Hubby did. I'm certain of it. Why? I was traveling for business, went to our US headquarters on the outskirts of Chicago and I was busy, tied up in meetings morning to night - not joking. When I returned home and the Uber driver dropped me off hubby awaited, kissed, and hugged me out on the porch. Also, there were flowers everywhere in the house waiting for me. Dark pink roses by the entrance. Some lovely mixed flowers on my creative desk and more roses on my nightstand. High five for my hubby (and flowers)!
Hubby is a keeper and I'm lucky to have him
I'm also lucky to have all of you who have not given up on me yet despite my stretches of breaks between posts. Earlier in January I really thought I had it down and was back to a consistent two maybe three posts a week but for the past two weeks, I haven't posted and only commented very little. As mentioned I was traveling and after my return, I needed some serious relaxation and time away from monitors (*the computer kind, not my little pet monitor*), so I started digging out my acrylic paints again. That was actually triggered by a series of posts by @ erikah about her endeavors in *pouring acrylics*. I will have to try this soon as well, I like the abstracts you can create with this technique. For now, I simply painted this (*a how-to post will be coming soon*)
Coincidentally, this was also the time AI-everything really hit me. For a few months, I read about AI-generated images with Midjourney and Stablediffusion and all the others. At that time I was very curious about it, new technology is fascinating, and now with going mainstream and all of its possibilities. But as an artist, I was also somewhat annoyed that artworks of real artists were being used to generate new works of art and that some AI-generated art is not labeled as such but being presented as, hmm, real (for lack of a better word) art.
Around that time I was invited to a new Hive game's Discord server to possibly help with their art. While I was in their artist/writer channel the game's creator entered and proclaimed how within a few minutes he had created images with an AI art generator and how everyone could use those images for their posts or whatever they wanted. The writers in the channel were cheering upon this news which on the one hand I get but on the other hand - I don't. I basically went MIA in that channel.
Only a week or two later, the next AI-driven tech hit the news. Now ChatGPT, AI-written content, blogs, articles, and even whole books are the next big thing - or maybe they're already old and there's something else new(er)? This again hit home, because I'm a blogger, not a writer but how much easier would it be to let the content be written by AI instead of ourselves finding the right words for our ideas? Fascinating, yes, but also
In my mind, cheating. And cheating irritates me, a lot.
This is my long-winded way of saying that I didn't blog because I was mulling over the dilemma of why should I bother making an effort to create content?
Somewhere I read that there's hope that if AI can do things better and faster than humans, humans will have more time for things they really care about like family, hobbies, etc. That would be great but - what if art/writing is their hobby? And how are humans going to make money to live that life if AI is doing the work they used to do? Aren't we AI-ing us out of business? It reminds me a lot of the industrial and digital revolutions. Humanity survived and humans thrived after or during those. So maybe the times we're living in now will someday be called the AI revolution. Who knows...
For now, even though AI can paint and write better and definitely a lot faster than I can - should I really bother painting and writing? My answer to that is: YES. For one I enjoy the art of creating art. The result may not be as beautiful and appealing as AI art but it is mine. Same with my writing. I enjoy sharing my creations and thoughts in my personal way and therefore I think
This blog will continue to exist with the same flawed writing and painting
(And possible breaks here and there.) How about you? What are your thoughts about AI-everything? Really, AI already is all around us. Just google 'best AI apps 2023' and you'll be amazed to see that you're probably already using AI. Siri, Cortana, Alexa, etc. they're AI-driven as well as translators, Pandora, Spotify, and Netflix all use some sort of AI and there are so much more.
And that's it for my ramble of the day thoughtful daily post.
I hope you're having a great weekend!
Cheers,
(Ocean)Bee
p.s. Sharing a picture/joke by my hubby:
Unless otherwise noted, copyright for all photos, dividers and gifs ©Oceanbee|ImagesByCW
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