AI

I’m a big fan of text-to-speech software. In part I just don’t like reading small text on a screen and in part it’s nice to be able to “read” a 120+ page PDF report while I patch a hole in my messenger bag or tune my guitar, or masturbate furiously to Internet porn, whatever. The text-to-speech software serves a useful function. Plus you can change the voices. It gives the reading some personality; albeit one that sounds like the offspring of Rosie from the Jetsons (fuck you, I’m not that old) and an espresso machine.

I wish I had the same ability to change the personality on my Alexa-enabled speaker as well. Not in a bad way, but in a way that might actually force the user to be polite. Alexa doesn’t require “please” or “thank you” and I gauran-damn-tee you that when the 5-10 year old kids today have to start dealing with real people their lack of politeness is going to get them punched.

Maybe we make her a sassy drag queen so that when I say “Alexa play my music on shuffle” she responds with a “bitch I know I heard you say ‘please’” Or we add in an Alec Baldwin personality so that when the kid asks the time but doesn’t sound grateful about it he gets a five minute voicemail with yelling and profanity.  Or give her a Kanye personality so that when I ask the weather and complain about it being too hot, I get a non-sequitur rant about how climate change was created by the Chinese and we need to clean up the forests #RakeAmericaGreatAgain.

Just something a little less conciliatory than the far too permissive personality that Alexa has today. Even a simple filter where you need to make your request with a “please” or she reacts like your ex and starts talking to you while facing in the opposite direction from you. And if you don’t say “thank you” after a few seconds, you get a sarcastic “you’re welcome.”

In the future we’re going to be interacting with limited AI-enabled devices like this more and more. Perhaps we'll even have general AI within my lifetime. They learn from us. We already stopped functioning with basic politeness in society – side note to the PHALANX OF ASSHOLES CROSSING THE STREET, PEOPLE ARE TRYING TO CROSS IN THE OPPOSITE DIRECTION, WALKING NEXT TO THE JACKASS IN THE WINDBREAKER DOES NOT GET YOU TO YOUR FUCKING DESTINATION FASTER THAN WAKING A STEP BEHIND HIM BUT IT DOES PUT ME INTO ONCOMING TRAFFIC YOU FUCKING DOUCHE. I’m getting off topic.

If we can’t rely on basic courtesy, at least within our homes, we’re all fucking doomed. It took humanity less than a day to turn Tay, Microsoft’s AI chatbot system, from a teenager online (already bad enough) into a fucking racist. We did that. People. The machines learn from us and by not enforcing common decency on our children as they interact with those devices, we’ll be teaching them the same behavior. Just a lot slower, because children are idiots.

I mean look, in the short term this is a relatively simple fix in software. And in the long term, it’s not going to matter, because Skynet is going to kill us all in a Pyhrric battle to try and save the planet by wiping out humanity. But in the medium term, in the middle distance, we have a chance to mold the development of our children and our children’s children. To shape a society where common courtesy isn’t so rare. Because when you don’t teach basic human decency and social interaction to machines, that’s how you get Mark Zuckerberg.

Jeopardy! needs a swimsuit competition

Is it weird that I'm checking out Jeopardy! contestants? No, no. I know it's sexist. I get that. I don't care. I'm asking is it weird that I think she's kinda hot and I'm wondering if she's single?

Doing The Job

For now, my thoughts and prayers are with the bullets. In these mass shootings, the President blames the victims for not having armed guards at a church, the NRA tells you to concealed carry a 9mm in yoga pants that can't conceal the Costco muffin you had for breakfast. Congress is fucking useless and State governments can't solve for lax gun laws in neighboring States so they generally don't bother trying. Cops try to shoot back and typically wound the shooter or, more often, he shoots himself. Republicans want to provide mental health care, by voting to fucking repeal health care laws and Democrats are so fearful of pissing someone off they're useless (though to be fair, I wouldn't trust the hipster who made my coffee with a water pistol, let alone a 1911 or a Glock 19). In all of this fucking idiocy, the only things actually doing their goddamn job are the bullets. So until somebody else decides to actually serve their fucking purpose instead of wasting space, my thoughts and prayers are with the bullets. Keep it up.

Childish

I've voted at the same polling place for like two decades and I've never actually gotten a sticker. I know it sounds like I'm a child, but I want a sticker. Also a pony.

Norms

What I really want is some damn consistency. All year long you tell your kids not to take candy from strangers. Then for no reason other than the date you encourage it. Where's the adherence to standards and norms?

Baby Arugula

Last week I bought a giant thing of salad because it was $5 at Safeway and its more salad that I’ll eat in a week. Incidentally, it’s organic salad in a giant plastic bin, which seems kind of counterproductive because a giant plastic bin is not only non-organic, I’m not even sure it’s recyclable. So while you’re busy eating organic greens you toss more non-biodegradable plastic onto the planet and take up space that can no longer be used to grow organic greens. On the plus side, some of that plastic will end up in the ocean and kill a turtle or something. Why are you going to try and sell me on some hippie organic shit and then put it in a giant plastic tub? These people make no sense.
I’m getting off track here.
Okay, so I bought a salad, only they didn’t have the one I normally get, that's like an actual salad mix, so I just grabbed one without really looking at it and it turns out I bought a giant plastic tub of only organic baby arugula. Which I’m pretty sure is actually one of the alien species from Star Wars and not actually a vegetable. It’s not that I dislike arugula per se, but it’s not something I’d like to eat 15 handfuls of. I mean even cocaine dealers cut their product a little. You can’t toss in some baby spinach or lettuce or something? Whoever is marketing this is trying to get all Pablo Escobar on my salad and I don’t particularly appreciate it.
Okay wait, I’m getting off track again.
So I bought a giant tub of baby arugula and as it turns out, the day before, someone had sent me the link to that stupid “Baby Shark” song that makes no sense because 1 – Sharks don’t have the same family structures as people, B – you don’t ‘run' away from a shark unless you’re in a Sharknado or you’re a fucking idiot; you swim away and then get eaten. Learn your fucking verbs. And, 3 – If I have to hear that song again Imma cut a bitch. But that song made me think about the “Baby Beluga” song. Subsequently, since I bought a giant tub of baby arugula, I have had “baby arugula” stuck in my head to the tune of “baby beluga” but with intermittent “doo doo doo doo doo doo doo” from the stupid baby shark song. This was like 3-4 days ago and it’s still in my head. Suicide is very much an option at the moment.
All of which is to say I learned that I’m not nearly as clever as I thought I was and I’m like, twice as old as I feel.