Let me introduce myself. I'm Olivia Wylie. I'm the Otter that chases the Salmon of Wisdom. I'm marked for the Hazel Tree, mark of the story that needs to be told.
I'm currently moving all social media to less heinous platforms.
These are my current focuses and areas of interest. If you follow me, you'll see posts concerning any or all of them on a given day.
Illustrated works of poetry, historical and horticultural nonfiction
Science fiction with a solarpunk (*cough* very LGBT, very punk!) twist written as O.E. Tearmann
The steampunk comic Parmeshen (on hiatus, relaunching June 21 2027)
The near-future book review blog Travel Documents (relaunching February 01 2027)
The webcomic review blog The Strip Show (re-launching June 21 2027)
Lots of memes in support of ecological responsibility, horticultural science, social change, equity, low carbon footprint living, and emotional health
Lots of geeking out about plants, books, music, my cat, my friends' projects, plants, changes of the seasons, the Irish language, plants, and folktales from many cultures.
Project Links
The Aces High, Jokers Wild Series
Hopeful Queer Get-Out-Of-Cyberpunk Book Series
Extremely correct response, leaving out the inevitable debacle over citizens declaring counterfeit genders in order to have rarer pronoun pins to sell to collectors in the underground pronoun market.
Dibbler, only mildly discouraged, eventually realizes he can sell embellishments for your pronoun pin, which he claims will upgrade your gender.
Also of note is that there are no cops present at Ankh-Morpork Pride. This is not because they aren't welcome (everyone knows Nobby is as kinky as they come), but because the festivities include throwing bricks at the City Watch building and they are busy trying to make sure they still have a place to work the next day. The Night Watch prepares each year with a barricade, and pre-marriage Vimes always collects the good bricks so he can save for a house. Nobody is really sure where the tradition came from, but it's good fun and usually nobody gets hurt too badly.
The bricks are provided by Vetinari, who considers it a good test of city infrastructure and training for the Watch.
Cheery would 100% march in the parade. She'd get Nobby to go with her, but Nobby would be completely oblivious as to why (he assumed she just wants company).
Moist von lipwig would have pride-themed stamps made; these would inevitably have some kind of issue, which would create some outrage and ultimately make the stamps more valuable as collectors' items.
I don't get the impression that Ankh Morpork ever had anti-sodomy or crossdressing laws, so I don't think the queer community's history with the police would be the same as it is in the real world. Especially because Cheery Littlebottom literally started the Dwarf trans/feminism movement as an officer of the Watch, with the Watch's support.
Dibbler would totally sell pride flags with the wrong colors (and then insist it was the "new, updated version" if anyone questioned him)
The nobility are all scandalized, meanwhile the Seamstresses Guild has a float in the parade
Adora Belle Dearheart is deeply involved with at least one queer organization and is one of the main organizers of the Pride festival, but refuses to answer any questions about why
Ridcully decides the wizards should be involved, and Ponder Stibbons should make a float and organize the refreshments for them to eat while riding on the float. Ridcully's concept of allyship is loudly saying, "Well done, that man!" and pointing at anyone he thinks is exhibiting particularly queer behavior.
Madam Sharn and Pepe release a whole new line of Pride-themed chainmail
Bengo Macarona is embraced as a gay icon
Reg Shoe decides the main pride event is too corporate, and organizes an alternative pride parade for the same time and place; this immediately gets subsumed by the main pride event. Some Omnians show up to Pride to protest and Reg is delighted to have someone to fight with.
Suddenly being smacked in the middle of this by the fact Vetinari was disappointed Vimes didn't properly handcuff him and made a note to get some proper shackles for next time
 'You're not going to handcuff me?' Vimes's mouth dropped open. 'Why should I do that?' 'Treason is very nearly the ultimate crime, Sir Samuel. I think I should demand handcuffs.' 'All right, if you insist.' Vimes nodded at Dorfl. 'Cuff him, then.' 'You haven't got any shackles, by any chance?' said Lord Vetinari, as Dorfly produced a pair of handcuffs. 'We may as well do this thing properly -' 'No. We don't have any shackles.' 'I was only trying to help, Sir Samuel. Shall we be going?' - Jingo
Dibbler pitches his mismatched flags by swearing up and down that each flag represents one of the lesser known genders and can be verified, absolutely verified, by the kind hardworking ladies/gents/et cetera of the Ankh Morpork Bureau of Gender.
Just reach your hand into the pile and pull out the flag that resonates with your unique gender!
Genre:Â nonfiction, memoir, social change, climate journalism, cultural change, solarpunk
The Dust Cover Copy
Sometimes the bravest thing we can do while facing an existential crisis is imagine life on the other side. This provocative and joyous book maps an inspiring landscape of possible climate futures.
Through clear-eyed essays and vibrant conversations, infused with data, poetry, and art, Ayana Elizabeth Johnson guides us through solutions and possibilities at the nexus of science, policy, culture, and justice. Visionary farmers and financiers, architects and advocates, help us conjure a flourishing future, one worth the effort it will take--from every one of us, with whatever we have to offer--to create.
If you haven't yet been able to picture a transformed and replenished world--or to see yourself, your loved ones, and your community in it--this book is for you. If you haven't yet found your role in shaping this new world or you're not sure how we can actually get there, this book is for you.
With grace, humor, and humanity, Johnson invites readers to ask and answer this ultimate question together: What if we get it right?
The Scene
Discussion
If youâre feeling lonesome, get this work as an audiobook. If youâre feeling depressed that nothingâs getting any better and nothingâs changing, get this book. Because it will help you put everything in perspective.
The work is framed pretty much like a serial podcast without the commercials. With introductory passages from the author, this work collects a series of over thirty interviews on the nitty-gritty improvements we must make to all elements of our culture in order to heal the planet and salvage a livable biome for humans. Each conversation begins with a bit about the interviewee, and ends with several questions including:
How screwed are we?
What are the top three things you wish people knew?
What would it look like if we fixed it?
What is the least sexy/interesting thing we need to work on for a better world?
Beyond that most interviews are free-flowing conversations that bring to life facts and observations that are sometimes sobering, sometimes beautiful, sometimes disturbing. and always pointing us towards a better tomorrow.
The section introductions add a feature I particularly like: each one lists ten things in two lists: Ten Problems, IE whatâs making it so hard to work towards a liveable ecological/economic system. And beside that, Ten Possibilities. So this book isnât making you any promises about Utopia. Itâs offering you reality, good and bad. Itâs telling you âthis is what is. And this is what is possible. Now weâre going to talk about what we do about thatâ.
For that, alone, it deserves a place on the bookshelf.
The Crowd
Host And Guests
The choices of guests and creative pieces to showcase for âWhat Ifâ were really spot on. I especially enjoyed the element of interdisciplinary effort. Interviewing a lot of people from a lot of fields was a stroke of genius, because you get to hear real people talking like real people instead of reading pages of polemic. The fact that Johnson thought to go beyond the usual coterie of scientist-geologist-engineer-public servant and go out to interview screen-writers on what an eco-romcom could look like, talk with educators and youth about how our education needs an overhaul, and speak to tribal members about what we can heal by just land improvement was absolutely huge. Itâs that diversity that makes this book a cut above. And more than that, itâs the humanity of these interviews. You get to hear about what the guestsâ day jobs really feel like. Youâre not reading graphs, youâre hearing how the scientist felt the gut punch when they saw the numbers on ice melt rates. But you also hear the emotion in the guestsâ voices when they talk about how good the world really could be. My only critique is that Johnson has a mildly irksome habit of interrupting the guests on the recordings, and I slightly winced at the repeated tendency. But thatâs a pretty small review nit to pick.
The Lingo
Writing Style
Johnson did some great things with writing style for this piece. Personal reflections of the author keep the work here and now (she talks at one point about mourning a reef she swam at her fatherâs house as a child, and that hits home viscerally. All of us can understand how bad things are when you canât go home to the childhood places you love again) And she allows her guests to do the same, which makes them human beings in conversation instead of expert talking heads. That really makes the difference between this work being an Important Treatise On The Crisis, and a companionable book that makes you remember that youâre not alone in this. This book because it is a conversation, and it brings you into the conversation. Reading it makes you feel like youâre sitting in on a really good after-hours bar conversation between the attendees at a climate convention. You feel included in a community of people doing lots of things to help heal this planet when youâre taking in these interviews. And, like the best cons, this collection reminds you that you arenât alone. This book reminds you that there are lots of people out there doing the work you care about too. As an audiobook, itâs wonderful chatty and yet deeply powerful listen that keeps you thinking about environmental improvement without making you yawn (and like I said, the lack of ads is a huge bonus).
The Moves
Flow
The layout intermixes the interviews with art and poetry, which makes the work flow in a refreshing and continually vibrant manner for listeners.
As a visual work, What If is an accessible read. Since itâs broken into so many discrete sections, another one of its virtues is that you can pick up and set down in any moment youâve got free. It may look like a massive doorstop of a book, but itâs actually a pretty breezy read. And yet lines out of it will stick with you long after the bookâs back on the shelf. Oh, and there are some amazing pictures. Did I mention the pictures?
THE PICTURES
Overall Rating
A valuable connection with the possibilities of the present and the future. Pick it up when you feel like youâre all alone. It helps.
This weekend, an entry from my Smoke and Roses series, revolving around the Victorian Language of Flowers
Apple- Fortune
Malus domestica
It may have been an apple that tempted Eve, but an apple blossom promised prettier things. âI prefer youâ said the one who sent their love a flowering sprig of apple, âfortune favors you.â
The scent rolled over him.
He looked up.
Overhead, a lilac tree was in bloom.
He stared.
Damn! Damn! Damn! Every year he forgot. Well, no. He never forgot. He just put the memories away, like old silverware that you didnât want to tarnish. And every year they came back, sharp and sparkling, and stabbed him in the heart. And today, of all daysâŠ
He reached up, and his hand trembled as he grasped a bloom and gently broke the stem. He sniffed at it. He stood for a moment, staring at nothing. And then he carried the sprig of lilac carefully back up to his dressing room.
This is part of a new series I've started, which I'm titling Verbum Agricola. I am a university-trained horticulturist, but I'm also half a Celt. I've never liked Latin. I've always felt wary of it. Pronouncing it in front of anyone else makes me feel insecure (and this is coming out of somebody who enjoys speaking Irish) So this year, I'm taking my professional weakness head-on by illustrating 100 of the most common botanical latin terms as a memory exercise. I'll use a plant for each illustration that has the word in it and personifies the word in a particularly obvious or interesting way.
Got a botanical latin term you'd like to see illustrated? Leave it in the comments.
This week: Acerosus
Meaning: Shaped like a needle
Specimen: Hibberta acerosa
today my wisdom is: the ecological crisis of our planet is not a thing that will Suddenly destroy us sometime in the next centuryâit has taken decades of continuous work for our biosphere to be preserved thus far, and it will take decades more of continuous work to continue preserving it.
The apocalypse is not a single event hovering in the future bearing down on us while we sit helplessly. We are at least 150 years into an ongoing "apocalypse."
Things will continue to steadily get worse without steady action, but "augh! it's already too late to stop climate change and mass extinctions!" is specifically the worst response
what I mean is, there is a persistent fallacy that the present situation of a thing is always worse than the past, even if there have been fluctuations in badness.
This is not true. There is a great wealth of specific cases where ecosystems/species/a specific anthropogenic impact on the environment is CURRENTLY, RIGHT NOW, better than it has been at any point in the past 100 years
I've been researching the history of conservation in the USA...and I think current doomers would benefit from knowing just how bad things got throughout the 20th century.
The eastern USA's natural environments were fucking razed. We went scorched earth on everything.
In the 1930's, DEER and WILD TURKEYS were almost eliminated from my state. Deer. Wild turkeys. Common animals that you can see all the time.
I've seen animals close to my home that a person in the 1970's would not have been able to see. I saw river otters and a bald eagle a couple months ago! Farmer family friend remembers when a bald eagle sighting here made the news. There is a thriving population of elk (16,000 animals) in the Appalachian Mountains, for the first time since before 1850!
We actively tried to exterminate so many species. Bison. Wolves. Mountain lions. The US GOVERNMENT PAID PEOPLE TO KILL CARNIVORES. They're still here. They're reclaiming their old territories. All is not lost
There was a time most American cities almost never saw a blue sky. Brown and yellow smog was the norm and rivers were garbage sludge that are now teeming with fish. People don't know that government environmental regulation actually did succeed, that the EPA really worked as intended. Now it gets eroded because people think it isn't making a big difference, and they think that because they haven't seen what it's still holding back.
Sam âheld a burning hot coal until it nearly took the skin off his hand while maintaining perfect calm and eye contact with the asshole in need of intimidation Just Becauseâ Vimes? Sam âsitting on the stoop with a mug of cocoa and a cigar, cautiously aware of every inch of the scene heâs buildingâ Vimes? Sam âcould just tear his sleeve to show the mark of the Summoning Dark but instead tears off his whole goddamn shirtâ Vimes? A drama queen? Reaching a bit donât you think
Yep, certainly doesnât seem to describe Sam âpretends to eat poison as a power moveâ Vimes. Not Sam âburies an axe in the table in the Rats Chamberâ Vimes.
I mean are we really talking about Sam âyes a whole room full of candles with wicks dipped in holy water is the best way to beat this vampireâ Vimes, here? Sam âhas fought bad guys on top of a speeding train AND a riverboat during a floodâ Vimes, really? Definitely Sam ânearly gets shot in the head by a crossbow bolt that shatters his shaving mirror and then uses the bolt to prop up a shard of said mirror to finish shavingâ Vimes weâre discussing here?
vimes did not resign from his post in protest, observe the rest of the watch resign from their posts in protest, recruit them into a militia, sail to the country they were at war with, and attempt to arrest two different armies for disturbing the peace so you could sit here and call him a drama queen, as though drama was some myffic quality bestowed by an accident of birth and not the inherent right of every creatively petty and histrionic citizen of ankh-morporkÂ
Genre:Â ecopunk, near-future, social change, dystopia
The Dust Cover Copy
Charlie and Parker are punks by night, biohackers by day, living in the stuttering decay of near-future climate-collapse London.
They pay for the beer they don't steal with money from their sketchy astronomy site Zodiac Code, while Charlie's bio-bespoke augments equip the criminals, punks, and eco-warriors of London. They have to deal with disgruntled clients, scene kids who don't dig their band, and a city that's run by corporates and criminals. Their world is split into three factions: Green â who are still trying to save the world; Blue â who try to profit while they can, and Black â who see no hope left.
When a group of extremist Green activists hire them for a series of jobs ranging from robbery to murder, Charlie â who struggles to feel anything except Black â wants to walk away. But Parker still believes they can make a difference, and urges her to accept.
As they enter an escalating biological arms race against faceless corporations, amoral biohackers, and criminal cyberpunks, Charlie will have to choose what she believes in. Is there still hope, and does she have a right to grab it?
The Scene
Worldbuilding
Okay, so you guys know I took a pretty big break from writing book reviews.
Well, this is the book that got me back in. This is one of those books that makes you want to pin down all your friends and gush âokay I just read this book and lemme tell youâŠâ
In this work, Green has done something very similar to what I wanted to do when I wrote the Aces High, Jokers Wild series. Put all the fears on the page. Then figure out what the hell to do about them. In this case, itâs a an eco-punk/scene punk rollick set in a tropical-hot and miasmatic London and a future where all the powers that be did jack. Nothing got better, even when we knew just how much we were screwing over the environment. So we got what we paid for. We got climate change to the max. We got one wave of pandemic after another. We got drowned and baked and fried and we still didnât learn. At a certain point everything got deregulated, everybody got cut loose by the government, and now the only thing that really gets protected is corporate profits. The power went off and all the bills came due, but the human race was partying too hard to pay attention.
The new generation born into this mess got depressed. Some locked out the world and lived in VR. Some died. Or they got focused. Some zeroed in on making their own lives as perfect and self-actualized as possible. Some looked for safety in corporate jobs with walled enclaves and worked away their fears. Some got creative. They screwed with their own genes to let them sleep less, grew interesting/strange/gross vat meat for something new to taste, got crazy tattoos and implants and haircuts to have something to be excited about. Live now, screw the world.
Some of the newcomers, they got angry. They went to the marches and screamed the chants and did everything they could to say THE WORLD IS BEING KILLED AND IT DOESNâT HAVE TO BE THIS WAY!!! Some went further. They started throwing molotov cocktails at petrol-burning cars. They made plans. They performed eco-sabotage. They raided mining operations and killed climate criminals. They sank tankers and bombed electric stations. They stopped asking nicely and stated: stop fucking the world up. Or else.
And some kids born into the middle of this whole mess just lived and did their best. They turned up the music and danced. Theyâve got three rules:
No snitching
No pigs, no corpos.
Donât be a cunt
And somehow, some way, they still have resolve. They still have the drive to make things better. At least on the good days, they do. Hope is going out. But it isnât gone yet.
The Crowd
Characterization
Told in the shifting voices of four main characters, this work holds up a cast that are both interesting people in their own right and avatars of the approaches we can take to living well in a hard world full of hard choices.
Charlie: your access character and every-girl. Torn between the Black (read, nihilism and learned helplessness at the overwhelming eco-devastation) and the Green (read, relentless fighting to do everything you can to help the environment heal). In love, in a band, in a squat on old industrial land. World-weary but still smiling, when she can. Trying her best on the good days. About to be in more trouble than she can imagine.
Scrimshaw: Too much drugs, too much violence, too little common sense, too much machismo. The inevitable human result of a âtake what you can and screw the other guyâ culture. Loyal to very few things. And did I mention INSANE? This POV has most of the truly cyberpunk stuff in it. The splattery âoh I did not want to know the human body could come apart that wayâ kind of stuff. And yet, under all that, there is a loyalty. And a code. And somethingâŠdare I say something that could be redeemed?
The Mole: Through this characterâs eyes, you are faced with the raw and bloody results of our cultural decisions. You want a sleek little smart watch? Then somewhere, a child is stuck in a mining camp that provides selenium, being worked to death. And when genetic modification and bio-tech become cheap, then somewhere, someone says âthese are my tools, optimize themâ. And the tools heâs talking about are children.
Mole was one of those kids from one of those exploited countries. She can never have a normal human life, not after what the owners did to her. But she might just have her revenge.
The Ghost: A true-blue. Power matters. Profit matters. Knowledge matters. Nothing else matters. Except maybe his amusement. Psychopath? Probably. Clever? Yes. Sophisticated? Definitely. Evil? Oh you donât know the half of it yet.
Woven around these characters are their various communities: friends, followers, enemies, and guys you run into when youâre in the scene. In fact, itâs one of the friends that probably sums the message and the philosophy of this work up perfectly.
âIâm not saying they are going to save the world. But fuck me, Iâd rather try than not.â
-Zoot
Writing Style
This story made me want to march. It made me want to put on The Interrupters and Flobots and Gaslight Anthem and Social Distortion and Mischief Brew and just rock out for a while. It made me want to act and it made me want to dance. It made me feel.
It pulled this off with tight, punchy lines that still had room for punk poetry. Its word choice was voicey. The narrator nailed that so hard in the audio. You can taste London fog and weird vape fumes in the slang. You can hear the slick of tires and the shouts of the street in the rhythms. When it switched points of view, it really switched. You got to know the urbane rhythms of the corporate psychopath. The hair trigger one-liners of the adrenaline junkie. The clean composure of the zealot with exactly one cause to live for. And the tired humor of the punk-rock bio gal just trying to get through the day. That made it all so much more real. In the print copy itâs pulled off visually with syncopated layouts, cute and clever glyphs, andâget thisâno dialogue tags. As in, none of âthis stuffâ. Yeah, itâs a little confusing to read at first. But let me tell you, it sure tells the reading eye that all the rules are out the window.
The Moves
Plot
This is a book written on several levels. On the surface, itâs a cleanly written adventure story with a punk-rock soundtrack and classic Brit-dystopic vibes. The goals couldnât be set more clearly. Steal the flower. Kill the ghost. Save the world. Three missions. Clean. Simple. Direct. Oh, and donât die. Thatâs important too. On the surface itâs an energetic, punchy rollick of a story with a swagger-step, a South London accent and a plot you could make a movie out of.
Below that, this story is a love letter to the punk scene and the liminal spaces we make for ourselves on the edges of things. The really cool shows that are all the more exciting because youâre holding them where you shouldnât. The meal that tastes so good because youâve been living on beans and toast for a week. The little piece of good luck that can feel so amazing when things have been bad a while.
One level down from that, Extremophile is a meditation on whatâs worth doing, whatâs worth living for, and what it takes to live in this beautiful and broken world. Itâs a taking into account all the tenuous joys and sorrows of being a living, social being in a bad time for society. One day you realize you hurt a peer, and have to figure out how to make amends. Another day your favorite band notices you, and youâre on top of the world. One day, you remember all the things youâve messed up and you want to cry and you want to die. Another day you see something so wicked cool that all you can do is grin and be in that moment and enjoy it. Another day youâre so furiously outraged by the fuckers who screwed the world that you vow to die fighting them. And some days, thatâs all the same day.
And at its deepest level, this work is a poem of love and loss and grief. The final chapter makes that achingly clear. Itâs justâŠwell, here. Read it.
That right there? Thatâs poetry. Thatâs loving a broken world that is so, so beautiful. That right there made me cry happy tears.
Overall Rating
A stoked and synthed strut through a future I really hope we donât have to live in. But if we do, this is our promise that there will still be blackbirds and people to love, guitars and something to do and songs to sing. That, Iâll raise a glass to.
So you can avoid them stealing things from you, the artist/writer, etc.
Pro GenAI websites/Programs:
Facebook
Instagram
X/Twitter (Remember, Grok gives people cancer)
Threads
Pro Writing Aid
Grammarly
Duolingo
Google Docs
Microsoft Word/all Microsoft products Takes from and will feed their machine.
Youtube (taking advantage of people who are hearing impaired. ==;;)
Adobe Products. All of them. If you HAVE to use them (Some businesses require it), save offline because there is a film of at least some privacy protections there, so if you have to sue, you can say it violates US privacy law. Remember, contracts do not circumvent US law.
Corel won't feed the machines, but still uses AI stolen from other artists. Which sucks since Corel Draw is the second best overall for vector programs. (Plus I love Painter, but I bought the offline version to avoid AI). (Canadian company)
Canva Takes and feeds their machine.
Deviant Art Not only supports AI, but put a tool in and said they are going to steal your work if you like it or not for their machine.
Sketchup went Pro-GenAI. The thing is that you can do the same thing in Blender these days with precise measurements.
Autodesk has stated they are Pro-Gen AI here. It is not clear if they will use your models to feed their machine. But be on guard. They make Maya and 3Dmax. You can replace it with Blender.
Neutral ground:
Tumblr (there is a way to opt out [Link] and they don't have an active AI machine.) https://www.tumblr.com/dookins/743519550598987776/heres-how-to-disable-third-parties-like-ai
Etsy allows GenAI, but still has some (minor) restrictions. I'd still be cautious. (Also be cautious of drop shippers). Complaints about too much AI and AI images+patterns made by Ai still exist on the website. They lean slightly more pro-AI, but still won't let it run completely amok, say like Facebook. They won't feed your work into a machine, but also don't ban it through robots.txt.
Bluesky They don't use an AI algorithm except for in the "Discover" section of their website, but while they are anti-GenAI strongly, they don't seem to block the Gen AI bots from entry, so you'd still have to use Nightshade or Glaze (links below). There is no opt-out because they don't need an opt out. (Leaning towards strong position on AI, but I wish they would block GenAI bots).
Searxng- If you super want to screw over Google, in general, and have some tech savvy, you can set up your own search engine through searxng. It's easier on Windows and Linux than it is on a Mac. (Mac you need Docker), but if you're determined on privacy, Searxng adds a layer of privacy. Some of it sometimes uses bits of AI, but most of it doesn't and you can fuss with the settings so it doesn't spit out AI results. At sheer minimum Google will stop spitting out weird videos on Youtube at you because in your private browsing, you searched for the origin of ball bearings while not logged in for a book and Google likes to break privacy laws.
Strong positions against AI:
Scrivener (Creator vowed against AI) Writing program. There is an active forum, and versions for Mac, Linux and PC. It is paid, but at ~60 USD, it's cheaper than most programs. There is usually a holiday sale around Christmas. It has a learning curve, but with an active forum with the programmer of it there to ask obscure questions it's not a dead zone. They often take suggestions and implement them over time. (Especially if you rank the importance, applications, etc) US company.
LibreOffice Open source and free Spreadsheet and Word processor program that can replace Microsoft Word. Some people might have seen older versions where it was called Neo Office (now extinct) and Open Office. LibreOffice is still populated, plus the forums are super helpful if you get stuck. The UX is pretty intuitive if you've used Microsoft Word. Scrivener, BTW, supports exporting to odt (the native file) as well as .doc, and this can open both. The slight thing is that sometimes it doesn't export to .doc smoothly. And I DO wish more magazines, and agent (big clue here) supported .odt files since it is free. Part of the reason .odt isn't as supported is because Microsoft and Adobe have a deal with the devil with each other, so Adobe's Book formatting program InDesign doesn't support ODT. (BTW, if you have a good open source replacement for InDesign that supports ODT, let me know.)
Dabble (as suggested by SF stories, see reblog) is a writing program. Similar to Scrivener. Has vowed against AI and to resist it. 108 dollars a year for Basic. It is almost twice the price of Scrivener who lets you update for fairly cheap. 29 dollars a month, v. 59 dollars for the whole program (Scrivener) for the same features of Premium. You choose.
yWriter is a free Writing program and like Scrivener, and has vowed against AI Last I looked it had some UX issues, but some people swear by it. The learning curve is higher than Scrivener which is saying something.
Ellipsus is an online writing program and vowed against AI. The main feature I like (which Scrivener doesn't have) is the ability to change spellcheck based on region/language. It is a requested feature of Scrivener, but lower priority. So if you have a Brit, you can get the spelling for the character. They are a British-based company.
Cara.app (The creator of the website sued GenAI there is no chance they'll convert) is an artist website. Cara is trying to institute an auto Glaze/Nightshade into the website if given enough funds. People see it as a soft replacement for deviant art. (which went fully AI) If you believe in human art, please donate if you can. Zhang Jingna, the Creator,is Chinese-Singporean. She lives in Singapore.
Clip Studio Paint added AI, but saw the light and decided to protect artists instead because of protest and removed it. There are tutorials and a good forum if you get super stuck. Based in Japan, so the UI and UX is really clean.
Davinci Resolve Pro is a film editing software that's super good. There is a free version and a paid version. The forums are responsive. The programmers aren't always present. There is a healthy group of tutorials. US company. Clean UX. It does take a little bit of time to remember the shortcuts.
Tahoma2D is anti-AI and open source animation program. Takes a little getting used to, but is good for animations and doesn't crash as often as Animate. Programmers are in the forums and some bugs are fixed within hours. The forums are super responsive and helpful.
Krita open source and free, no AI. I'd rank it secondary to Clip Studio Paint (which is paid) I haven't tried the forums, but it's pretty intuitive and can stand for a lower level replacement for Painter, and do a lot of the basics of Photoshop. It's usually ranked higher than the equally open source Gimp.
Writer P AKA Writer+ (app for when you're on the go) is a simple word processor app for your phone that doesn't use AI. The original programmer stopped updating, so Writer+ person took over and isn't out to make a profit since it's free in the spirit of the original app. It has subfolders you can use. Since it was programmed before GenAI it doesn't have AI. Intuitive, easy to use. Fairly easy to upload the files through three dots->share. The files can save to your card or phone with some settings fussing. Simple word processor.
Inkscape is a free vector program and no AI. It is harder to use than illustrator and has less features. But if you're doing smaller vectors for one-offs with less complexity, it'll do you after some learning curve. Best of the lot. I hate Affinity Designer which is the same thing, only paid. (Neither Affinity program was worth the money paid)
Affinity (Designer, etc) swore to be AI-free and does Vector and Photos. The UX is messy, I dislike the program and regret paying for it. Inkscape and Krita are better UX and do the same thing. The forums aren't as friendly since there has been an onslaught of people seeing it's supposed to be a replacement for Photoshop and Illustrator, but the programmers aren't present. The people on the forums are often on edge about this assertion. And the capabilities of the program don't outshine basically Krita or Inkscape capabilities (both free). What is usually intuitive is not. UK company. If you're going to pay for a program, go for Clip Studio Paint which rivals Corel Painter.
Blender is a 3D art program and does not use GenAI. It can do 2D animation, but Tahoma is easier to use in this regard. It's open source and free. Plus there are plenty of tutorials. The forums can be touch and go sometimes, but there are plenty of sub Blender communities that might be responsive. It can also do animation.
Handmade vowed against AI and promised to never sell itself for stock prices to prevent AI (as a replacement for Etsy.)
Discover a world of creativity and craftsmanship through Handmade, an innovative platform connecting passionate artisans with discerning buy
Proton (to replace Google Suite) as suggested by SF Stories (see reblog) Vowed against AI. They are missing a spreadsheet, but have online and offline capabilities, plus a built-in VPN.
But you need a pro website...
Look up robots.txt and AI bots: https://www.cyberciti.biz/web-developer/block-openai-bard-bing-ai-crawler-bots-using-robots-txt-file/
Use cloudflare:
Use Nightshade:
https://nightshade.cs.uchicago.edu/whatis.html
which will poison the algorithm
Use Glaze:
Take Away:
The thing is you think you doing it alone will do nothing, but the more AI feeds on itself, AI images, the worse they become, and the less detailed so, denying it the images, adding poison or not being able to read the human text is eventually going to lead to an AI collapse.
Analysis shows that indiscriminately training generative artificial intelligence on real and generated content, usually done by scrapi
And why not help that along?
I don't want to give cancer to poor people [Link] or make the planet burn faster [Link]. So GenAI collapse is everything I dream of. GenAI apocalypse is not.
I keep seeing people asking âis solarpunk really punk?â because itâs too happy and optimistic and stuff
and Iâm picturing a perfect moment in a solarpunk community â the neighbourhood mayor standing with a shit-eating grin on her face when the cops come and cut them off from city power, and nothing turns off
This is my absolute favorite example of how solarpunk is punk. Also, Detroit (and a lot of other places) could probably use something similar for water. Especially in places where itâs illegal to harvest rainwater. I dunno, maybe water tanks cleverly designed as yard art?
Like⊠yeah itâs happy and optimistic, but my view of solarpunk at least is in complete defiance of many capitalist ideals so if thatâs not punk ⊠âPunkâ isnât edgy, dark and gritty. Not to me. Building a society completely based on renewable resources, accessibility for all, and constant sharing is a big fuck you to the current system if you ask me.
Exactly. Near future solarpunk especially requires rebelling against the current system. Punk is about defiance (at least thatâs what itâs come to mean colloquially). Defiance doesnât have to be destruction and violence and grit, it can look like stubborn creation and community building and rejecting many of the dominant systemâs values.Â
Thereâs an interpretation of the concept of property that says if something has value, then someone should be getting paid for it. Despite being flatly absurd and riddled with obvious logical flaws, this has been one of the major philosophies of property in the US, in some contexts (including water) for over a hundred years. This Washington Post article gets into it in detail.Â
According to this logic, if there are water suppliers in a region, then theyâre entitled to money when people get water. Collecting rainwater for yourself gets around that, so, in this concept of property, itâs a form of theft.
There have also been legal battles over people growing food in their lawns, generating their own electricity, etc. If youâre looking to extricate yourself from the systems wherein you have to serve the interests of specific wealthy people to survive, many parts of the western world are ready to use the force of government intervention to stop you.
I feel like a big chunk of the âdark, grittyâ aesthetic punk is associated with came as a reaction to the bright, glamorous âAmerican Dreamâ imagery and patronizing ad campaigns of the 50s.
But now that weâre being sold âThe future is bleak and dirty and thereâs nothing you can do about it,â being optimistic and cheerful is the most punk and rebellious thing you can do
This. Exactly this. Solarpunk is helping your neighbors (especially the ones you're told not to bother with) and finding your ways to help heal the damaged world a little bit and giving the finger to anyone who tells you some version of 'that's not how this works, the world won't let you do that'. Actually, it's giving them two middle fingers and a massive grin. Standing up to the profiteers and the doomers and the despair with dirt under your nails, ripped pants you stitched up yourself, and a shirt your buddy working on a refurbished sewing machine whipped up for you when you gave them that MASSIVE basket of summer fruit and veg.
Two middle fingers to the apocalypse. An open hand to the neighbors. An eye on how to do better by the living world. That's the whole thing.
