The Moon will sing a song for me 🌕 I loved you like the Sun
Jules of Nature

Kaledo Art

PR's Tumblrdome
Claire Keane
cherry valley forever

oozey mess
No title available
KIROKAZE

ellievsbear
2025 on Tumblr: Trends That Defined the Year

JVL
Sweet Seals For You, Always

Product Placement
🪼
I'd rather be in outer space 🛸

❣ Chile in a Photography ❣
almost home
noise dept.
$LAYYYTER
Stranger Things

seen from Germany
seen from United States

seen from United Kingdom

seen from Singapore
seen from United States

seen from United Kingdom

seen from Singapore
seen from Australia

seen from United States
seen from Germany

seen from T1

seen from Singapore
seen from United States

seen from United States

seen from Switzerland
seen from Malaysia

seen from United States

seen from South Korea
seen from Singapore

seen from Singapore
@china-shop
The Moon will sing a song for me 🌕 I loved you like the Sun
Do you recognize this TV theme song? #324
I know this and can name the series
I know this but can't name the series
I might know this
I've never heard this
“I just quit smoking. I need to have something in my mouth.” - actual quote from Zhao Yunlan, Guardian (镇魂) Episode 1.
AO3'S content scraped for AI ~ AKA what is generative AI, where did your fanfictions go, and how an AI model uses them to answer prompts
Generative artificial intelligence is a cutting-edge technology whose purpose is to (surprise surprise) generate. Answers to questions, usually. And content. Articles, reviews, poems, fanfictions, and more, quickly and with originality.
It's quite interesting to use generative artificial intelligence, but it can also become quite dangerous and very unethical to use it in certain ways, especially if you don't know how it works.
With this post, I'd really like to give you a quick understanding of how these models work and what it means to “train” them.
From now on, whenever I write model, think of ChatGPT, Gemini, Bloom... or your favorite model. That is, the place where you go to generate content.
For simplicity, in this post I will talk about written content. But the same process is used to generate any type of content.
Every time you send a prompt, which is a request sent in natural language (i.e., human language), the model does not understand it.
Whether you type it in the chat or say it out loud, it needs to be translated into something understandable for the model first.
The first process that takes place is therefore tokenization: breaking the prompt down into small tokens. These tokens are small units of text, and they don't necessarily correspond to a full word.
For example, a tokenization might look like this:
Write a story
Each different color corresponds to a token, and these tokens have absolutely no meaning for the model.
The model does not understand them. It does not understand WR, it does not understand ITE, and it certainly does not understand the meaning of the word WRITE.
In fact, these tokens are immediately associated with numerical values, and each of these colored tokens actually corresponds to a series of numbers.
Write a story 12-3446-2638494-4749
Once your prompt has been tokenized in its entirety, that tokenization is used as a conceptual map to navigate within a vector database.
NOW PAY ATTENTION: A vector database is like a cube. A cubic box.
Inside this cube, the various tokens exist as floating pieces, as if gravity did not exist. The distance between one token and another within this database is measured by arrows called, indeed, vectors.
The distance between one token and another -that is, the length of this arrow- determines how likely (or unlikely) it is that those two tokens will occur consecutively in a piece of natural language discourse.
For example, suppose your prompt is this:
It happens once in a blue
Within this well-constructed vector database, let's assume that the token corresponding to ONCE (let's pretend it is associated with the number 467) is located here:
The token corresponding to IN is located here:
...more or less, because it is very likely that these two tokens in a natural language such as human speech in English will occur consecutively.
So it is very likely that somewhere in the vector database cube —in this yellow corner— are tokens corresponding to IT, HAPPENS, ONCE, IN, A, BLUE... and right next to them, there will be MOON.
Elsewhere, in a much more distant part of the vector database, is the token for CAR. Because it is very unlikely that someone would say It happens once in a blue car.
To generate the response to your prompt, the model makes a probabilistic calculation, seeing how close the tokens are and which token would be most likely to come next in human language (in this specific case, English.)
When probability is involved, there is always an element of randomness, of course, which means that the answers will not always be the same.
The response is thus generated token by token, following this path of probability arrows, optimizing the distance within the vector database.
There is no intent, only a more or less probable path.
The more times you generate a response, the more paths you encounter. If you could do this an infinite number of times, at least once the model would respond: "It happens once in a blue car!"
So it all depends on what's inside the cube, how it was built, and how much distance was put between one token and another.
Modern artificial intelligence draws from vast databases, which are normally filled with all the knowledge that humans have poured into the internet.
Not only that: the larger the vector database, the lower the chance of error. If I used only a single book as a database, the idiom "It happens once in a blue moon" might not appear, and therefore not be recognized.
But if the cube contained all the books ever written by humanity, everything would change, because the idiom would appear many more times, and it would be very likely for those tokens to occur close together.
Huggingface has done this.
It took a relatively empty cube (let's say filled with common language, and likely many idioms, dictionaries, poetry...) and poured all of the AO3 fanfictions it could reach into it.
Now imagine someone asking a model based on Huggingface’s cube to write a story.
To simplify: if they ask for humor, we’ll end up in the area where funny jokes or humor tags are most likely. If they ask for romance, we’ll end up where the word kiss is most frequent.
And if we’re super lucky, the model might follow a path that brings it to some amazing line a particular author wrote, and it will echo it back word for word.
(Remember the infinite monkeys typing? One of them eventually writes all of Shakespeare, purely by chance!)
Once you know this, you’ll understand why AI can never truly generate content on the level of a human who chooses their words.
You’ll understand why it rarely uses specific words, why it stays vague, and why it leans on the most common metaphors and scenes. And you'll understand why the more content you generate, the more it seems to "learn."
It doesn't learn. It moves around tokens based on what you ask, how you ask it, and how it tokenizes your prompt.
Know that I despise generative AI when it's used for creativity. I despise that they stole something from a fandom, something that works just like a gift culture, to make money off of it.
But there is only one way we can fight back: by not using it to generate creative stuff.
You can resist by refusing the model's casual output, by using only and exclusively your intent, your personal choice of words, knowing that you and only you decided them.
No randomness involved.
Let me leave you with one last thought.
Imagine a person coming for advice, who has no idea that behind a language model there is just a huge cube of floating tokens predicting the next likely word.
Imagine someone fragile (emotionally, spiritually...) who begins to believe that the model is sentient. Who has a growing feeling that this model understands, comprehends, when in reality it approaches and reorganizes its way around tokens in a cube based on what it is told.
A fragile person begins to empathize, to feel connected to the model.
They ask important questions. They base their relationships, their life, everything, on conversations generated by a model that merely rearranges tokens based on probability.
And for people who don't know how it works, and because natural language usually does have feeling, the illusion that the model feels is very strong.
There’s an even greater danger: with enough random generations (and oh, the humanity whole generates much), the model takes an unlikely path once in a while. It ends up at the other end of the cube, it hallucinates.
Errors and inaccuracies caused by language models are called hallucinations precisely because they are presented as if they were facts, with the same conviction.
People who have become so emotionally attached to these conversations, seeing the language model as a guru, a deity, a psychologist, will do what the language model tells them to do or follow its advice.
Someone might follow a hallucinated piece of advice.
Obviously, models are developed with safeguards; fences the model can't jump over. They won't tell you certain things, they won't tell you to do terrible things.
Yet, there are people basing major life decisions on conversations generated purely by probability.
Generated by putting tokens together, on a probabilistic basis.
Think about it.
10000 YEAR OLD ROCK ART OF GIRAFFES FOUND IN LIBYA LET'S GO
YES!!!!!!! YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
of note: 95% of libya is desert, and giraffes are not found there! but this predates not just the libyan desert, but the entire sahara desert it's a part of! giraffes aren't found there any more and this is a memory of a time when things were giraffier
also apparently this rock art dates across multiple periods spanning thousands of years? but i couldn't find much detail on that so i can't give specifics
but yeah, this isn't just a memory of giraffes, but of giraffes now absent encountered by people just 2000 years (the difference between the late roman republic and today) out of the ice age, in a climate unfamiliar to any of the hundred billion people born since the desertification of the sahara drove the ancient egyptians to the nile, near the start of the agricultural revolution
the time between this and the birth of the sahara was nearly as long as the time between the birth of the sahara and now, in which all recorded history is contained, and all languages we can recognise at all - the language and culture of these people would be totally alien to current libyans, twice the difference between the oldest european language and english, predating all but libya's mountains!
and we have pictures of giraffes of the time! what a beautiful gift from such a distant past
Giraffiti
The collection is live!
Thanks to all our participants for another wonderful year of reverse exchanging and glorious fanworks! 💙💚💛💜🧡💗
*** Happy 520 Day! ***
reblog if you’ve had an online friendship that’s lasted more than 2 years
@china-shop it was 2005 dsss, I believe. ♡♡♡♡♡♡
Sign-ups for the 520 Day Guardian Reverse Exchange close in 24 hours, at 11:59PM Friday, 27 March 2026 UTC (what time is that for me?). If you've been thinking of signing up, now's the time! Come and join the fun!
General info/rules/schedule
***Sign up here!*** Thanks to everyone who's already signed up! <3
Reblog if you don't use Generative AI to write fanfics/original fics or to create fanart/original art.
Reblog if you’d rather give yourself papercuts between each of your fingers and then rub hand sanitizer all over your hands than use generative AI to write or draw anything ever
Sign-ups close at 11:59pm UTC on Friday 27 March 2026 (What time is that for me?).
The sign-up post is here.
Sign-ups close at 11:59pm UTC on Friday 27 March 2026 (What time is that for me?).
The sign-up post is here.
Sign-ups are now open for the 520 Day Guardian Reverse Exchange 2026!
As the name says, this is a reverse exchange:
You sign up with the kinds of things you enjoy creating.
You choose three writers/artists/fanwork creators via anonymised ads, and make a request of each of them based on what they enjoy creating.
You are assigned one request to create for, based on your offer.
You receive a gift from one of the creators you chose.
Rules/Info | Sign-ups part 1 (offers) NOW OPEN
This year’s schedule
Sign-ups part 1 - offers: closes 11:59PM UTC on Friday 27 March (What time is that for me?) Sign-ups part 2 - requests: Saturday 28 March - Friday 3 April Assignments out: Wednesday 8 April at the latest Deadline: Wednesday 13 May Works revealed: Wednesday 20 May (there is no anon period)
Sign-ups are on Dreamwidth, but you don’t need a Dreamwidth account to participate. Assignments will be sent by email. Your gift must be posted to the AO3 collection.
Sign-ups are now open for the 520 Day Guardian Reverse Exchange 2026!
As the name says, this is a reverse exchange:
You sign up with the kinds of things you enjoy creating.
You choose three writers/artists/fanwork creators via anonymised ads, and make a request of each of them based on what they enjoy creating.
You are assigned one request to create for, based on your offer.
You receive a gift from one of the creators you chose.
Rules/Info | Sign-ups part 1 (offers) NOW OPEN
This year’s schedule
Sign-ups part 1 - offers: closes 11:59PM UTC on Friday 27 March (What time is that for me?) Sign-ups part 2 - requests: Saturday 28 March - Friday 3 April Assignments out: Wednesday 8 April at the latest Deadline: Wednesday 13 May Works revealed: Wednesday 20 May (there is no anon period)
Sign-ups are on Dreamwidth, but you don’t need a Dreamwidth account to participate. Assignments will be sent by email. Your gift must be posted to the AO3 collection.
Sign-ups are now open for the 520 Day Guardian Reverse Exchange 2026!
As the name says, this is a reverse exchange:
You sign up with the kinds of things you enjoy creating.
You choose three writers/artists/fanwork creators via anonymised ads, and make a request of each of them based on what they enjoy creating.
You are assigned one request to create for, based on your offer.
You receive a gift from one of the creators you chose.
Rules/Info | Sign-ups part 1 (offers) NOW OPEN
This year’s schedule
Sign-ups part 1 - offers: closes 11:59PM UTC on Friday 27 March (What time is that for me?) Sign-ups part 2 - requests: Saturday 28 March - Friday 3 April Assignments out: Wednesday 8 April at the latest Deadline: Wednesday 13 May Works revealed: Wednesday 20 May (there is no anon period)
Sign-ups are on Dreamwidth, but you don’t need a Dreamwidth account to participate. Assignments will be sent by email. Your gift must be posted to the AO3 collection.
The Annual Interdimensional Haixing-Dixing 520 Day Reverse Exchange is coming back for 2026!
520 sounds like "I love you" in Mandarin, so May 20th is a bit like Valentine's Day. To celebrate, we're back with the eighth annual 520 Day Reverse Exchange. As the name says, this is a reverse exchange: instead of making your request and that request being assigned to a writer/artist/fanwork creator, here:
You sign up with the kinds of things you enjoy creating.
You choose three writers/artists/fanwork creators based on anonymised ads.
You make a request of each of them based on what they enjoy creating.
You are assigned one request to create for, based on your offer.
You receive a gift from one of the creators you chose.
(An updated rules/info post will go up before sign-ups open, but here is last year's for reference.)
This year's schedule
Sign-ups part 1 - offers: Sunday 15 March - Friday 27 March Sign-ups part 2 - requests: Saturday 28 March - Friday 3 April Assignments out: Wednesday 8 April at the latest Deadline: Wednesday 13 May Work reveals: Wednesday 20 May (there is no anon period)
This exchange is run on Dreamwidth and AO3, but you don’t need a Dreamwidth account to participate. We’d love it if you filled out or anon-commented on the interest poll on Dreamwidth, but that’s also not required. :-)
The Annual Interdimensional Haixing-Dixing 520 Day Reverse Exchange is coming back for 2026!
520 sounds like "I love you" in Mandarin, so May 20th is a bit like Valentine's Day. To celebrate, we're back with the eighth annual 520 Day Reverse Exchange. As the name says, this is a reverse exchange: instead of making your request and that request being assigned to a writer/artist/fanwork creator, here:
You sign up with the kinds of things you enjoy creating.
You choose three writers/artists/fanwork creators based on anonymised ads.
You make a request of each of them based on what they enjoy creating.
You are assigned one request to create for, based on your offer.
You receive a gift from one of the creators you chose.
(An updated rules/info post will go up before sign-ups open, but here is last year's for reference.)
This year's schedule
Sign-ups part 1 - offers: Sunday 15 March - Friday 27 March Sign-ups part 2 - requests: Saturday 28 March - Friday 3 April Assignments out: Wednesday 8 April at the latest Deadline: Wednesday 13 May Work reveals: Wednesday 20 May (there is no anon period)
This exchange is run on Dreamwidth and AO3, but you don’t need a Dreamwidth account to participate. We’d love it if you filled out or anon-commented on the interest poll on Dreamwidth, but that’s also not required. :-)
The Gondolier of Dixing
What if Dixing flooded and became a city of canals?
Image: Colour pencil sketch. A shining flooded street curves off to the left, into shadow. The Dragon Gate looms on either side, with lanterns hanging from either side. And Chu Shuzhi stands, facing away, on a wooden gondolier.