Hate Those Things. Homing Missile Sharks

AI using your writing to train.

Hey writerly friends! Here's your warning that Google is making updates to terms and service allowing them to mine your data and train AI with it. It's focused on emails right now but Google docs facing a similar change is on the horizon.

Keep your eyes peeled for terms of service updates because you've already accepted future changes once you hit accept the first time. Unpublished novels do not have the same copyright protections as published novels and lawsuits are much more difficult to win. I would highly recommend anyone with a large amount of writing in Google docs start removing it from that platform.

If you don't want your writing used to train AI (and to be clear you won't be paid for it) then it's time to start looking at alternatives to Google Docs.

Some thoughts on alternatives

Microsoft Word - unlikely to implement AI training

Microsoft Word is possibly the safest bet at the moment. The Office suite makes most of it's money from corporate licensing. That depends heavily on strict privacy rules. The risk to their reputation is too high to even attempt it on just the personal version of Word. If you want to be very very cautious, get Word Professional as there is ZERO chance of it being used for AI scraping.

$159.99 USD one time purchase OR subscription model for $69.99 per year which comes with all of the Microsoft Office suite and significantly more cloud storage.

Microsoft Word Professional is $439.99 USD. You really don't need it for writing.

Scrivener - unlikely to implement AI training

Scrivener would probably not survive the kind of controversy AI scraping would cause as their customers are exclusively writers.

$59.99 USD one time purchase per platform (if you switched from windows to mac you would need to repurchase.)

Libre Office - read all the terms and conditions or don't risk it.

Libre Office has an AI tool. There are no stories circulating about them scraping user's data but they're not near as big as Google and may not have drawn enough attention yet.

Free! (Which unfortunately makes data scraping more likely.)

Also don't forget:

Platforms like Ao3, Wattpad, Smashwords and possibly even Tumblr are all being targeted by AI companies for data scraping. In fact OpenAI are being sued for doing just that.

Be careful where you post your writing.

That's all folks!

the real reason twitter was turned into x

friend who is playing ff7 remake being excited about how cool and strong aerith is while i'm just watching and internally

transport of all kinds have had to be reinforced to be able to withstand the different abilities of vivosaurs. however, flight-based vivosaurs often seem uninterested in air travel, some even choosing to fly alongside the vehicles

based on this

:)

die

YOU GOT IT BOSS!

The initial fic is right here, "darkness in the basement" (i really need to keep working on the fic oof)

but I'll go into more detail here (including a bit of spoilers under the cut because i really wanna blabber about this)

Okay so! When Ventus destroyed their heart, his half got rescued by Sora, but Vanitas' half was basically cast out into the void with no body to return to. So when Aqua brought Ventus' empty body to the Land of Departure and subsequently Castle Oblivion, he was dragged along with, ending up in the lowest floor while Ventus slept in the highest floor.

He's stuck as a Flood now because he no longer has a body. I like to think the Vanitas Remnant really is that; a pitiful attempt at anything that's left of him trying to restructure himself, but only ending up as an Unversed recreation. That's what the Vanitas in this story is, his mind was too weak to truly bring himself back initially and that's why he's in the form of an Unversed at first, because he's not human anymore. Up until a certain point. It's also why his dark suit is now white instead of red (there's no symbol on his helmet though).

Eventually, with the help of

inhumane science experiments

he gains enough energy to have the ability to transform into other forms of Unversed, though the Flood tends to be his preferred form until he regains his human appearance. But you can't exactly sit on someone's shoulder parrot-style as human, now can you?

Skipping forwards a lot, Vanitas eventually ends up in Radiant Garden around the time of Dream Drop Distance and after being a little shit for a few weeks, is finally reunited with the only person he's ever really tolerated that he watched, you know, die. I say "tolerated" because they weren't really friends in Castle Oblivion, only truly bonding in Radiant Garden and become practically inseparable (you know those neck pillows? yeah that's flood form vanitas wrapped around ienzo's shoulders)

Also because he's still connected to Ventus, he feels when Xehanort tries to possess Sora and ends up having a panic attack because he thinks Xehanort is coming after him again :)))

(the image is bigger then i intended but meh)

design from my vanitas and ienzo friendship au where vanitas is turned into a flood after dying bbs, trapped in the basement of castle oblivion, and eventually gains the ability to transform into any unversed form

one common thing is the red marks along his chest being consistent in every form. this includes his human form, both on his skin and the dark suit, which has turned to similar colors to the remnant colors, just with the remaining red on his chest.

i refuse to believe this man thinks

fully inspired by this

So in Majora's Mask, I read somewhere that the reason Link screams when putting on masks is because he's experiencing the pain the character went through before their death, so I thought it would be interesting if he saw some of the things the Fierce Deity did when putting on the mask. But because in my au Oni isn't dead, just sealed away, they're able to talk in Link's head except the connection goes both way so Oni also saw some of the shit Link went through. Unfortunately the visions only show the bad things(neither know this) so Link only saw the horrible crimes and Oni only saw the bullying Link went through and figured they were the same, having also gone through bullying for being different than the others around him.

Realize at this point in his life, Oni has been sealed away for who knows how long with only his thoughts, so he is very much not a stable person, and is making Link very uncomfortable despite trying to relate to him by making himself look like his child self(they're in Link's head and he's a powerful demon, who's to say he can't shapeshift?).

Also Majora's Wrath is the one that slashed Link's eye with one of its whips, and in a panic he used the Fierce Deity mask, inadvertently letting Oni take control of his body.

smile!