Notices by The Duality of Xan (xanindigo@writing.exchange)

@doot@glitterkitten.co.uk @Hbomberguy How tragic, for us to have so easily forgotten the ancient texts.

@guysoft Happy new year.

恭喜發財!🍊🍊🍊

Happy year of the Dragon!

龍年快樂🐉

I mostly post photographs and handwritten poems, so that's what I tested it with. Here are the original, unaltered test pics (both from my Instagram feed).

Nightshade has two settings – Intensity and Render Quality. Quality means a longer render time and Intensity is fairly self-explanatory.

Test #1 – default settings

Intensity set to default (medium) and render time set to the lowest. The app says this takes about 30 minutes, but it really depends on how powerful your computer is. A gaming rig would handle this much better.

The defaults are probably good enough for most people.

Test #2 – weak poison

Minimum intensity, minimum time. There are barely any visible changes, but this also has the weakest effect on AI algorithms, so I can't really recommend it.

Test #3 – strong poison

Max intensity, minimum time. Really noticeable effects with these settings. This has a rougher effect on the AI but probably aren't great for your artwork. Reserve this for when you know someone's stealing your stuff and you want to make their algorithms sick.

So with Nightshade now available to poison the AI image generators, I did a few little tests to try and figure out what settings work best. Some are much more effective than others.

tl;dr default intensity and max render time give the best results by far

nightshade.cs.uchicago.edu

"If peace means keeping my mouth shut in the midst of injustice and evil, I don’t want it. Peace is not simply the absence of conflict, but the existence of justice for all people."

– Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

pretty ironic that onomatopoeia isn't spelled the way it sounds

For those who don't know, these are the non-binary pride flag colours. They represent everyone who doesn't fit into the gender binary.

The colours represent people who:
💛 Yellow – exist outside the binary
🤍 White – identify with multiple/all genders
💜 Purple – identify as a mix of male and female
🖤 Black – have no gender

It's quite inclusive. If you don't like to conform with the gender binary, you're welcome under this colourful umbrella.

@tillianisafox Honestly, that's how I've always thought it would work. If it's not the same you, can it really be considered the same you?

See also: why Star Trek transporters are secretly horrifying

Twitter is honestly pretty funny now. A small army of sycophants have somehow managed to turn it into a political statement to give $8 to the world's second richest fool. Meanwhile, the overgrown edgelord himself has managed to turn giving away free blue checks into some form of punishment. Like the cone of shame, but... smaller. And more pixelly.

"But why are you still on Twitter?"

Listen. I am an internet ancient. I stood amidst LiveJournal as it crumbled while I watched the fall of Flickr. I was there both times Tumblr burned down, toasting marshmallows over its smouldering ruin, laughing at the folly of Verizon. The death of Twitter was foretold by the dark prophecies of the forgotten internets. I am there to witness its passing as the old internet is dying and the new internet struggles to be born. Now is the time of monsters.

Honestly, I wish we lived in a world where libraries were given a higher priority. The library pays the author. The reader supports their local community. Everyone wins.

Did you know that someone can just make an account on Amazon KDP and sell copies of YOUR book under YOUR name at a higher price than YOU originally asked for? Because apparently that's a thing that happens now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3_JNXPp97w

My feelings on pirating books are complicated. On one hand, if you genuinely can't afford or can't access a book any other way, I'm not going to just say not to. Especially for things like school textbooks which, let's be honest, are horrifically overpriced anyway.

On the other hand, few fiction authors can actually make a living selling their work. Many struggle to break even. Many quit because of that.

Paying creative people for their labour, if you can, should be seen as an act of solidarity and support. Especially if they're asking only a few dollars for literal months of work.

I'm a simple enby. I see a movie or show with Katee Sackhoff and I have to watch it.

“I’m going to be late”
– mundane
– overused
– sounds like it’s your fault

“The cold and unfeeling machinations of fate have once more thrown my plans into disarray”
– mysterious
– implies some kind of impending doom
– sounds like the start of a villainous monologue