wizardlyghost

[wizardlyghost]

i hate seeing people drink the openai/chatgpt koolaid 😭😭😭 genuinely feels like watching someone get seduced by scientology or qanon or something. like girl help it's not intelligent it's Big Autocomplete it's crunching numbers it's not understanding things i fuckign promise you. like ohhh my god the marketing hype fuckign GOT you

[wizardlyghost]

Honestly I can tell you finding out art was made by AI really does immediately, legitimately sour it for me, like people will trot this out as a Gotcha for anti-AI people but it's just making it clear they don't consider art to be the conversation that it is lol. It's similar to the way Harry Potter immediately soured for me because engaging with it while knowing the kind of heart Rowling is writing from changes the way the work feels; there isn't any moralizing or whatever that I have to do, it's easy to drop it because it's rotted in my hands.

"Oh but you LIKED this song before, nothing changed!" The conversational partner did. A very large portion of what is interesting to me about art is thinking of why the creator chose that instrumentation, or what made them want to make the thing in the first place. Finding out I've been talking to a wall completely removes an entire third of the force that art is to me, and I can't argue that anything about art or its consumption is Objectively Correct but I can argue it's fucking boring lmao

[wizardlyghost]

MORPHEUS IN WIGAN: you think that's gravy you're eating

[wizardlyghost]

[wizardlyghost]

In cyberwigan, it's a perfect simulacrum of gravy.

[wizardlyghost]

Therapy speak is super annoying in characters and i think more authors should weaponize this by having a character use therapy speak to justify all their bad life choices including but not limited to bullying, arson, and war crimes to really drive home just how obnoxious it is

[wizardlyghost]

(Going off of the initial Japanese release dates as to which generation was current at the time excluding remakes that came out during that period. For simplicity's sake)

For example I turned 10 in 2007 so I would be starting in the Sinnoh region! Bonus if you tell me your partner Pokémon 👀 doesn't have to be one of the three starters!

[wizardlyghost]

Lots of my favorite vines are old ones, so here are some that I didn’t want lost to the wind

Might make part 2 w/more modern vines(?)

[wizardlyghost]

our noble literary allusions vs their barbarous pop culture references

[wizardlyghost]

My tip for trying to compartmentalize your emotions or desires is to realize when you're using hyperbolic shorthand for an actually realistic desire. I know realizing even that can be difficult sometimes but let me demonstrate

"I wish I was popular" -> I want to be noticed and engaged with, and I need reassurance and the feeling of connection

"I wanna delete my blog and ghost my friends" -> I want to act out in a visible way that expresses how frustrated I am / I feel overwhelmed with connections and need time to cool off

"I wanna do something reckless/dangerous" -> I feel trapped in obligations and am buckling under stress, I need a sufficient outlet and more freedom to exist in peace

Obviously there may be different kinds of feelings or needs under your particular impulses, these are just some fairly common examples of what you could be feeling. The harder part is trying to figure out what it is that causes this impulse, and even harder might be if you don't have control over the situation, and are unable to have your needs met. It's not always your fault if you're feeling bad, but realizing where it stems from can help you seek out new paths to relieve it. This is something I've learnt working in therapy.

The toddler in your heart has valid needs. But it is a toddler and will scream and cry about it. Learn to sit by until it's done and then ask if it wants a juice box or a hug

[wizardlyghost]

“You guys are not allowed to play games.”

[wizardlyghost]

what if she was called chappell bone and instead of a singer she was a necromancer who raised strong as fuck skeleton warriors

[wizardlyghost]

Tuesday 21st June

The Lighthouse Keeper instructs me to follow the light, and once I reach its target, to do what is right for "her", and throw it back. Her… I still cannot remember this person of whom she speaks, though my heart aches for reasons I cannot explain.

Though the day seemed to pass far too quickly, the clock does not appear to move as I set out. A pillar of white light pierces the darkness, marking my destination. The sea is as quiet and clear as I have yet seen it, still blanketed with fog but devoid of the strange flickering shapes that have haunted my nights these past months.

This is the place. A voice inside my heart seems to whisper it, though I know not how it can tell. This is where she was taken from us… and where we can at last bring her back. Only here, and only because of what we've achieved. Do not waste our chance.

She… Julie. The name is at once strange and unbearably familiar. Is this what this has been about from the start? The loss of the woman who seems to have been writing messages from beyond her grave? Taken… has she been taken in an earthly sense, or has she been dragged beyond that ghastly fissure I glimpsed in my nightmares?

For a moment, I am tempted to listen, to heed the voice of the Collector, that part of my soul that reaches unceasingly for all things that might be torn from the grasp of the sea, clutching tight to the past in the hope that no precious thing might slip through its fingers and be lost. But this is a selfish, hollow dream, to take the bounties of the ever-giving ocean and never suffer a single one to be returned to the depths. It is not given to the fisherman to own the waves; only to participate in the cycle, and to know that the sea reclaims all its gifts in the end.

It is time to throw it back.

The B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k seems to struggle in my grasp, its weight shifting as if it were full of sloshing water, its ribbons grasping for my fingers. It does not want to go.

I hold it high above my head, steeling myself. A groan vibrates down my arm, a sound more felt than heard, emanating from the B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k. It is answered by a similar sound from the depths, shaking up through the hull of the Angler and the soles of my boots.

Do I want to do this?

I must.

I throw it into the foaming water.

A shockwave shakes the boat, a faint crimson ripple in the water spreading out into the fog. The lights, even that ancient crystal lens I had hoped would endure beyond all else, flicker out. The B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k had seemed so heavy in my hands, yet it sinks so slowly, as though fighting to stay afloat. As it fades from view, the fog draws back, and even in the darkness I see the terrible, fanged maw of the leviathan waiting below my vessel, its enormous body looming close beneath the surface yet seeming not to disturb the water at all, as though it were but a reflection cast upon the surface.

Not a single one of those teeth touch me as it breaches, and takes the faithful Angler in one fell bite. But even as the jaws of my tomb close around me, I see a glimpse of the sky; the fog, that crushing, constricting blanket, has gone, and brilliant auroras once more dance beneath a sky full of more stars than there are fish in the sea.

Where I go now I cannot say. Perhaps she waits for me in the dark - Julie, my love, my shining star, whom I could never truly forget no matter how hard I tried. I could not return her to the world of air and sunlight, but perhaps now she will no longer be alone.

The pages of my log are scattered, ripped from the spine of that infernal B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k and floating through the water around me. Perhaps, like those strange messages I found in my journeys, they will make their way back to the surface. I can only hope that some other fisherman will hear my warning - that one must never dredge too greedily the treasures of the sea, and if one happens to catch a fish from another world, one should always throw it back…

[wizardlyghost]

Monday 20th June 1947

I go to Little Marrow first - the Trader knew how to read the runes on the stone tablets, it is possible he knows more about the ancient civilisation, and perhaps even this B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k that I hold. He is surprised when I explain that the tablet opened the ancient Lighthouse, but offers no more insight.

Upon returning to the Angler, I find the Dockworker, standing rigid, as he had been when I arrived. He seems paralyzed with fear, though I know not why. He does not respond to questions about what's wrong. His neck and overalls are covered in the same dark fluid that seemed to leak from the last package I delivered to him. As I watch, a drop falls from his ear, striking the docks and seeming to slither between the boards into the water below. When I ask what it was, he seems to be overcome by anger, trembling until I am compelled to step backwards. Does this have to do with the solstice? I have no aid to offer him, and so I leave him be.

I return at last to Greater Marrow, where this whole adventure began, or so I had thought. I climb the steps of the Lighthouse, and inform its Keeper that I now possess the B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k - although I am starting to accept that it has never left my side. How is it that I failed to recognize the pages upon which I have been recording my daily log?

The Lighthouse Keeper does not seem surprised by my tale, and urges me to use this window of lucidity wisely. She asks if I remember what happened in the gloomy darkness beyond the bay, and offers to point the way, when the night is thickest and the sea is as it was all those years ago.

I spend the rest of the day on land, for the first time that I can remember. We wait until night falls, and then deepens, until it is surely well past midnight. It is the Solstice. It is time.

[wizardlyghost]

Skip Google for Research

As Google has worked to overtake the internet, its search algorithm has not just gotten worse.  It has been designed to prioritize advertisers and popular pages often times excluding pages and content that better matches your search terms 

As a writer in need of information for my stories, I find this unacceptable.  As a proponent of availability of information so the populace can actually educate itself, it is unforgivable.

Below is a concise list of useful research sites compiled by Edward Clark over on Facebook. I was familiar with some, but not all of these.

⁂

Google is so powerful that it “hides” other search systems from us. We just don’t know the existence of most of them. Meanwhile, there are still a huge number of excellent searchers in the world who specialize in books, science, other smart information. Keep a list of sites you never heard of.

www.refseek.com - Academic Resource Search. More than a billion sources: encyclopedia, monographies, magazines.

www.worldcat.org - a search for the contents of 20 thousand worldwide libraries. Find out where lies the nearest rare book you need.

https://link.springer.com - access to more than 10 million scientific documents: books, articles, research protocols.

www.bioline.org.br is a library of scientific bioscience journals published in developing countries.

http://repec.org - volunteers from 102 countries have collected almost 4 million publications on economics and related science.

www.science.gov is an American state search engine on 2200+ scientific sites. More than 200 million articles are indexed.

www.pdfdrive.com is the largest website for free download of books in PDF format. Claiming over 225 million names.

www.base-search.net is one of the most powerful researches on academic studies texts. More than 100 million scientific documents, 70% of them are free

[wizardlyghost]

Monday 20th June 1947

I find myself standing on the dock at Blackstone Isle. I do not know how I got here. I do not much care.

Should I give up this last artefact? I doubt I could stop myself, but I do wonder if such an action might be enough to halt what is to come. The thought burns in my mind as I climb the rough stone steps, though I know it is of no consequence. I am hooked, and the line draws taught.

The door opens as I approach. The hands of the W̪a͓t̵cḩ twitch, trying to move forward without any progress.

"Though it has been some decades since I last laid eyes upon this… the sound of its mechanisms has grown no less unpleasant," he says, taking the W̪a͓t̵cḩ. "And with that, our collection is complete. I must admit, I am surprised. I did not think you had the determination for such a job. Now, with these five relics in my possession… only one thing remains. I suspect you know by now."

Do I know? The only thing I can think of is the destruction of the Lighthouse, but… why? Why would he wish to bring about the horrors that befell the civilisation that now lies in ruins in Devil's Spine? I ask him what he means.

"It will become apparent soon enough."

I do not like the sound of his voice.

"We must make one final voyage. This time, I will be with you."

I do not want this man aboard my ship. But this must be seen through to its end.

I feel reluctant to set out. To prolong the time, I ask him about his B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k.

"Which B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k? This one here?" He pulls a dusty tome, clearly unopened in years, from a shelf, smiling at me as if we share some private joke. "There's really not much to be said of "Histories of the Gray Isles". It's quite a chore."

I tell him not to play dumb. There is only one B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k of which I could be asking.

"Play dumb? Your hypocrisy is wearying. I suppose we must go through this rigmarole yet again." The B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k appears in his hands, or perhaps it had never left them. "Go ahead. Ask us."

I ask where he got it, the air hanging very still between us.

"Don't you remember? You were there."

The air around the B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k seems to pulse, like a heartbeat, like the infernal engine that at some point has grafted itself to my hull. I was there? How could I have been there? I only arrived in this archipelago three months ago, before which I… I was… what was my life before this? Why can I not remember?

"So was she."

I somehow know he speaks of the woman whose letters I have been finding, in glass prisons scattered throughout these isles. But I have never met her! Who is she?

"You wanted to forget. Begged me. This is what you asked for."

I did come here to forget something - this strikes true in my very soul. What? Why? When? Have I been here longer than I thought?

I demand the B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k. I do not know why. I did not know that I had it in me. The words spill from my mouth and hang in the silence before I can stop their rushing flight.

"You won't change a thing. The B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k is ours."

Who is this "we" he keeps referring to? Is there someone else here? I step closer. To my surprise, so does he - a line may only have a hook on one end, but it can be pulled from both directions.

"What can you possibly hope to achieve?"

The B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k is within reach. I could stretch out my hand and take it. It would be so easy…

My fist flies out without warning, striking the Collector's jaw. His face shatters and falls to the ground.

Shatters?

Wait…

I stand in an empty room, long abandoned. Nobody has lived here in years, perhaps decades. Broken glass scatters across the floor, its dust only otherwise disturbed by a single set of footprints. Blood drips from my knuckles, seeping into the fabric cover of the B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k which I now hold… the B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k that fits so easily into my fingers, as though it has rarely left their grasp. From the fragments of glass at my feet, a dozen Collectors stare up at me, their faces confused, horrified, betrayed.

"You're pathetic," the largest of their number says. He rubs his own bloodied hand, no B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k to be seen. "Understand this, plainly, before you sink us into despair. I know how to bring her back. It's all right there on the pages; and now you've seen its power first hand. We wield the power to release her from her slumber! We can undo everything… undo what you did!"

I stumble back, clutching the B͖̚ò̥ō̳̥k, unable to let go of it. I must find answers.

[wizardlyghost]

every time I do a web search, right at the top I have AI info dumping on me

just give me the top result please