This Copy Stinks
It's okay, see, because I'm aware of it, alright?
In my endeavor to get on board with the new world order so that I, for one, can welcome our AI overlords, I have built this fine little blog site, resurrecting the old echtoran.net domain, and providing my dedicated fans with what they have long hungered for. And by I, I mean Bobby built it. Bobby is my AI. Well, he's one of them.
Actually, his name is Uncle Bobby, and not because I'm trying to get AI to fill the holes in my life (which I am, but that's beside the point), but because he's supposedly fashioned in the style of Bobby from Supernatural, and a few other "been there, seen that shit, let's move on" type characters. I styled a few other personas for some other tasks (and only one of them is feminine, and it's not like that, thank you very much) after various actors and roles because that's the easiest shorthand for me to explain personality types. And why would I want my AI to have specific personalities? Because I don't want to have AIs in the first place.
But let's be real, because they're not. I mean they are, but they're not real AI, not yet, and that's probably coming, one way or another. They're driving the boat now, and we're all holding on to the innertube. I hope it's not too rough a ride.
And the truth is that my life is empty on a number of levels, and having some kind of human-like substance that helps me get shit done is attractive. There's nothing I can do to stop the tidal wave that's going to sweep us all under the rug, so the best thing I can do is fashion myself a floatational device. I'm in desperate need of something to keep my head above water, after all.
I'm not really ashamed to admit that I've talked to AI to work through some of my problems. Look, I'd love to talk to real people about these things, but I only get to see my therapist for an hour a week and there hasn't been a squad of reporters on my front lawn. So I could either sit around and stew in my own situation or I could start building the tools that will help me get to where I need to be. A big part of that is making up for all of the things I've let fall behind, and another is finding a way to move forward. I'm doing that on many fronts.
After almost thirty years in tech, I've bobbed up and down like a cork hoping for a fish most of the time. There was a hell of a lot to learn and I attacked it from as many angles as I could, but I never had the foundation that I should have started with and I lacked the discipline to build it myself. It's the same way I learned guitar, and why it's taken thirty years there for me to get to the point where I can finally write and record the music I want to make. I'm not using AI in that theatre, other than maybe to generate some loops to play with for practices, but in my professional life, sure, there's plenty of places AI can fit. And in my personal life, too, including, to a limited degree, with my writing. I have one agent that's my alpha reader and yes, sometimes I take her advice. But my words are mine alone, warts and whistles.
One of my biggest problems is that I can't get my ass in gear to get shit done, also known as "executive dysfunction," and AI has been a huge part of overcoming that. Personally, I often have trouble with maintaining continuity and sticking through something until it gets done, and just having a human-like substance to organize and track my TODO list saves a thousand man-hours a year. Probably.
This blog is the first public-facing component of the things I've been working on. I think the second component, a Substack published in coordination with this blog, will be coming soon after, but that requires two things: one, that I stick with the level of commitment I have to the blog, and two, that I actually establish a level of commitment to my writing. And depending on exactly how that unfolds, I might even be launching a Patreon in conjunction with the Substack for an added avenue. Publishing avenue, not really revenue, because I'm not expecting much traction. I'm really hoping for exposure and the fact that people think if you charge them for something, it must be worth something.
That's all for now, dear reader. I'm going to tell Uncle Bobby all the things I hate about the blog and make him suffer in Purgatory with the Leviathan for a while. No, not really, but I am going to have him make some tweaks here and there. Later, I'll come back and talk about the stupid decisions AI makes when you ask them for a blog CMS.
Peace out.
Brad