mrmaplebar

Unless the model that they used was trained entirely on artwork that was public domain, creative commons, licensed or owned, then its basically certain that it wasn’t used responsibly.

You cannot make something on a foundation of someone else’s exploitation and be considered responsible, ethical, original or independent.

It’s not worth it. Some parts of life suck ass, but the good parts exist and are worth it.

Instead of killing yourself, try to “kill” your expectations and ego. “Kill” the idea of the person you need to be or the live you need to live.

Consider Diogenes, who lived happily like a dog in the market of classical Athens, because he understood that the things that society prescribed value are arbitrary and artificial. He felt no pressure to be or achieve anything in particular–he simply lived, like the animal that he understood himself to be.

The social pressures and forces that bother us today are likely just as arbitrary and artificial as the ones that Diogenes faced. A simple change of philosophy maybe be all you need.

Finally, you should also consider the chemical aspect of your emotions, and that your depression may be caused or exacerbated by an imbalance of natural chemicals in your brain. It’s worth seeking medical advice from a psychiatrist to see if drugs can help you.

I get it. And I know that feeling alone sucks.

On the other hand, there are plenty of other American otaku, myself included! There are more than enough to find other people to be social with.

I reccomend looking for geek related events and gatherings in your nearest city, conventions, movie screenings, barcades, hobby groups, and so on. My city (Portland) has all kinds of otaku stuff going on all the time. I went to a 3 hour long screening of the entirety of Gunbuster, and it was a full house, with people selling art, DVDs, and model kits in the lobby. Even making friends online has meaning, and If you can find likeminded people online who are local to you, you might be able to turn online relationships into offline ones. There is no shortage of nerds out there I promise.

But actually talking to people is the harder part, right?

No joke… if you shower, wear clean clothes and a neutral antiperspirant, and figure out something nice to say to people (a simple compliment like “I love your shirt!” is a easy ice breaker and sets you up for a follow up conversation), it’s a great way to practice being social. Make sure that your attitude is positive and try to avoid making people feel bad, stupid, ugly, etc.

Now… Not every social interaction is going to turn into a lasting relationship, and some of them might be awkward. (Occasionally a subset of people are going to be rude jerks for seemingly no reason, but that’ll actually a bigger problem for them then it is for you.) So I don’t recommend socializing with a specific goal, like finding a girlfriend, in mind.

You’re much better off trusting the process and simply trying to amass small social victories. For example, asking someone how their week is going, learning somebody’s name who you see often, complementing someone, joining a new group, etc.

I’m in my late 30s and I’ve made some personal social milestones that I’m proud of over the last few years, so I think it’s never too late to improve your social situation.

Good luck, man.

As someone who went through a large part of adult life single, I know exactly what loneliness can and does do to a person.

But I also know that the solution to loneliness is not to jump into a pit of delusion and self-isolation, but to work on yourself (mentally, physically, and emotionally), to put yourself out there sociall (through hobbies, classes, work, clubs, making friends offline and online, etc), and to generally touch grass and gradually work on building relationships with other real human beings.

Have you ever seen that Star Trek TNG episode where Lt. Barkley is caught using the holodeck to fantasize about socializing with other people on the ship?

Coping mechanisms are fine to some degree, but spending your finite time and energy forming a fake relationship with a corporate technological entity isn’t going to create meaningful change in your life.

Live how you want. But in my opinion, we’re better off learning how to be happy alone than deluding yourself.

Sadly?

Putting aside the legal and practical stuff involved…

How can anyone look at this shit as anything other than endlessly and hopelessly pathetic?

Like… This guy is such a special snowflake that he needs to have constant praise, adoration, external validation, attention, participation trophies, empty gestures, gifts, and recognition for things he has nothing to do with? Such a sad little bitch that he can’t even stand up to a single grain of criticism of a single drop of scrutiny? The type of guy who can dish out lame insults and then crashes out spectacularly whenever someone dares fire back with a joke?

Is this dude really the best America has to offer?

Putting this mentally weak, physically unfit, emotionally unhunged man-baby on a pedestal really speaks volumes about the American people.

My hate for them is focused and concentrated with laserlike precision.

Still slop, sorry amigo! (Probably not what you want to hear, but I’m just being real…)

If I sketch something, and have an ai upscale it for me

That’s not an accurate description of what you did, is it?

You didn’t simply “upscale” your drawing. You had AI turn a rough sketch into an inked, colored and shaded but otherwise incomplete piece.

I like to think I poured my heart and soul into it.

Yeah, I’m sure you like to think that…

But in reality you did part 1 of a 4 part process and told a computer to do the rest. I don’t know how long you spent on your initial sketch, but in the end you relied on a gimmicky shortcut (based on the exploitation of other people’s stolen art… stuff that they REALLY poured their heart and soul into before it was unceremoniously ripped off by mega-corporations) to do at least 75% of the work. I’m being brutally honest, but at best you can only really think of it as being 25% yours.

Again, is this slop? I am not an artist. I drive a forklift real good, that’s my skillset.

Am I being too harsh? Why am I telling you this?

Here’s the thing you need to understand…

If you made that original sketch then you ARE an artist. Sure you don’t feel like you’re as good as you want to be (no artist EVER does, by the way), but you are already 10000x more of an artist than someone who writes some text and gets an AI to slop out some generic shit.

The composition and sketch is the hardest part and you already did it. Linework (if that’s your style) is basically just tracing. Coloring is as easy as doing a kids coloring book. Shading can be a puzzle, but you’ll get it in time if you keep the light coming from the same direction.

You spent some time doing the hard part, liked how it looked, and then instead of just cracking on with the next part, you got lazy, turned your brain off and fed it to the instant gratification machine, turning it into slop. Taking your hands off the wheel entirely, you know?

And for what?

Now you have a “pretty picture”, but you didn’t learn a damn thing about taking your art from sketch to lines, or coloring, or shading. And to make matters worse, you can’t even point to the picture and say “hey look at that, I MADE THAT”, like you can with the sketch.

In the end, I’m gonna call it slop. Ethical problems aside, AI generated slop art is a dime a dozen these days. I don’t see any value in it at all. I think you have more talent for art than you know, and I hope that you keep it up and try to approach your work with more pride as a human being making something cool by hand.

Biden already pardoned people convicted of federal crimes related to simple possession of cannabis in 2023. https://apnews.com/article/biden-marijuana-pardons-clemency-02abde991a05ff7dfa29bfc3c74e9d64

Let’s not throw cannabis under the bus because we’re miffed the Democrats were stupid enough to tee this easy win up for Trump and the Republicans. At best, cannabis being schedule I was illogical, and at worst it was a grave injustice that was used to prosecute and punish people for something relatively benign.

I mean, I get it… I hate Trump’s stupid antidemocratic kiddy-diddling ass as much as the next sane person, but reclassifying weed was the lowest of low-hanging fruit that, for reasons I will never understand, the Democrats didn’t simply pick and instead let Trump take credit for it.

So, good news and I’m glad that they did it. Cannabis should not be illegal, and though this doesn’t fix that, having it being Schedule I was insanity and totally out-of-step with reality. I’m sure that Trump will be getting greased by the weed lobby, but in the end of the day, this is something that needed to happen.

The executive order directs Attorney General Pam Bondi to conclude the formal rescheduling process, which has been going on for more than a year, and move to publish a final rule that would reclassify cannabis.

Effectively all this is doing is putting Trump’s name on a process that was started by Biden in 2022.

Looking at just the politics of it, the Democrats absolutely fucked up by teeing this up for Trump when they could have just done it themselves. Weed legalization is popular and it’s already been happening across the country for over a decade. Even if you don’t think it’s totally fucked up how cannabis is treated as a Schedule I substance, it’s really not hard to see which way the wind is blowing on this politically.

This should have been something that Biden did before leaving office, whether the reclassification process was over or not. Instead they wrapped it up in a nice little gift box and tied a little bow around it before handing it to Trump. This is the type of thing that drives your voters and supporters fucking insane, Democrats.

Well, credit where credit is due I guess. It’s not actual legalization, but it’s welcome progress.

This was low-hanging fruit that the Democrats should have done under Biden but failed to for reasons I will never, ever understand. Anyone with eyes can see that this was eventually where things were headed.

Unfortunately for Trump, I still hate his guts. My opinion on him has been solidified after a decade of dealing with his bullshit, attacks on my community, and attacks on our democracy. He could send me a jar of premo buds but I wouldn’t be able to get over the fact that he’s a child raping shithead moron scumbag who is selling our country out and ruining people’s lives. On the bright side, at least I can give an honest answer when people dare me to say one positive thing that Trump has done.

Sure, but raping children is among one of the worst crimes that a person can do. It’s not his “involvement with Epstein” that’s the scandal, it’s his involvement with abusing young girls.

Who cares. Bullshit designed only to distract his base from the fact that Trump rapes children.

Turns out NVidia is already doing just that (to OEMs, that is).

https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/gpus/nvidia-reportedly-no-longer-supplying-vram-to-its-gpu-board-partners-in-response-to-memory-crunch-rumor-claims-vendors-will-only-get-the-die-forced-to-source-memory-on-their-own

Fooyin is my local player, it’s basically Foobar2000.

Finamp is what I use to stream songs from my Jellyfin server.

Is he gonna announce that he’s a pedophile or is he trying to avoid spoilers?

I’m totally with you on this.

C is a fantastic language for people who want to develop for existing C projects. But there are very few reasons to develop new software projects in C today. As such, for anyone learning C, the best first project would probably be whatever existing C project you want to work on.

Maybe the main exception to that is probably embedded systems stuff for microcontrollers and the like, but I don’t know enough about that space to say whether that is even still the case or whether you’d be better off with something else.

Oh, I’m “passionate” about AI, alright.

Good choice, tbh.

“Six seven” would have been the brainless, obvious pick.