attention, freaks, it's me
8 April 2026 07:34![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pkkiaii'm alive! wow!
I didn't mean to abandon this blog. Just been busy, I guess? Um. I got a girlfriend and the first thing I made her do was watch the entirety of Marble Hornets with me lmfao. She loved it. I'm over the moon. I never thought I'd be able to share my Slenderverse interest with someone like that.
We went to Anime Boston together and had a blast. I took her to the hololive karaoke party and we waved our plushies around in the air. That was the first hololive event I attended in person and I'm really glad I got to experience it with her. I met some cool otaku, too. The guy next to me was like, "I'm surprised you still have a voice" at the end of the show since I screamed so much lmao. It was so much fuckin fun... we also cosplayed Stan and Kyle from South Park. We went to Wendy's in our costumes and some guy asked me for my number. You ever been hit on by a guy while you're cosplaying cartoon kid characters with your girlfriend? It's funny. I wonder if he'll think of us whenever he sees South Park now, I'm assuming he isn't huge on the show since he erroneously called me Kyle... and this employee at the local Walgreens was totally fangirling over our cosplays lmao.
I'm rambling. I just had fun!!! I've been doing great mentally, too! wow! I wanna write here again so bad, I have so many thoughts on internet horror shenanigans that I wanna jot down... we will see...
I didn't mean to abandon this blog. Just been busy, I guess? Um. I got a girlfriend and the first thing I made her do was watch the entirety of Marble Hornets with me lmfao. She loved it. I'm over the moon. I never thought I'd be able to share my Slenderverse interest with someone like that.
We went to Anime Boston together and had a blast. I took her to the hololive karaoke party and we waved our plushies around in the air. That was the first hololive event I attended in person and I'm really glad I got to experience it with her. I met some cool otaku, too. The guy next to me was like, "I'm surprised you still have a voice" at the end of the show since I screamed so much lmao. It was so much fuckin fun... we also cosplayed Stan and Kyle from South Park. We went to Wendy's in our costumes and some guy asked me for my number. You ever been hit on by a guy while you're cosplaying cartoon kid characters with your girlfriend? It's funny. I wonder if he'll think of us whenever he sees South Park now, I'm assuming he isn't huge on the show since he erroneously called me Kyle... and this employee at the local Walgreens was totally fangirling over our cosplays lmao.
I'm rambling. I just had fun!!! I've been doing great mentally, too! wow! I wanna write here again so bad, I have so many thoughts on internet horror shenanigans that I wanna jot down... we will see...
I’M READING AS FAST AS I CAN (MARCH 2026 EDITION)
31 March 2026 20:20defrogTruly I am.
The Star Mouse by Fredric BrownMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
I generally like Fredric Brown, and read him when I get a chance, since so much of his work is criminally out of print. So I was chuffed to find out that Project Gutenberg has archived some of his stories from his early pulp SF days. I decided more or less at random to start with this tale from 1942 about, yes, a star mouse, albeit a not-exactly-willing one.
The story starts with Professor Oberburger, a scientist who fled Nazi Germany and now lives in Connecticut, where he is trying to develop rocket fuel for a small experimental spaceship capable of going to the moon. For a test subject, Professor Oberburger captures a mouse living in his house, which he names Mitkey. The professor doesn’t expect Mitkey to return from his maiden flight. But he does – after an unexpected encounter on his way to the moon …
Well, it’s good fun, really, although I’ll add that the twist ending (one of Brown’s trademarks) adds a bittersweet aftertaste to what otherwise have been a cute Disney-eque story. And given Mitkey’s namesake, that may have been intentional on Brown’s part. Anyway, it’s a good yarn. Fair warning: Brown is one of those writers who writes foreign accents into the dialogue (“Und now, idt is budt a madter of combining der fuel tubes so they work in obbosite bairs,” etc), which slows things down some, but everyone did it in those days, and at least Brown is good at it.
Empire of AI: Dreams and Nightmares in Sam Altman's OpenAI by Karen HaoMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
One of my day jobs is tech journalism, so of course I’ve been writing a lot lately about AI. I also read publications like MIT Technology Review quite a bit, so I was already familiar with Karen Hao’s excellent journalism work with them. So I was keen to read this, which is mainly the story of OpenAI (the creator of ChatGPT and its variants) and its founder Sam Altman, but also the rise of the AI industry itself, and how that rise is fast creating an oligarchy of corrupt and exploitative technological empires (with OpenAI leading the charge) with real control over resources and people, especially in developing countries with less economic and political power.
In essence, Sam Altman started OpenAI as a non-profit research company with the goal of developing AGI (artificial general intelligence, the theoretical version of AI that’s as smart or smarter than human intelligence and therefore potentially the most dangerous) before anyone else does to ensure that it’s developed ethically and safely and benefits humanity. But in the process of chasing that goal, OpenAI has sparked a tech arms race that consumes huge amounts of energy and water, hoovers up copyrighted and personal data of everyone on the planet without their consent, and employs people in the Global South to clean up that data for sweatshop wages (not to mention the psychological impact of having to watch the absolute worst of the web all day long to make sure it doesn’t end up in AI datasets) – all while OpenAI has increasingly sidelined its own safety teams in its quest to stay ahead of everyone else.
As Hao points out, this is not an anti-AI book, but a warning of where the current AI leadership is headed with its imperialist mindset (consciously or otherwise) and who’s getting exploited along the way. Hao also makes the argument that it doesn’t have to be this way – we can have useful, ethical and beneficial AI, but we’re not going to get it from Silicon Valley broligarchs. It will only happen when people organise at grassroots community levels and work to redistribute that power, and regain control of their data and land being commandeered to build these empires.
Inevitably, the book is already outdated, as the AI industry has continued to evolve and grow in positive and negative ways. But Hao tells the story as well as it can be told, and especially excels at covering the hidden cost of AI on communities in the Global South, which for me is the more interesting part of the book – I’d have liked to see more of that and less of the OpenAI corporate drama, though I can see why that story had to be told to understand why all this is happening. Needless to say, fans of OpenAI, Sam Altman, Elon Musk and Silicon Valley techbro hype may not like this as much as me. So it goes.
View all my reviews
Empire down,
This is dF
ABSOLUTELY POSITIVELY MY ONLY POST ABOUT THE BIG RUSH COMEBACK
7 April 2026 20:04defrogThe social medias is abuzz with Rush’s surprise appearance as the opening act of the Juno Awards, in which they returned to their roots, playing “Finding My Way”, the first track from their first album.
As you’ve no doubt heard, it’s their first time playing as Rush since 2015 and since the death of drummer Neil Peart in 2018, at which point everyone – including Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson – felt that was the end of Rush, as Peart was considered to be irreplaceable.
As you’ve also no doubt heard, Lee and Lifeson surprised everyone last year when they announced they had in fact found a replacement – German drummer Anika Nilles – and would be returning to the road for a new tour in 2026.
The Juno appearance was essentially a soft launch for that, with Nilles onstage as well as Loren Gold, who will be handling the keyboard bits of Rush songs rather than Lee having to do it all himself.
There have been something like 1.2 million hot takes on the Juno gig – some positive, some not, some constructive, some not. The usual, then.
And of course, as a lifelong Rush fan, I have my own hot take to add to the pile, and this is it:
1. To get the obvious out of the way, Nilles was great. She’s no Neil Peart, but no one is. You could also argue that Neil Peart was no Anika Nilles. All of which is fine and proper.
Some will nitpick and say that technically she proved she could at least fill John Rutsey’s shoes (as Peart joined Rush on their second LP). That said, having watched them play together live, I have full confidence that if she couldn’t handle anything the Rush back catalog has to throw at her, Lee and Lifeson wouldn’t have hired her in the first place.
2. Some will of course continue to say Peart is irreplaceable. Maybe. On the other hand, it would be false to say Peart had no equal in terms of technical ability – there are tons of TikToks out there with wannabe drummers who can cover “YYZ” flawlessly. There’s also this interesting interview in Classic Rock magazine in which Lifeson explains how replacing Peart is not really about technical ability but the feel:
That feel is what Nilles had to get right, and as Lifeson admits in the same interview, it took four days of rehearsals for all three of them to figure that out:
If the Juno gig is any indication, they seem to have worked that out just fine. Once the tour kicks off, we’ll find out.
3. Like a lot of people, I was happy for Rush to call it a day after Peart’s death. There’s always this debate about whether bands with established and beloved lineups should stop when one of them (traditionally the drummer) dies. Do we do a Zeppelin? Do we do a Who? In a sense, there’s no wrong decision, but for perspective, the Zeppelin/Who examples happened in the late 70s. Since that time, we’ve long become accustomed to bands continuing with multiple lineup changes, and it works more often than not. At some point a band can become more than the sum of its parts if the core elements remain and new elements can fit seamlessly. (Or, as Mark E Smith once said, “If it’s me and your granny on bongos, it’s still The Fall.”)
Anyway, at the time, I thought Lee and Lifeson made a good decision to go out on a high note. On the other hand, they clearly missed playing the music, and eventually decided that the best way to honour Peart would be to keep the music going, provided they could find someone worthy of the drummer’s seat.
4. So, while part of me kind of wishes they had let their legacy speak for itself and ride off into the sunset, everyone on that stage was clearly having an absolute blast playing together, which is really what it’s all about at the end of the day. So it feels churlish to complain that musicians I love and respect are up there having a great time and enjoying themselves – and totally blowing the roof off the dump in the process.
5. I admit, I may feel differently if they decide to do a new album. Peart’s lyrics were the heart and soul of Rush’s music, and there’s a reason Lee and Lifeson generally left the lyrics to him. Maybe Nilles can write epic SF fantasies and technocratic dystopian allegories in metered verse too – I dunno. But that might be a bridge too far.
Then again, Rush surprised us at Juno. Maybe they’re not done surprising us yet.
On the road again,
This is dF
As you’ve no doubt heard, it’s their first time playing as Rush since 2015 and since the death of drummer Neil Peart in 2018, at which point everyone – including Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson – felt that was the end of Rush, as Peart was considered to be irreplaceable.
As you’ve also no doubt heard, Lee and Lifeson surprised everyone last year when they announced they had in fact found a replacement – German drummer Anika Nilles – and would be returning to the road for a new tour in 2026.
The Juno appearance was essentially a soft launch for that, with Nilles onstage as well as Loren Gold, who will be handling the keyboard bits of Rush songs rather than Lee having to do it all himself.
There have been something like 1.2 million hot takes on the Juno gig – some positive, some not, some constructive, some not. The usual, then.
And of course, as a lifelong Rush fan, I have my own hot take to add to the pile, and this is it:
1. To get the obvious out of the way, Nilles was great. She’s no Neil Peart, but no one is. You could also argue that Neil Peart was no Anika Nilles. All of which is fine and proper.
Some will nitpick and say that technically she proved she could at least fill John Rutsey’s shoes (as Peart joined Rush on their second LP). That said, having watched them play together live, I have full confidence that if she couldn’t handle anything the Rush back catalog has to throw at her, Lee and Lifeson wouldn’t have hired her in the first place.
2. Some will of course continue to say Peart is irreplaceable. Maybe. On the other hand, it would be false to say Peart had no equal in terms of technical ability – there are tons of TikToks out there with wannabe drummers who can cover “YYZ” flawlessly. There’s also this interesting interview in Classic Rock magazine in which Lifeson explains how replacing Peart is not really about technical ability but the feel:
“So you get a sense of appreciation for the way the song is, but you also get a more acute appreciation for how Neil played. Because when you see someone else trying to capture his feel, you realise what kind of player he was, and the tightness of his attitude, the firmness in attack as well.
"With Tom Sawyer, or even Limelight, you can’t just shuffle through those songs, you have to be attentive. And, you know, stand up straight. And that’s sort of where the feel comes from.”
"With Tom Sawyer, or even Limelight, you can’t just shuffle through those songs, you have to be attentive. And, you know, stand up straight. And that’s sort of where the feel comes from.”
That feel is what Nilles had to get right, and as Lifeson admits in the same interview, it took four days of rehearsals for all three of them to figure that out:
"And on the fifth day, on the last day that we rehearsed, she took all our comments about feel, about Neil’s feel and the way he played, and being very cognisant of the ability that he had, and bang! She nailed the songs all day. It was a real ‘Wow!’ moment.
In other words, for all the other musicians in the band, it’s not just what the drummer plays but how they play it. Nilles can’t just imitate Peart – she has to play in a way that doesn’t throw Lee and Lifeson off.
If the Juno gig is any indication, they seem to have worked that out just fine. Once the tour kicks off, we’ll find out.
3. Like a lot of people, I was happy for Rush to call it a day after Peart’s death. There’s always this debate about whether bands with established and beloved lineups should stop when one of them (traditionally the drummer) dies. Do we do a Zeppelin? Do we do a Who? In a sense, there’s no wrong decision, but for perspective, the Zeppelin/Who examples happened in the late 70s. Since that time, we’ve long become accustomed to bands continuing with multiple lineup changes, and it works more often than not. At some point a band can become more than the sum of its parts if the core elements remain and new elements can fit seamlessly. (Or, as Mark E Smith once said, “If it’s me and your granny on bongos, it’s still The Fall.”)
Anyway, at the time, I thought Lee and Lifeson made a good decision to go out on a high note. On the other hand, they clearly missed playing the music, and eventually decided that the best way to honour Peart would be to keep the music going, provided they could find someone worthy of the drummer’s seat.
4. So, while part of me kind of wishes they had let their legacy speak for itself and ride off into the sunset, everyone on that stage was clearly having an absolute blast playing together, which is really what it’s all about at the end of the day. So it feels churlish to complain that musicians I love and respect are up there having a great time and enjoying themselves – and totally blowing the roof off the dump in the process.
5. I admit, I may feel differently if they decide to do a new album. Peart’s lyrics were the heart and soul of Rush’s music, and there’s a reason Lee and Lifeson generally left the lyrics to him. Maybe Nilles can write epic SF fantasies and technocratic dystopian allegories in metered verse too – I dunno. But that might be a bridge too far.
Then again, Rush surprised us at Juno. Maybe they’re not done surprising us yet.
On the road again,
This is dF
JESUS IS COMING SOON
5 April 2026 09:30defrogNobody:
Absolutely nobody:
Me: Hey, I made a playlist for Easter Sunday, check it out!
Everyone: Oh, Jesus.
Me: Exactly!
PRODUCTION NOTE: The main objective was to avoid kids’ songs and church hymns. Which is funny because when you Google “songs about or related to Easter”, about 94% of results are mostly split between kids’ songs and church hymns. So this one took some work to get it to two hours, is what I’m saying.
Look busy,
This is dF
Absolutely nobody:
Me: Hey, I made a playlist for Easter Sunday, check it out!
Everyone: Oh, Jesus.
Me: Exactly!
PRODUCTION NOTE: The main objective was to avoid kids’ songs and church hymns. Which is funny because when you Google “songs about or related to Easter”, about 94% of results are mostly split between kids’ songs and church hymns. So this one took some work to get it to two hours, is what I’m saying.
Look busy,
This is dF