MARINETTE:

Look at this amazing drawing that @smilingsam made as my secret santa T^T.

The tags say it all #in my head it's showing how they're trying to support each other whilst each blaming themselves for everything 

It totally captures all the messy emotions that Ladybug and Chat are feeling. Love for each other, incredible guilt and shame and fear.

Thank you so much @smilingsam for this incredible drawing ❤︎

Merry Christmas @ladyblorg

This is my take on the last scene of the London special for @mlsecretsanta

@juxsweet I was your secret santa! Thank you so much for wanting to see some fluffy Adrinette. I had so much fun drawing this sweet moment ❤︎ In my mind Adrien fell asleep while Mari and him were watching TV. They aren't together yet so seeing Adrien let go of his perfect self tears at Mari's heartstrings. She can't help but continue to talk to him as he is loosing the battle with consciousness, mumbling answers, until his breathing evens out. For a breathless minute Mari is just in awe and the words she's been longing to say are stuck in her throat until she whispers them into existence.

@mlsecretsanta

I just wanted to say that u have an incredibly delightful drawing style !! It makes me smile to see your art! It’s so fun and endearing, and you convey expressions so well

Writing stories for the MLB characters is so fun and trying to push their expressions is such a joy.

And hearing that you smile when you see my art makes me so happy, there is honestly nothing better then that! Thank you so so much for telling me (˶ᵔᵕᵔ˶)♡♡♡

Have you ever thought of what shadybug x adrien would be like?

Thank you so much for asking! Surprisingly I actually hadn't. I think because I was living in an AU world created in my head. Somehow I kept thinking of stories with Marinette transformed as "Lady Noir" (I call her Dark Paw) rather then "Shadybug".

But since you are asking, I think that since Marinette dislikes Adrien (at least in my head-canon), Shadybug would dislike Adrien too. That said I think being Shadybug would let her see a different side to Adrien, since Griffe Noire in turn dislikes Shadybug too. Untransformed, Adrien doesn't quite know how to interact with Marinette because he really likes her which makes their interactions quite awkward with lots of misunderstandings. But I think Shadybugs interactions with Adrien would be filled with much more heated dislike, which I think Shadybug (Marinette) would know how to deal with better. I could even imagine that she would miss that interaction in her daily life. The simplicity of it. I think for Mari, there is something freeing about telling people off and having someone equally give back in turn. She wouldn't have to put up a front or pretend. I could totally see Mari getting closer with Adrien as a result.

(˶ᵔᵕᵔ˶)♡

Anonymous, thank you so so much for asking this question!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It lead to this stream of consciousness writing which was so fun!!! I can picture what their dynamic would be like so much more now! Thank you so so much ♡

I was in a storyboarding mood when I drew this panel. Mari is standing behind Adrien and he going to have to mitigate how to react when he turns around lol.... Adriens thoughts would probably be going crazy like: 'Did I hear her right? What emotion is my face showing right now!!!?!? WTF DO I DO?!?!' "Me...Chat Noir.....<gulp>...what...what made you think that...hahaha?!?"

How would you guys want the reveal to go down? ♥

The inspiration for this was an amazing picture of Chat I found on Pinterest. He had super flooffy hair!!! I had so much fun drawing this even if I totally didn't do him justice like the original artist did (whose name I can't read T^T). Please please go check them out!

To my LGBTQIA+ friends ❤️🧡💛💚💙💜

I wanted to reach out because I can't even imagine the anger and fear that some of you must be experiencing after being told in the US that your lived experience is "imagined" and that you in fact don't exist.

I'm an ally and if you ever need anything I'm here

You are real and beautiful 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️

Automattic will sign a contract with OpenAI for Midjourney to learn off of Tumblr and Wordpress

Hello! Automattic, Tumblr's parent company, will sign a contract with OpenAI and Midjourney so Midjourney can learn off of Tumblr's and WordPress' art and other user data. :) (The full text of this article is copy/pasted in the cut below). You can opt out! but I truly cannot imagine a more idiotic or out of touch decision on the part of Tumblr's CEO.

First thing's first: When/if this goes live, opt out of this immediately. Do this even if you're not an artist. The more people opt out, the less valuable this contract is to Midjourney. in an ideal world, literally all of the active users would opt out, but if we can even get to 50% that's pretty delicious.

Second: Contact Tumblr Support. It's vital that you do this politely. Tumblr staff is not responsible for this decision and the point of doing this is to show the userbase's unwillingness to be involved in this, not harangue Tumblr staff. (Seriously, stop haranguing Tumblr staff). Here's a script:

Hi, I'm writing in to express my disappointment in Automattic's pending contract with OpenAI to sell user data. Midjourney is already embroiled in copyright lawsuits, and it is not possible to train it without compromising copyright, including violating the IP of artists on this site. I strongly protest this contract and will opt out if it goes live. Depending on the privacy terms around what user data is sold to OpenAI and why, it is possible I will leave the platform entirely. Thank you for your time.

Third: Download Glaze and start poisoning them prompts, my friends

Fourth: Stare into the middle distance for a second with me because holy fucking shit? How stupid can one decision be?

Tumblr and Wordpress are preparing to sell user data to Midjourney and OpenAI, according to a source with internal knowledge about the deals and internal documentation referring to the deals. 

The exact types of data from each platform going to each company are not spelled out in documentation we’ve reviewed, but internal communications reviewed by 404 Media make clear that deals between Automattic, the platforms’ parent company, and OpenAI and Midjourney are imminent.

The internal documentation details a messy and controversial process within Tumblr itself. One internal post made by Cyle Gage, a product manager at Tumblr, states that a query made to prepare data for OpenAI and Midjourney compiled a huge number of user posts that it wasn’t supposed to. It is not clear from Gage’s post whether this data has already been sent to OpenAI and Midjourney, or whether Gage was detailing a process for scrubbing the data before it was to be sent. 

Gage wrote:

“the way the data was queried for the initial data dump to Midjourney/OpenAI means we compiled a list of all tumblr’s public post content between 2014 and 2023, but also unfortunately it included, and should not have included:

private posts on public blogs

posts on deleted or suspended blogs

unanswered asks (normally these are not public until they’re answered)

private answers (these only show up to the receiver and are not public)

posts that are marked ‘explicit’ / NSFW / ‘mature’ by our more modern standards (this may not be a big deal, I don’t know)

content from premium partner blogs (special brand blogs like Apple’s former music blog, for example, who spent money with us on an ad campaign) that may have creative that doesn’t belong to us, and we don’t have the rights to share with this-parties; this one is kinda unknown to me, what deals are in place historically and what they should prevent us from doing.”

Gage’s post makes clear that engineers are working on compiling a list of post IDs that should not have been included, and that password-protected posts, DMs, and media flagged as CSAM and other community guidelines violations were not included.

Automattic plans to launch a new setting on Wednesday that will allow users to opt-out of data sharing with third parties, including AI companies, according to the source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, and internal documents. A new FAQ section we reviewed is titled “What happens when you opt out?” states that “If you opt out from the start, we will block crawlers from accessing your content by adding your site on a disallowed list. If you change your mind later, we also plan to update any partners about people who newly opt-out and ask that their content be removed from past sources and future training.” 

404 Media has asked Automattic how it accidentally compiled data that it shouldn’t share, and whether any of that content was shared with OpenAI, but did not immediately hear back from the company. 404 Media asked Automattic about an imminent deal with Midjourney last week but did not hear back then, either.

Another internal document shows that, on February 23, an employee asked in a staff-only thread, “Do we have assurances that if a user opts out of their data being shared with third parties that our existing data partners will be notified of such a change and remove their data?”

Andrew Spittle, Automattic’s head of AI replied: “We will notify existing partners on a regular basis about anyone who's opted out since the last time we provided a list. I want this to be an ongoing process where we regularly advocate for past content to be excluded based on current preferences. We will ask that content be deleted and removed from any future training runs. I believe partners will honor this based on our conversations with them to this point. I don't think they gain much overall by retaining it.” Automattic did not respond to a question from 404 Media about whether it could guarantee that people who opt out will have their data deleted retroactively.

News about a deal between Tumblr and Midjourney has been rumored and speculated about on Tumblr for the last week. Someone claiming to be a former Tumblr employee announced in a Tumblr blog post that the platform was working on a deal with Midjourney, and the rumor made it onto Blind, an app for verified employees of companies to anonymously discuss their jobs. 404 Media has seen the Blind posts, in which what seems like an Automattic employee says, “I'm not sure why some of you are getting worked up or worried about this. It's totally legal, and sharing it publicly is perfectly fine since it's right there in the terms & conditions. So, go ahead and spread the word as much as you can with your friends and tech journalists, it's totally fine.”

Separately, 404 Media viewed a public, now-deleted post by Gage, the product manager, where he said that he was deleting all of his images off of Tumblr, and would be putting them on his personal website. A still-live post says, “i've deleted my photography from tumblr and will be moving it slowly but surely over to cylegage.com, which i'm building into a photography portfolio that i can control end-to-end.” At one point last week, his personal website had a specific note stating that he did not consent to AI scraping of his images. Gage’s original post has been deleted, and his website is now a blank page that just reads “Cyle.” Gage did not respond to a request for comment from 404 Media. 

Several online platforms have made similar deals with AI companies recently, including Reddit, which entered into an AI content licensing deal with Google and said in its SEC filing last week that it’s “in the early stages of monetizing [its] user base” by training AI on users’ posts. Last year, Shutterstock signed a six year deal with OpenAI to provide training data.

OpenAI and Midjourney did not respond to requests for comment. 

bianca u are my fave artist on this website - zo @zodoods

OMG @zodoods T^T I'm so honoured!!

I am constantly inspired and in awe by the art and stories everyone makes. I know I said this before, but your art is absolutely wonderful and to know that you feel that way about my art fills my heart with so much joy. Thank you so much!! ♡