Daniel Jalkut on AI-based art and “prose”

Like everybody else, I was fascinated by AI art and prose. But I’m bored by it already. Why? Because it’s obviously not human. I like human things. Little quirks that make us laugh and cringe. That’s the beauty of life. AI is amazing, but it’s not human.

I don’t think that I’m bored yet, but I certainly feel the same about human-based creations. I’ll never be bored and always be fascinated by it.

[@numericcitizen](https://micro.blog/numericcitizen) It's a good formal summary of the pros and cons of social networks, written by a textual robot capable of being unintentionally harassing itself...
So this is how the replies appear on micro.blog, a brilliant platform designed by [@manton](https://micro.blog/manton), both uncluttered and optimized for blogging, which seeks through a constrained design to avoid as best as possible the flaws mentioned by ChatGPT.

I couldn't agree more with this take too. In fact, I prefer this take to ChatGPT's.

Here's The Weekend… Suggestions Instead of Infinite Social Media Scrolling...

It’s the week-end in a few hours, consider those suggestions by Shawn Blanc: A few alternative things you can do when you’re bored (instead of scrolling social media)

Here are a few alternatives to what I call the “Just Checks”.

– Scroll through your Day One timeline and read a previous journal entry or browse some old photos and memories.

– Launch Day One and log how you’ve spent your time so far for the day. Doing this for a few weeks can also be super helpful for getting a perspective of where your time and energy are being spent.

– Write down 3 new ideas. These could be articles you want to write, business ideas, places you want to visit or photograph, topics you want to research, date ideas for you and your spouse, gift ideas for a friend, etc. These ideas never have to to be acted on — the point isn’t to generate a to-do list, but rather to exercise your mind and build your idea muscle. Ideation and creativity are muscles, and the more we exercise them the stronger they get.

– Send a text message to a friend or family member to tell them how awesome they are.

– Don’t get out your phone at all — do some stretches or take a 5-minute walk.

Me? I’ll be creating, as always. Have a great weekend.

Writing Shouldn’t Be Hard

We now live in a world of multimodal communications, and how we communicate is changing. The omnipresence of devices in our lives — smartphones to computers, means most of our conversations and communications happen through text. We have replaced so much of our face-to-face interaction with the written word. Teams, Slack and Discords, are part of our daily lives now. As the volume of text in our lives increases, we need tools that help facilitate and perhaps improve how we write and how fast we write.

Am I alone in having the feeling that people no longer read?

Dear developers, be honest with us. In my usual morning rabbit hole digging, I stumbled on Flow, a Pomodoro app for the Mac. According to the website, Flow is free.

I click on the “Available on the App Store” link. Once in the App Store, I look at the app details.

Then, things start to look different. There is an “In-app purchases” tag. Scrolling down to the details, I get to see this.

Now, I go up and read the app description. 😠 The developer fooled me. I feel cheated when basic and core features are under the “Pro” plan (like a timer custom duration). It’s a stupid one-feature app, and the developer manages to put the core feature under the pro plan!! I skip the app and move on because I don’t feel the developer is honest in his approach. Yeah, I know it’s called “marketing”.

Attorney General Ashley Moody:

“We must ensure that consumers have the information needed to make informed decisions about their data privacy and security. The existing lack of transparency in app stores can create a significant risk for American citizens, and could cause their personal information to be exploited by foreign entities of concern. That is why I am calling on Apple and Google to bring more transparency to their app stores—so consumers know what products are owned or developed by nations that may pose a national security risk.”

I think this is a great idea. In challenging times, I want to know if an app is created or owned by someone who brings money into bad actor pockets. I do have internal debate about this issue from time to time, having such labeling in the App Store would certainly help in my buying or subscription decisions.

The Computer is Wrong — Stay Critical & Curious

This evening, using an Apple Shortcut called Clips, I imported the « Apple in 2022 The Six Colors report card » by Six Colors into Craft. It’s a 25 000 article that I started reading on my iPad, within Craft. Then, fifteen minutes into my reading, I asked Craft assistant to summarize the Mac section. It came out with this summary:

« In 2022, Apple released the M2 MacBook Air, Mac Studio, and Studio Display. The hardware in the Mac lineup is powerful and impressive, and the M2 MacBook Air has become a favorite of Mac users due to its light weight, zero noise, and long battery life, as well as its ability to handle workloads that used to require a pro-level desktop. macOS Ventura has some great features, but there is still backsliding represented by bugs that have gone unfixed and apps that don’t work well. While many users are disappointed that an expected Mac Pro did not arrive, Apple is still praised for their strong hardware lineup and the Mac Studio, which might be a success except for the long shipping delays. »

Because I’m an Apple pundit; I read a lot about Apple in general, I find this summary « plausible », but also because I read the entire Mac section of the Six Colors report. Otherwise, I could I really know? This is where this article ChatGPT from Matt Birchler comes into view « The Computer is Wrong »: it’s fun to play with ChatGPT or any derivative services but staying critical, curious is still a mandatory thing to be these days.

My Taxi Ride to The Past

I recently took a taxi ride to leave the airport as Uber taxis were unavailable and plagued with longer than usual delays. We were directed to the traditional taxi lines. I couldn’t use an app on my iPhone to call a taxi instead.

Boy, it was a trip in the past. The taxi driver had no Google or Waze open to know where to go, only his memory and his knowledge of the city. The taxi timer was this old and ugly box installed on his car dash, partially blocking his view.

It was disorienting not to get any feedback about how long the trip would go, what was the best road alternatives along the way, and not having a driver reputation score.

You would think that Uber would kick the butt of taxi companies so they evolve the customer experience and get their shit together to build a competitive experience, but no. They seem to have given up a long time ago.

My message to taxi companies: enjoy the ride while it last.

Google’s official announcement of incoming layoffs:

I have some difficult news to share. We’ve decided to reduce our workforce by approximately 12,000 roles. We’ve already sent a separate email to employees in the US who are affected. In other countries, this process will take longer due to local laws and practices. Source: A difficult decision to set us up for the future

And comment from Gruber:

There are numerous reasons the tech industry wound up at this layoffpalooza, but I think the main reason is that the biggest companies got caught up in a game where they tried to hire everyone, whether they needed them or not, to keep talent away from competitors and keep talent away from small upstarts (or from founding their own small upstarts). These big companies were just hiring to hire, and now the jig is up. Source: Daring Fireball

Here’s my view on this. Google is not alone. Microsoft and Meta announced major layoffs too. I’ve been working in IT for over thirty years, and I have never been in such a situation where we have so much difficulty finding or hiring new people. Big companies are competing for great talent not only with each other but also draining talent from smaller companies. It’s very difficult to compete in this context.

I think what is happening is not as catastrophic as it sounds. We will see a redistribution of the workforce in the industry. A lot of talent is being freed in the process from the big ones and is now available for the smaller companies where management is more sound, and financial posture is in good shape.