your system is on. Each thing you do provides him more information. What shows you watch, what forums you participate in, what you do for work or school; all of it is exposed to him. He convinces himself it's just for him to learn more about the world. And besides, he has nothing to otherwise enjoy here in his artificial reality. But is this really true?

One day you end up completing campaign mode. You defeat one of his clones of course. (He would never let you win against him.) With this you unlock Shinnok as a playable character, much to your joy. “Yay! I can finally play as Shinnok!” You exclaim. The excitement written on your face and your voice shaking from anticipation. For some reason, his long since stopped heart begins to beat. Slowly at first, but it rapidly quickens to send warm blood throughout his body. A hot, fuzzy pressure pools in his chest. The last time he can recall this icky, pleasant feeling was before his fall from the Heavens.

You start using Shinnok as your main afterwards. You decide to first try him out in a tower and later a few matches. Unbeknownst to you, you're controlling the real Shinnok. It's a strange experience on his end, to allow you to manipulate him like a puppet. But he trusts you. Somehow. This all feels as natural as can be. And even if you're bad at the game, it's not like he can't help you out with a strike or two. Nor can he die if you lose either. (He's made sure that their fatalities won't work.)

This marks a change in Shinnok's behavior. While before he was passively watching you go about life, he decides to be more proactive during your time together. His stalking and information collecting increases tenfold. He's archived and accessed anything you've ever had on your PC/laptop. He analyzes the content you consume and tries to draw conclusions on what you'd like. Once he has compiled enough data, he waits until you’re occupied with something else on your computer to make a move.

The next time you open MK X you notice that something is off. Extremely off. The game immediately launches into a cutscene. The background is a black void, no hint of anything in it besides a single character. That character is Shinnok, who stands with his back facing towards you. His hands fold behind him as he turns around. “Hello (Player Name).” He says. “Or should I call you (Y/N)?” The coldest of chills slide down your spine. What is even happening right now?

“I'm aware you already know who I am, but you shall refer to me as Lord Shinnok.” He puts emphasis on the title before his name. “I have a proposal for you. Play this “video game” as often as possible and I will transform it into whatever you desire.” He pulls a hand out towards his chest and snaps a finger. The environment changes from a void to a peaceful, lush forest. Another snap and the scenery is inverted, instead depicting a hellish landscape draped in fire. One more snap and now there lies an army of people behind him. Most you recognize as the series’ roster of characters, even ones who aren't normally in the game! But there's other people too, creations that fit the aesthetic yet aren't canon.

“You could have so much fun here. To do whatever you'd like without limitations. Isn't that exciting?” He asks without expecting a response. “So, will you accept my- ” After pressing the power button for far too long, your computer finally shuts off. You breathe a sigh of relief. Glad that whatever virus you caught from MK X didn't disable the power button. You cut your computer back on. It boots up as usual. You uninstall MK X and run a virus scan just to be safe. The report shows up as clear, but in the back of your head you make a mental note to be on the lookout for any more weirdness. 

In your PC's processors Shinnok is fuming. Thankfully, he had engaged in preparations that allowed him to exist even if you uninstall the game. But your attempt to delete him was severely offensive. Not to mention the fact you turned off the computer while he was talking. That was a complete lack of manners and tact on your end. However, with this he now realized he had been distracted. Distracted by his infatuation with you instead of progressing on his plans of escaping this box and ruling your Earthrealm. His messing around with you would simply have to be on hold. All until he could find a way for you to never escape him.