30, INFP/ISFP, Artist, Hopeful Architectural Conservationist. Love video games, T.V. Shows, Freetime writing... Reblog mostly Dragon Age, Skyrim, Assassin's Creed, Natsume Yuujinchou... Also lots of random stuff. Personal Blog.
Copyright class actions could financially ruin AI industry, trade groups say.
AI industry groups are urging an appeals court to block what they say is the largest copyright class action ever certified. Theyâve warned that a single lawsuit raised by three authors over Anthropicâs AI training now threatens to âfinancially ruinâ the entire AI industry if up to 7 million claimants end up joining the litigation and forcing a settlement.
Authors have until March 30th, 2026 (That is just 9 days as of this reblog, which I am posting on March 21st, 2026) to file their claim against Anthropic to be reimbursed up to $3,000 per work found in the list.
Updated February 18, 2026 IMPORTANT: The Claims Deadline Is March 30 Background Bartz v. Anthropic is one of the major copyright lawsuits b
Please click the above link for all of the exact details of how to file a claim and to check for your works, and share this post as far and wide as you can before March 30th, 2026!
hello fellow artists. google has fallen. pinterest/duckduckgo AI filters don't work. do not despair; here is a list i made of places to find reference images without having to sift through piles of worthless garbage. (for future editing convenience i am just linking my blog post on dreamwidth.)
âš good places to find art reference that are not full of AI trash đ
REMAKING THIS POLL AFTER I TRIED TO POST IT WHEN I HIT POST LIMIT LOL đ€Ł
I regularly hit the post limit (250 posts/reblogs, 500 with Tumblr Premium). Depending on how busy I am and the energy I have, it can go from multiple times a month to multiple times a week, easily. Among my mutuals, I'm the only one who does this so regularly. Given recent events, I'm curious how many of us on here are as into reblogging/making original posts.
How many times have you hit the post limit?
Never
Once
A handful of times
Once or twice every few years, more than a handful though
Once every few months
Monthly
Multiple times a month
Multiple times a week
Daily/near daily
I use the queue, which avoids hitting the limit
nuance/bald
Voting ended onMar 26
I feel like it goes without saying, but if you vote please reblog this poll.
God sometimes I'm writing smut and I'll like, delete a sentence because I'm like, no, I can't write that. It's too indulgent. And then it's like. Girl, what the fuck are you even going to the candy store for if you're just going to buy raisins. Get real.
I bring you a Dragon Age Map with the OFFICIAL distances calculated in miles! Higher rez version here for the regular map and here for the map with extra large boxes to help with reading larger distances.
Details under cut.
So I had been on the hunt for a Thedas map that actually had any distances calculated on it for years. There's some fan maps, but none were official.
Well, imagine my shock when I opened my dragon age ttrpg book to find a map at the back that DOES include official distances!! If you have the book, check the back, it's glued in there.
I found no one had uploaded this map online, though. So I took a photo, lined it up as best as I could with a map I found online of the same style, and then pasted in the distance calculator in the corner. I then added a grid on top. I couldn't find a better way of doing it than 5 squares for every 70 miles, which means each square is about 14 miles. I thought that'd be easier to calculate than trying to break a 70 mile chunk down.
Then I realized by looking at the map that trying to calculate longer distances using that map will suck cause they're such tiny squares... so I added another grid on top to make it so the large grid is 70 miles. I included both versions of the map for anyone to use.
According to this map and some online calculators, Varric was wrong that it took Hawke 2 weeks to get to Kirkwall from Gwaren. it should have taken closer to 20 days. But eh, not too big an error and 2 weeks sounds neater. Plus, we know he's an unreliable narrator.
The funny thing is, it takes nearly (edit: MORE than) 2 weeks to get across Ferelden. On horseback. Warden was walking. Warden... how far did you walk... How many miles did you cover...
Anyone feel free to spice up the map however you'd like! I hope this is helpful for anyone out there!
Never realized that this wasn't already done by someone, I think just because I've seen so many versions relying on the other "official" scalings. Really cool to see this done!
I love (and lament) the variations of scaling across the different versions of the Thedas maps. So here are some fun facts about the scaling of this map because they're are just kinda neat.
Note: I'm putting official in quotes because there is next to no consistency and the ttrpg scaling actively contradicts most of the other canon travel times that it is definitely not the one being used by anyone in BioWare. Though sometimes used by novels and other 3rd party material. Officially for the ttrpg, they made some decisions that BioWare says is canon as long as it isn't directly contradicted by the games - which this is so really up to you.
- This is one of the "official" scales, there are actually about four or five depending on how you want to decide âofficialâ. This scaling contradicts about 8 canon time travel points.
Daoâs scaling - where it is a week to travel from Orzammarâs entrance to the circle one way - Two weeks round trip.
One of the more common ones that OP probably saw was based off Varricâs statements of travel times at the start of DA2. This person did a wonderful round up of distances that if you want to use the scale in this post you can convert.
Asunder asserts it takes a month to get to Adamant from the White Spire.
Last Flightâs assertion that on horseback it takes 2 weeks to cross the Anderfels from Weisshaupt to the Wandering Hills. Which contradicts all scaling lol
Daiâs scaling that says you can traverse all of Southern Thedas in a year. Which is 3 1/2x the size of Ferelden which is also traversal in a year (barely).
Dai also asserts it take a week for a letter (and Barris) to get from the Free Marches to Skyhold.
The official cookbook that says you can travel the entirety of Thedas in a year by carriage/on-foot. Which contradicts both dao and dai, as well as Varric's statement of travel times and all the novel travel times.
- This interactive map uses the scaling of a couple theories based on canon travel times. Which I think is neat and could be helpful for any map shenanigans you all may have.
- The printer map is about a half inch off from if you were to print out the WoT map (a version of the map op put the grid on, though that might vary depending on the image source. When making my consolidated map of Thedas there seems to be about a 1/2 to 3 inch wobble across any official map that can be found online or supplied through digital copies of the books. This is where my lamenting of the scaling variations comes from lol)
- Officially it is stated that Ferelden is the size of England. The ttrpg contradicts that. Which I saw somewhere in the reblogs that this scale puts it on par with Poland, which is about 2.35x bigger than England. 312,696km (poland) vs 132,932km (england)
- According to the ttrpg scale, Anders swam 13 miles / 20.92km to get to the docks when he escaped. It also makes it so the horizon for Thedas is further than that of earth by I believe by nearly triple the distance, which is super interesting. 13 miles / 20.92km vs the 4.97 miles / 8km
AO3 has recently seen a rise in guest spambot comments making false accusations about work creators or other users. For example, they may claim that a particular user is discriminating against minorities, trying to hide the fact that they use AI, or are at risk of having their works stolen or deleted.
These comments often copy existing AO3 usernames in order to make their accusations seem more legitimate. They may also try to lure people onto other platforms (similar to the art commission scam), or use fake links that actually lead to pornographic images.
As always, we recommend that you do not click on any suspicious links or give your contact information to scammers. Instead, simply mark the comments as spam or report them so that the Policy & Abuse committee can remove comments left by these spambots.
Learn how to recognize them and what to do below the cut!
How to recognize this kind of spam:
The comments come from guests, not logged-in users.
The comments may start with praise for you and your writing, trying to lull you into a false sense of security. Or they may claim that you are a bad writer, trying to make you too upset to realize that the comments are fake.
The comments may accuse you or another user of promoting discriminatory beliefs, deceiving fans, or similar behaviors that might cause other people to shun or harass the accused individual. They may claim that they checked social media to find that the accused user is "brazenly sharing hateful content" or "bragging about using AI".
The comments are often pleading or angry, asking you to "stop lying to your readers", "don't remove the AI prompts from your work", or suggesting that you "consider adding more diverse characters" to "repair the trust you've lost with your audience".
So far, these comments have all been from guests. Our advice is to flag them as spam to better filter them out.
To help train our automated spam-checker to block similar guest comments in the future:
If the comment is on your own work:
Go directly to the comment on your work, either by clicking on the link in your email or in your AO3 inbox.
Click on the "Spam" button to mark the guest comment as spam and remove it from your work.
Note: The "Spam" button only appears when viewing a guest comment directly on your work. This is because the AO3 comment inbox is merely a copy of the work's comments â deleting a comment from your AO3 inbox does not delete the comment from the work itself.
If you see comments like these on someone else's work:
Feel free to let the creator know the comment is from a bot, and that they should mark it as spam.
You can also report the comments as botspam via the Policy Questions & Abuse Reports form linked at the bottom of every page on AO3.
If you are reporting multiple guest comments, please submit only one report, and include all comment links in your report description. (You can get the direct link to any comment by clicking the "Thread" button on the comment, and then copying the URL of that page.)
As of December 2025, bots have also left guest comments harassing users by:
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What these bots claim is not true. These accusations do not mean your work will be deleted or that your accounts are insecure. We recommend that you mark these comments as spam following the instructions in our previous post.
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Small fantasy worldbuilding elements you might want to think about:
A currency that isnât gold-standard/having gold be as valuable as tin
A currency that runs entirely on a perishable resource, like cocoa beans
A clock that isnât 24-hours
More or less than four seasons/seasons other than the ones we know
Fantastical weather patterns like irregular cloud formations, iridescent rain
Multiple moons/no moon
Planetary rings
A northern lights effect, but near the equator
Roads that arenât brown or grey/black, like San Juanâs blue bricks
Jewelry beyond precious gems and metals
Marriage signifiers other than wedding bands
The husband taking the wife's name / newlyweds inventing a new surname upon marriage
No concept of virginity or bastardry
More than 2 genders/no concept of gender
Monotheism, but not creationism
Gods that donât look like people
Domesticated pets that arenât re-skinned dogs and cats
Some normalized supernatural element that has nothing to do with the plot
Magical communication that isnât Fantasy Zoom
âBooksâ that arenât bound or scrolls
A nonverbal means of communicating, like sign language
A race of people who are obligate carnivores/ vegetarians/ vegans/ pescatarians (not religious, biological imperative)
Iâve done about half of these myself in one WIP or another and a little detail here or there goes a long way in reminding the audience that this isnât Kansas anymore.
One Of The Issues With People Trying To Do World Building Can Be Seen Here Because, The Concept Of Marriage Can Be Excluded Entirely, In Place You Could Do Something Like, A Society Without Romantic Relationships Entirely It Could Be Utopian Or Dystopian As In A Society Where Everybody Is Able To Have Relations With Anyone Else Provided Consent, Or It Could Be Where Parents Are Chosen By Maybe The Government Or Maybe The Gods/God To Make Perfect Stronger Children
✠Memory becomes absolute garbage. Like âwhy am I in the kitchen?â garbage. âWhat was I saying?â garbage. Their brain is running on buffering screens and regret.
✠Fine motor skills? Ha. Theyâre dropping everything. Pens. Phones. Entire moral compass. Theyâre basically a malfunctioning claw machine.
✠Hallucinations creep in. That jacket on the chair? Suddenly a person. That noise? Definitely doom. Everything becomes mildly haunted.
✠Time gets weird. Five minutes feel like a year. A full hour disappears and they swear they blinked wrong.
✠Irritation skyrockets. They get mad at chairs. At air. At gravity. At the audacity of other humans continuing to exist.
✠Their voice sounds weird. Slow, scratchy, like they swallowed sand.
✠They walk like a drunk baby giraffe. Walls suddenly jump closer. Floors rise unexpectedly. Coordination said: âIâm out.â
✠Zoning out becomes a hobby. They stare at random objects like theyâre trying to understand quantum mechanics.
✠Vision blurs in and out. Like someone smeared Vaseline over their eyeballs out of spite.
✠Their body just hurts. Not a dramatic pain, just the âwhy does my skeleton feel like itâs buzzing?â pain.
✠Food cravings go feral. Theyâd fight someone for a stale cookie.
✠Terrible choices. They will absolutely say âIâm fineâ while making decisions that end in disaster.
✠Random emotional implosions. Crying because their sock feels wrong? Yes.
✠Cold hands. Cold feet. Cold heart. (Okay maybe not the last one, but it feels like it.)
⧠Broken ribs suck. You donât just âwalk it off.â Breathing hurts. Laughing hurts. Existing hurts. Characters with rib injuries wonât be doing heroic sprints.
⧠Concussions arenât instant naps. Dazed vision, nausea, dizziness, maybe even personality changes, but theyâre not going to collapse neatly like in the movies.
⧠Blood loss is sneaky. Itâs not just about dramatic pools of blood. Itâs dizziness, confusion, and the body getting cold as circulation tanks.
⧠Adrenaline lies. Someone can take a serious injury and not feel it until the fightâs over. That âI didnât realize I was bleeding until laterâ trope? Very real.
⧠Twisted ankles are brutal. One bad step and suddenly running is off the table. Even walking hurts like hell. Perfect way to ground a chase scene.
⧠Burns linger. Even small burns hurt more than most people expect. Blisters, infection risk, constant pain, itâs not just a cool scar later.
⧠Dislocated shoulders = useless arm. Characters canât keep swinging a sword or firing a gun. Theyâre basically fighting one-armed until itâs fixed.
⧠Shock is a thing. Pale skin, trembling, rapid heartbeat, and eventually disorientation. A character might not even realize how bad their wound is.
⧠Stitches arenât magic. Getting sewn up is painful and recovery takes time. Theyâre not instantly battle-ready after a needle and thread.
⧠Scars tell stories. Some fade, some donât. Some stay sensitive forever. Donât forget the aftermath when the wound becomes part of the character.
some people think writers are so eloquent and good with words, but the reality is that we can sit there with our fingers on the keyboard going, âwhatâs the word for non-sunlight lighting? Like, fake lighting?â and for ten minutes, all our brain will supply is âunofficialâ, and we know thatâs not the right word, but itâs the only word we can come up withâŠuntil finally itâs like our face got smashed into a brick wall and we remember the word we want is âartificialâ.
saw this being debated and just wanted to talk about it too.
"is it rude if I politely ask a writer if they use ai or chatgpt on their works because I'm almost certain they do?"
yes, it is rude. no matter how polite you are being when you ask them this.
you say you are almost certain. so you are not absolutely certain.
unless you are absolutely, undoubtedly certain â with actual proof â that their writing is ai generated, never ever ask an artist if their work is ai generated.
I know several writers who would stop writing and delete all of their works if they were ever accused of using ai. so it doesn't matter if you are polite when you ask them this, you are suggesting that their works are ai generated, that they didn't create the works they could have spent hours, days, weeks, months or years working on.
ai and chatgpt are trained on real humans' works, they are trained to mimic the way real humans write. so if you say a genuine writer's work "looks ai", I'm gonna have to ask you what you think ai was trained on.
a writer whose English isn't their first language may also write in a way that "looks ai" to some, if they write in English and have to rely on translator.
using em dash isn't a sign of ai. I do it all the time. my fellow writers all love em dash.
having long paragraphs with "overly described scenes" isn't a sign of ai. I do it all the time, and so do my fellow writers.
all the "ai signs" are actually just what most writers actually do. they get mistaken for "ai signs" because sometimes the way writers write or describe a scene in a fanfic or an original work is different than the way people talk or text. because they're writing a fic and describing a scene, not chatting with a friend. the way I talk is different than the way I write my fics.
if you suspect a work was ai generated, but are not 100% sure, you can always just stop reading said work without saying anything.
if someone does use ai to write, they will either a.) deny and continue using ai to write or b.) admit because they see nothing wrong with it and continue using ai to write.
if a genuine writer was wrongly accused of using ai, they may stop writing altogether.
asking a writer if they use ai or chatgpt to write will always do more harm than good. witch hunting will always do more harm than good.
you are not "fighting against ai" by throwing around such accusations. you are harming genuine writers and artists.
all of the fanfic writers, whom I personally know, say the same thing that they would feel discouraged and might delete all their works if they were asked this.
itâs not âhey do you like x or yâ question. itâs a subtle implication that your work looks like it was written by a robot within a minute. if you personally donât find that offensive, thatâs cool. but I know a lot of writers do. and they have the rights to be discouraged by it.
also we are talking about fanfic writers who write as their hobby, getaway or safe place, writers whose works you read for free. not writers who sell their works and are making profit from what they write. fanfic writers donât owe you anything.
This just came across my dash. I'm going to be blunt.
Asking a writer or artist if they âuse AIâ is an accusation, no matter how you dress it up. Itâs not neutral. It implies you think their effort, style, or voice is artificial. It implies that their human work doesnât look human enough for you.
You donât protect the community by policing people who are actually creating from scratch. You protect it by supporting human creators, reporting confirmed AI misuse when thereâs evidence, and learning the difference between this sounds different than what Iâd write and this is machine-generated.
Writersâespecially fanfic authorsâalready pour their time, emotion, and identity into what they share for free. They donât owe anyone proof of authenticity on top of that. And if your question makes someone want to quit writing, itâs not protecting the community. Itâs shrinking it.
If youâre not 100% sure, just scroll. AI ethics donât need to turn into public inquisition season.
hey so anyone else just, feel thin. sort of stretched. like butter scraped over too much bread. like you need a holiday. a very long holiday. and you don't expect you shall return? or is that just me and bilbo baggins
Iâm writing scenes which are good, and I donât know where they are going to fit in the book. But itâs what I call âThe Valley Filled With Cloudsâ technique. Youâre at the edge of the valley, and there is a church steeple, and there is a tree, and there is a rocky outcrop, but the rest of it is mist. But you know that because they exist, there must be ways of getting from one to the other that you cannot see. And so you start the journey. And when I write, I write a draft entirely for myself, just to walk the valley and find out what the book is going to be all about.
-- Terry Pratchett - A Slip Of The Keyboard: Collected Non-fiction
Every story should have consequences, but even the most dramatic, plot-shifting consequence ever written is going to fall flat if we didnât know it was going to happen beforehand. Always spoil your consequences.
By that, I mean that if the reader doesnât understand what would be so bad about getting caught as the characters explore the sewers, weâre not going to feel any tensionâand when they are caught and fed to the sewer creature, weâre going to feel more confused than surprised.
Using our example, this might look like some character at the beginning telling our MCs about the âlegend of the sewer monster that eats wayward childrenâ. Later, when theyâre in the sewer, this warning would be at the backs of their minds and ours as the reader. When theyâre caught and taken to said sewer monster, we would still find it surprising, but not confusing. Thereâs a very important difference between the two.
There are a lot of ways to bring up the risks or implications of an action. You canâŠ
1. Demonstrate it on a background character
Person ahead in line makes a run for it and is shot. Guy fighting dragon in the news is roasted alive. My neighbour went out to sea three months ago and never returned.
2. Hint at it through the environment
This one is pretty common because itâs subtle but effective. For example, Jack Sparrow sails into port and passes by a hanging skeleton wearing a pirate hat. Before heâs even reached land, we know exactly what could happen to him there. Or entering the sewer and finding some sort of nest, even if the creature is no where in sight.
3. Hide it within dialogue
If the characters react to something as though itâs a joke, the readers will assume it is too, until the thing comes up and is proven real. This is a great way to outline a consequence without drawing too much attention to it.
Otherwise, sometimes the most obvious example that manages to slip by us is: â[Thing] would never happen. If it did, [consequence].â And you better believe not only will thing happen, but so will consequence. âThe police will catch escaped serial killer, if they donât, so many more people will die.â Etc.
This can also look like our exampleâthereâs a myth/rumour/legend that⊠Or I heard of a friend of a friend who⊠Or, did you hear across the border there wasâŠ
