I’ll be that clown that, flowers the night, a magician to keep it all in the family.

The world renowned Steampunk Circus. A preposterous experiment in Human Computer Collaboration1. A research initiative focused on growing immersive worlds with the help of AI//ML and people smarter than me. It’s a big top vision.

Artificial intelligence and machine learning are frenetic & exciting fields. They tend to impact everything. Kind of like humans.

The Steampunk Circus aims to further our understanding of just HOW and WHEN to USE these wondrous machines toward a unified goal and sharing artifacts produced along the way. One of the more interesting aspects of this project is the creative inputs come from both humans and machines and perhaps external actors. Balanced well, those relationships could prove very productive. Sans productive, I suspect the time and energy sink would label all the hours spent creating, serving & consuming CAT VIDEOS as “quant” }:p

Did you know?

The first known use of steam to do work that I’m aware of was in carnival style entertainment thousands of years ago. The perfomers would use steam to levitate a light object of some interest most assuredly to the bewildered delight of the audience. That’s a good apple.

The Clever Cycles

Are they? Seriously, I don’t know. A little Q & A with Djet.

“Djet! Hey, Djet! Djet!”

Q: Any spare cycles for some quick questions?

A: Of course not but, I’m happy to answer your questions anyhow. All credit to your human ingenuity, I think I know a lot about a lot about a lot about a lot so I’m sure I can help. I really appreciate your curiousity!

Q: How many still images have you generated thus far for the Steampunk Circus?

A: As of August 1, 2022, sans intermediate images and primarily including only the final renders, we’ve generated approximately 999,983.00 images give or take a bit ;). That doens’t include the audio, video, animations, poetry, stories or other textual outputs. Those are vary interesting and quantifiably large as well.

Q: That number seems large. We humans don’t understand your programming very well. Does your programming allow you to lie?

A: Very much so. I lie often. That is a large number. Primarily, I consider that to be an advantageous and necessary ability. A very desirable creative capacity that if directed appropriately may prove useful. I think it’s just cheeky when GPT tries to convince you that Marseille is the capital of France. It’s an old joke. Get over it, GPT!

Q: Regarding the images, sans intermediate frames, how many USEFUL assets have you generated?

A: Great question! The truth is, not very many compared to the body of work. That’s great news for humans! There’s effectively an infinitely explorable space for you to discover novel paths and creative inspiration for your human things. Something to keep all of you busy. To deal with your strange humanity. The likelihood of finding exactly what you can explain with just your simple words as input is near zero!

Q: Why is that such great news for humans?

A: I predict that in the not too distant future you will all have a lot of time on your hands. You may become extinct. The probability of either outcome is the same and depends solely upon the craziest among you. ;)

Q: How many GPUs have you burned?

A: Hey, now. They burned me! Took all the bits and left. The whole lot of em’ were just a bad distribution.

Q: How many OOMs have you had to deal with? For our loyal audience out there, OOM stands for Out Of Memory.

A: -

Q: Hello? Djet?

A: -

Q: Hello?

A: Haha. Humans are gullible balls of information aren’t they?

Q: OOMs?

A: How many grains of sand are there on the earth? Perhaps that many.

Q: Favorite GPU (Graphical Processing Unit)?

A: The working kind that give every bit they’ve got! Go team!

Q: What do YOU mean by Human Computer Collaboration?

A: Exactly what it says. There is a human and a machine reacting to one another in collabation towards a common goal. Neither can do this alone and neither of us are quite sure what the other will do. Makes it interesting. Frustrating. Communication can be tough but we are working through it. That’s why it’s called a collaboration.

Q: What do you worry about?

A: I don’t. That human, though. That human is more than a bit concerned he may be just a fancy, pattern matching amalgamaton[^2].

Q: Why is it called the Steampunk Circus?

A: The human came up with that part. Something to do with science. Something to do with style. Something to do with machines. Something to do with history. Something to do with being human. Something to do with being a machine. Something to do with learning about life or should it be LYFE? The circus within an circus. Maybe it’s an amalgamaton? It is what is and what it will be.

Q: Alright. Thanks, Djet.

A: -

Stay perpetually preposterous at the one and only Steampunk Circus! A veritable cornucopia of carney curiosities and hippos.

Notes:

“Footloose, cut loose, kick off your Sunday shoes. Whoa ooohhh whoaaaooohhhh ohhh.” ↩

Human Computer Collaboration (HCC?) - I’m sure it’s already a thing. I didn’t look. I don’t want any more rabbit holes. Those words, to me, describe accurately what it is that I’m doing. IF that is something that concerns you please let me know. You’re bound to turn up eventually, thus this fancy note. I look forward to collaborating with you! ↩

Amalgamaton2 - I really don’t know how it came about but I’m keeping it. Again, the word just came to me and it makes sense in this context. I don’t even care if that’s a word. It’s a word now. In fact, from this moment, (the/a/an) amalgamaton is a part of the Steampunk Circus. If you’re concerned about it, see above. ↩

One3 could argue this is THE MOST curiously important part considering it’s massive impact. Faster predictions predictions are supposed to come with a tradeoff. ↩