5 ms·

CuratedAI: A literary magazine written by machines, for people

dingaling 10y ago
Fairly awful stuff but it would be fascinating to keep that experiment running for a decade to watch AI evolve.
infiniteseeker 10y ago
Very poetic The best part of my job is the weight I lost. Found the truth beneath your lies. And I am still waiting for the rain to abate.
steinsgate 10y ago
Love the caption. Straight out of the future!
sanxiyn 10y ago
This is beautiful: The deeper the hustle the deeper the pain I wish I could play the Violin The thought of you is driving me insane Go to http://villanellebot.tumblr.com/post/148629267135/so-many-thoughts-it-makes-my-head-spin http://villanellebot.tumblr.com/post/148629267135/so-many-th... for the entire poem, and https://avoision.com/2015/08/26/villanelle-bot-poems-in-the-villanelle-form-created-using-random-posts-from-twitter.php https://avoision.com/2015/08/26/villanelle-bot-poems-in-the-... to learn how it was done.
- coetry 10y ago
  That actually is incredibly beautiful. It's crazy to think that the machine that generated it was devoid of the emotions behind this assembly of words.
  - SCHiM 10y ago
    Well is it? At some point, either we become like machines, or the machines become like us. There is a limit to how many times we can redraw the lines.
    - TheLarch 10y ago
      The common distinction between machine and life seems arbitrary. Suppose for instance you had essentially infinite resources to design a machine that self-replicates by stealing blood from mammals, etc etc. You would end up with something very much like the mosquito. Why is it a machine only when man designs it? This is perhaps more apparent with viruses. They aren't living per se, but are halfway there. The assertion that the virus is not a machine seems to be a difference without a distinction.
      - jrlocke 10y ago
        The expression is "a distinction without a difference"
        TheLarch 10y ago
        Oh yes! Thanks.
  - SixSigma 10y ago
    Generating in the loosest sense. Code up the format of a villanelle and find Twitter posts to fit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Villanelle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Villanelle > VillanelleBot, created by Felix Jung, is a bot that composes villanelles using random posts from Twitter. Each line corresponds to a full post on Twitter If you click on the line it goes through to the tweet e.g. > i ate curly fries and shaker fries https://twitter.com/ahtaebvh/status/757935083135258626 https://twitter.com/ahtaebvh/status/757935083135258626
DarkContinent 10y ago
I really don't see the literary merit in a lot of these pieces, but obviously this is an interesting step forward...
- ashark 10y ago
  "I Ate Curly Fries And Shaker Fries" wouldn't be out of place in well-regarded literary magazines. That slice-of-life with references-only-the-author-gets but maybe-sometimes-they-resonate-in-an-oblique-way-with-the-reader poetry is pretty common. Get an author with a decent bio[1] to submit it and I bet you could get a similar-quality machine-generated work published in Ploughshares or similar. [1] MFA, edits a local poetry magazine with a circulation of 100, accepted submissions to some mid-level publications, one or two "chapbooks" out.
  - yolesaber 10y ago
    Try submitting it. It will get rejected immediately becasue a) villanelle's are hokey and played out and b) it's obvious this was written by a machine. There's no poetic turn, there's nothing worthwhile to derive from it. It's word salad. There's a reason why Oulipo, whose members have written many algorithmic poems plays and novels, despised chance generations of text.
ComteDeLaFere 10y ago
The code behind this is probably more poetic than the output. Perhaps the union of technology and culture is farther than we think. Although, this really shines a light on the fact that it probably isn't necessary for technology to attempt to optimize every human experience.
pipio21 10y ago
Ugly and nonsense. But over time I expect it evolving into something we could read.
washt 10y ago
If the aim is to land somewhere within the style of Edward Lear, then this is a job well done.
Uehreka 10y ago
I Ate Curly Fries And Shaker Fries has been stuck in my head all morning... and I am still waiting for the rain to abate.
etrevino 10y ago
Reading the prose is like reading James Joyce, without the twee construction. The poems I actually enjoyed, if only because they were funny to read out loud.
JoeDaDude 10y ago
Followers of computer generated literature may recall "The Policeman's Beard is Half Constructed" [1], ostensibly written by the program Racter [2] (though that authorship was never conclusively proven). [1] http://www.ubu.com/historical/racter/index.html http://www.ubu.com/historical/racter/index.html [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racter
- tempodox 10y ago
  Racter was quite impressive for its time.
emptybits 10y ago
This reminds me of that AI-written screenplay earlier this year [1]... it's interesting, it may be progress, but it's partly carried by its presentation and production value and the promo value of "who" it was authored by. (This is also true, to a lesser degree, of human works.) Fingers crossed for progress. [1] http://arstechnica.com/the-multiverse/2016/06/an-ai-wrote-this-movie-and-its-strangely-moving/ http://arstechnica.com/the-multiverse/2016/06/an-ai-wrote-th...
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
yolesaber 10y ago
When you just set an AI to generate content based on input text, you get garbage like this. You need to set restraints and create a form to work in. An "AI" (i.e. probably a markov chain) spewing out word salad just isn't interesting in 2016 unless it has conceptual weight.
ggonweb 10y ago
SCIgen - An Automatic CS Paper Generator - Note: one of the papers was accepted to SCI 2005 https://pdos.csail.mit.edu/archive/scigen/ https://pdos.csail.mit.edu/archive/scigen/

Fairly awful stuff but it would be fascinating to keep that experiment running for a decade to watch AI evolve.

Very poetic The best part of my job is the weight I lost. Found the truth beneath your lies. And I am still waiting for the rain to abate.

steinsgate 10y ago

Love the caption. Straight out of the future!

sanxiyn 10y ago

This is beautiful: The deeper the hustle the deeper the pain I wish I could play the Violin The thought of you is driving me insane Go to http://villanellebot.tumblr.com/post/148629267135/so-many-thoughts-it-makes-my-head-spin http://villanellebot.tumblr.com/post/148629267135/so-many-th... for the entire poem, and https://avoision.com/2015/08/26/villanelle-bot-poems-in-the-villanelle-form-created-using-random-posts-from-twitter.php https://avoision.com/2015/08/26/villanelle-bot-poems-in-the-... to learn how it was done.

coetry 10y ago
That actually is incredibly beautiful. It's crazy to think that the machine that generated it was devoid of the emotions behind this assembly of words.
- SCHiM 10y ago
  Well is it? At some point, either we become like machines, or the machines become like us. There is a limit to how many times we can redraw the lines.
  - TheLarch 10y ago
    The common distinction between machine and life seems arbitrary. Suppose for instance you had essentially infinite resources to design a machine that self-replicates by stealing blood from mammals, etc etc. You would end up with something very much like the mosquito. Why is it a machine only when man designs it? This is perhaps more apparent with viruses. They aren't living per se, but are halfway there. The assertion that the virus is not a machine seems to be a difference without a distinction.
    - jrlocke 10y ago
      The expression is "a distinction without a difference"
      - TheLarch 10y ago
        Oh yes! Thanks.
- SixSigma 10y ago
  Generating in the loosest sense. Code up the format of a villanelle and find Twitter posts to fit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Villanelle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Villanelle > VillanelleBot, created by Felix Jung, is a bot that composes villanelles using random posts from Twitter. Each line corresponds to a full post on Twitter If you click on the line it goes through to the tweet e.g. > i ate curly fries and shaker fries https://twitter.com/ahtaebvh/status/757935083135258626 https://twitter.com/ahtaebvh/status/757935083135258626

DarkContinent 10y ago

I really don't see the literary merit in a lot of these pieces, but obviously this is an interesting step forward...

ashark 10y ago
"I Ate Curly Fries And Shaker Fries" wouldn't be out of place in well-regarded literary magazines. That slice-of-life with references-only-the-author-gets but maybe-sometimes-they-resonate-in-an-oblique-way-with-the-reader poetry is pretty common. Get an author with a decent bio[1] to submit it and I bet you could get a similar-quality machine-generated work published in Ploughshares or similar. [1] MFA, edits a local poetry magazine with a circulation of 100, accepted submissions to some mid-level publications, one or two "chapbooks" out.
- yolesaber 10y ago
  Try submitting it. It will get rejected immediately becasue a) villanelle's are hokey and played out and b) it's obvious this was written by a machine. There's no poetic turn, there's nothing worthwhile to derive from it. It's word salad. There's a reason why Oulipo, whose members have written many algorithmic poems plays and novels, despised chance generations of text.

ComteDeLaFere 10y ago

The code behind this is probably more poetic than the output. Perhaps the union of technology and culture is farther than we think. Although, this really shines a light on the fact that it probably isn't necessary for technology to attempt to optimize every human experience.

pipio21 10y ago

Ugly and nonsense. But over time I expect it evolving into something we could read.

washt 10y ago

If the aim is to land somewhere within the style of Edward Lear, then this is a job well done.

Uehreka 10y ago

I Ate Curly Fries And Shaker Fries has been stuck in my head all morning... and I am still waiting for the rain to abate.

etrevino 10y ago

Reading the prose is like reading James Joyce, without the twee construction. The poems I actually enjoyed, if only because they were funny to read out loud.

JoeDaDude 10y ago

Followers of computer generated literature may recall "The Policeman's Beard is Half Constructed" [1], ostensibly written by the program Racter [2] (though that authorship was never conclusively proven). [1] http://www.ubu.com/historical/racter/index.html http://www.ubu.com/historical/racter/index.html [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racter

tempodox 10y ago
Racter was quite impressive for its time.

emptybits 10y ago

This reminds me of that AI-written screenplay earlier this year [1]... it's interesting, it may be progress, but it's partly carried by its presentation and production value and the promo value of "who" it was authored by. (This is also true, to a lesser degree, of human works.) Fingers crossed for progress. [1] http://arstechnica.com/the-multiverse/2016/06/an-ai-wrote-this-movie-and-its-strangely-moving/ http://arstechnica.com/the-multiverse/2016/06/an-ai-wrote-th...

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

yolesaber 10y ago

When you just set an AI to generate content based on input text, you get garbage like this. You need to set restraints and create a form to work in. An "AI" (i.e. probably a markov chain) spewing out word salad just isn't interesting in 2016 unless it has conceptual weight.

ggonweb 10y ago

SCIgen - An Automatic CS Paper Generator - Note: one of the papers was accepted to SCI 2005 https://pdos.csail.mit.edu/archive/scigen/ https://pdos.csail.mit.edu/archive/scigen/