Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie and Samantha and welcome to Stephane
Speaker 1: Never told your production by Heart Radio, and today we
Speaker 1: are thrilled to be joined by Katrina, who I'm just
Speaker 1: gonna go ahead and say friend of the show hopefully
Speaker 1: by the end of this UM, who has been involved
Speaker 1: in the AI world, the world of artificial intelligence as
Speaker 1: both a user and professionally for a while. Now. Thank
Speaker 1: you so much for joining us, Katrina, Thank you for
Speaker 1: having me. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Can you tell the
Speaker 1: audience a little bit about yourself? Yes? I can so.
Speaker 1: My name is Katrina slaps Off. I, like Annie has said,
Speaker 1: I've been in the AI art world for well, not forever,
Speaker 1: but like considering how quickly the air our world is
Speaker 1: kind of popped up, I would say I've been there
Speaker 1: for like a good chunk now. I have been working
Speaker 1: with mid Journey UM in the volunteer since since the
Speaker 1: beginning of July UM and I started working with them
Speaker 1: as a community liasion. I think I'm saying that right
Speaker 1: since September. They're not my only job. I also work
Speaker 1: in the creative industry. I have for about six years now,
Speaker 1: maybe seven. For my day job, I am a senior designer.
Speaker 1: I work in a democratic slash left leaning political agency.
Speaker 1: We do a lot of work for UM campaigns, political campaigns,
Speaker 1: for nonprofits, UM, for some super PACs and whatnot. UM
Speaker 1: and we just got out of the election cycle, which
Speaker 1: was intense and fun. Yeah. And I've also, like in
Speaker 1: the past, I've worked with a ton of big brands
Speaker 1: like Amazon, Alexa, bunch of brands under PNG UM and
Speaker 1: also on an immersive space of spaces actually weirdly so yeah,
Speaker 1: so I've kind of been all over the place, but
Speaker 1: it's really fun. So yeah, Yeah, you sent us kind
Speaker 1: of a like breakdown of all the stuff you've done,
Speaker 1: and it's quite a bit, quite a bit. Um. We
Speaker 1: did want to put a disclaimer in here because you're
Speaker 1: here speaking as an individual and that for any particular company. Yes,
Speaker 1: and also we Samantha and I have an episode on
Speaker 1: artificial intelligence coming out. Keep an ear out for that
Speaker 1: because there is a lot to talk about. But um,
Speaker 1: for people, Katrina who do not know what we're talking about,
Speaker 1: can you explain it like that? It can be the
Speaker 1: barest explanation, but can you give us kind of a
Speaker 1: working definition the way that I always explain it to people? Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, when I'm talking to them in real life
Speaker 1: and they have no idea what it is. I just
Speaker 1: always say in the simplest way, you just put in
Speaker 1: words and outcomes pretty art. It's really what it is
Speaker 1: at its simplest, you know, like it's it's it's at
Speaker 1: its foundation, you just put in just put in words, right.
Speaker 1: So I know because when we're talking about AI specifically
Speaker 1: with you, we are talking about the prompts and uh, well,
Speaker 1: I would have thought of AI a long time ago,
Speaker 1: which is the artificial intelligence that we are like, it's
Speaker 1: going to take over the world. It's robots and it's
Speaker 1: gonna take our personality, which is always a sci fi moment.
Speaker 1: But here we're talking with you specifically about the art world,
Speaker 1: such as you were talking about mid Journey, and I
Speaker 1: know Dolly was one of the first ones that I'd
Speaker 1: ever heard of, uh coming out, which has some really
Speaker 1: interesting and fascinating background and even though it feels like
Speaker 1: to me as a newbie, it's really just it's come
Speaker 1: at us fast. But I know it's been around, but
Speaker 1: to this point that it is growing in leaps and bounds. Um.
Speaker 1: And you talked about how you got involved. You went
Speaker 1: from volunteer to now you're actually a part of that
Speaker 1: community for real. How did you get into this type
Speaker 1: of AI? You know, it's really funny that you say, yet, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it has actually been around before Dolly and mid Journey,
Speaker 1: I'd say, like in the capacity that we know mid
Speaker 1: Journey as like there have been private versions of that
Speaker 1: with like Google's image in and Navidia has like their
Speaker 1: own version of that and they've had it for a
Speaker 1: couple of years now, I think. So this is actually
Speaker 1: like the first time that regular people have had access
Speaker 1: to UM these services. And before I ever knew about
Speaker 1: mid Journey, I was experimenting with another service which I
Speaker 1: cannot remember the name of. It was like play play
Speaker 1: something and that used AI, but you had to input
Speaker 1: your own images for it, and it was um a
Speaker 1: lot more basic and not as cool looking as mid Journey, right,
Speaker 1: but I had a lot of fun just like putting
Speaker 1: in my own art with that stuff. And UM, I
Speaker 1: actually do a lot of a experimental video work, uh,
Speaker 1: just just weird, glitchy stuff. And I've been doing that
Speaker 1: for many years now, and so I have gained quite
Speaker 1: a few friends within that world, and so UM, one
Speaker 1: day one of my friends messages me on Instagram and
Speaker 1: they're like, Yo, you need to check out my journey
Speaker 1: And I was like, what is that? What is that?
Speaker 1: And that was when you still needed an invite to
Speaker 1: get in. I it was really hard because people are
Speaker 1: always begging for advites and stuff and I didn't really
Speaker 1: know anybody that could give me one. So all I
Speaker 1: did was just post on my Instagram story like hey,
Speaker 1: anybody got one of those? And by the end of
Speaker 1: the day I was in because I just already knew
Speaker 1: a lot of people, you know, in the art world
Speaker 1: that we're already using it. So that's how I got
Speaker 1: into my journey. There are still only like forty people.
Speaker 1: We just actually we the discord just hit ten million
Speaker 1: people about an hour ago. That is yes, um, we
Speaker 1: were all celebrating. I was like, wow, I remember. It's
Speaker 1: so funny too, because I remember when I got in
Speaker 1: at four d K. I was kind of disappointed. I
Speaker 1: was like, man, I could have been here when it
Speaker 1: was smaller, and look at us now. In terms of
Speaker 1: how I like became a guide, I don't know. I
Speaker 1: think I think the story of how that happen is
Speaker 1: actually kind of funny because they just started like a
Speaker 1: new feedback channel at the time, um, and they didn't
Speaker 1: have any slow mode or any restrictions people posting in there.
Speaker 1: And one night and it was it was so empty, right,
Speaker 1: like there's like not as many people that were there
Speaker 1: as there are now. And so one night, this one
Speaker 1: guy just goes on a long ramble and I'm like,
Speaker 1: I was. It was like pages just worth of like
Speaker 1: not this wasn't even feedback. Eventually, I was like, yo, dude,
Speaker 1: go somewhere else with that. And the next day I
Speaker 1: woke up to one of the developers being like, yo,
Speaker 1: you want to be a guide? And I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: I thought I was going to get in trouble for that,
Speaker 1: but okay, I like it. You spoke in mind. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And I remember it was early July because it was
Speaker 1: the very next day I had off for July fourth,
Speaker 1: and I was manning the support channels and stuff and yeah,
Speaker 1: and it's just been all up from that since then.
Speaker 1: That's cool. Yeah, Um, for people who don't know, can
Speaker 1: you kind of describe what being a guide is? Yeah?
Speaker 1: So there are actually two tiers of volunteers that helped
Speaker 1: run the discord now and I say to volunteers. UM.
Speaker 1: There are benefits to working as a guide or a moderator,
Speaker 1: but we don't really talk about them much because we
Speaker 1: have a very specific recruitment process where it's like we
Speaker 1: don't want people trying to become a guide or a
Speaker 1: mod for the wrong reasons. And it's worked really well
Speaker 1: so far. We have a really great group of people.
Speaker 1: But basically you have the guides and you have the moderators.
Speaker 1: They're both kind of the same group. The guides are
Speaker 1: meant more as like people to like help and support
Speaker 1: channels we have, but we also have guides that work
Speaker 1: in other capacities to UM. We have like a good
Speaker 1: group of people that work in our prompt chat channel,
Speaker 1: which is basically like people helping other people with like
Speaker 1: getting the images they want, you know, getting the prompt
Speaker 1: right so they can get the results that they want. UM.
Speaker 1: I could listen more examples. UM. The moderators, on the
Speaker 1: other hand, they have a couple more abilities. UM. They
Speaker 1: can ban people. UM, they can get rid of images. UH.
Speaker 1: Those are the big ones. UM. We can ban words
Speaker 1: and phrases in the prompts, which we can talk about
Speaker 1: later if you want. And a couple of other things,
Speaker 1: but those are the big main ones. I would really
Speaker 1: be curious about how the conversation that goes into how
Speaker 1: do you ban something? How do you decide what gets banned?
Speaker 1: Because there is there is a lot of conversation and
Speaker 1: there are some lawsuits right now around artificial intelligence, and
Speaker 1: it's just a lot of conversation happening. And um, because
Speaker 1: we're an intersectional feminist show, we're really interested in in
Speaker 1: how artificial intelligence interacts with and impacts marginalized communities. And
Speaker 1: you've been yeah, involved in in moderating and guiding UM
Speaker 1: artificial intelligence communities AI communities and setting standards and training
Speaker 1: others on them. So yeah, we'd like to break that
Speaker 1: down a little bit more, UM, starting with like, why
Speaker 1: do you think it's important to bring an intersectional feminist
Speaker 1: perspective two things like this? I think it's very important.
Speaker 1: And also I just realized I didn't hit on that.
Speaker 1: I also run the Facebook group from a Journey and
Speaker 1: I also run uh well, I'm one of the main
Speaker 1: mods that helps run the subreddit. Um, so that's what
Speaker 1: you were hitting on when you said, like I said,
Speaker 1: the moderation standards, I'm the one that's I'm actually one
Speaker 1: of two what we call what we're calling super moods,
Speaker 1: who we basically have access to internal communications with the team,
Speaker 1: and so we do a lot of back and forth there. Um.
Speaker 1: But also like we are kind of like the managers
Speaker 1: slash bosses of the rest of the mods. So even
Speaker 1: though they do a lot of work and a lot
Speaker 1: of decision making on their own, like me and one
Speaker 1: other person are basically like the last Like if we
Speaker 1: say you can't, you gotta do this, you gotta do it,
Speaker 1: like you know what I mean. So, yeah, that's some
Speaker 1: more context there for like where I'm where I'm at
Speaker 1: with the other mods. Um. In terms of having like
Speaker 1: the intersectional part, I think it's super important we have
Speaker 1: a really really good group of mods and guides that
Speaker 1: are super diverse because if you, if you once you realize,
Speaker 1: like we're doing this on a global scale, so there
Speaker 1: are a lot of different cultures and communities that are
Speaker 1: basically coming in and forming one right, and so there's
Speaker 1: gonna be different standards of like what's okay and what's
Speaker 1: not okay in a lot of different places. Um. And
Speaker 1: what I really love about mid Journey and our moderation
Speaker 1: team is we have always made decisions in the sense
Speaker 1: of like, we are always trying to put real people
Speaker 1: and the community first. So we think it's more important
Speaker 1: um to reduce harm to real people than it is
Speaker 1: to let other people make art that could be harmful
Speaker 1: to them. Right. So I'll give you one example. My
Speaker 1: very first word that I got spanned on my very
Speaker 1: first day as a moderator. I'm not going to say
Speaker 1: the word because it is a slur to a large
Speaker 1: group of people, but it starts the G and it
Speaker 1: describes people of Romani descent um. A lot of people
Speaker 1: in the US don't know that that's a very harmful word.
Speaker 1: I kind of, I kind of knew a little bit,
Speaker 1: but I actually I didn't realize the full extent of it.
Speaker 1: And somebody had brought it up to me, and I
Speaker 1: was still a guide at this point, and so I
Speaker 1: brought it up to the moderators and I actually talked
Speaker 1: to a team member, a dev team member about it
Speaker 1: for a little while, and we were going back and forth.
Speaker 1: I was like, look, most people in the USA don't
Speaker 1: know this is bad. They use it innocently, even you know,
Speaker 1: even if the term itself isn't in this in you know,
Speaker 1: they don't know. But on the other hand, this term
Speaker 1: was literally used like to create genocide. It's violent, you know,
Speaker 1: so maybe we shouldn't allow people to use that because
Speaker 1: it's really hurtful and harmful to the very real, alive
Speaker 1: people today, you know, to see that term getting used
Speaker 1: and actually, UM, people get really upset about it. They're
Speaker 1: like seriously, like you're you're something, you're banning that, you're
Speaker 1: censoring that, and we're just like, yeah, find other words,
Speaker 1: you know. Um. Another really good example actually came up recently.
Speaker 1: It's been brought up a couple of times, but somebody
Speaker 1: in our feedback channel, UM was pretty upset. Understandably, so
Speaker 1: I think, um, because the term down syndrome is banned.
Speaker 1: And when we banned that, we actually we went come
Speaker 1: forth on it because we we do not like banning
Speaker 1: things that are identities. UM. You know, you don't like
Speaker 1: banning things that are real people unless it's like very obviously,
Speaker 1: you know, a hurtful way to to refer to real people.
Speaker 1: Down to the term isn't a hurtful way to refer
Speaker 1: to refer to people. However, nine of people who are
Speaker 1: using that term, we're using it in a really bad
Speaker 1: way and in a really hurtful way, and so it
Speaker 1: got to the point where or we were just so
Speaker 1: flooded with that that it started to become unmanageable UM
Speaker 1: and moderating it, and so we just went ahead and
Speaker 1: just banned the whole term. And it's it is upsetting,
Speaker 1: I think, because you know, it's like the fact that
Speaker 1: people are misusing certain phrases, certain words in a way
Speaker 1: that is harmful or crappy enough, you know, it's that
Speaker 1: we have to like ban it, like that sucks UM
Speaker 1: and we have like people get upset about it, Like
Speaker 1: we have suggestions like use this word instead, or use
Speaker 1: that instead. The guy in feedback, for example, he was like, oh,
Speaker 1: my wife works of down syndromes children and like wants
Speaker 1: to be able to create with this. And so we're like, okay,
Speaker 1: use I'm gonna say this wrong. It's like tris some
Speaker 1: me or try somebody twenty one. It's like the specific
Speaker 1: mutation or something like that that will create what you want.
Speaker 1: But anybody who's trying and create imagery about down syndrome
Speaker 1: people in a bad way isn't going to know that,
Speaker 1: or they're not going to take the time to try
Speaker 1: and figure that out, you know, so a lot of
Speaker 1: our decisions, you know, it's really just trying to balance
Speaker 1: between all the people who are abusing a term and
Speaker 1: you know the rest of everyone else, like trying to
Speaker 1: give people the most freedom to to create things that
Speaker 1: are important. And that's absolutely a big conversation about UM
Speaker 1: able is UM and what is seen as how disability
Speaker 1: is seen in general, And and I know many disabled
Speaker 1: activists would say disability is not a negative thing, so
Speaker 1: saying it is, I think that is a complicated issue
Speaker 1: because you do have the bad players who come in
Speaker 1: to do something as obvious in an evil or bad intent.
Speaker 1: So that's an interesting perspective they have to look at,
Speaker 1: you know. And on on top of this UM One
Speaker 1: of the things I find interesting with all of the
Speaker 1: AI conversations, and this includes chat GPT, I know, it
Speaker 1: is getting bigger and bigger, and there's so much conversation
Speaker 1: about the information that is being fed into AI and
Speaker 1: what happens and and what the biases are and what's
Speaker 1: even available. And it's pretty interesting because I know, for
Speaker 1: a chunk of content, let's say, for when people are
Speaker 1: talking about specific imagery of women, a lot of it
Speaker 1: comes from an and cel kind of group of men
Speaker 1: who think this is the perfect woman, and for some
Speaker 1: reason that overtakes an image. So you may not want this,
Speaker 1: Like I think I've seen a few where I've seen
Speaker 1: files or it's just as women and I like, in
Speaker 1: my mind, I'm like, oh, women are creating this, let's
Speaker 1: what this is. But it turns out these are men
Speaker 1: creating what they think is a beautiful woman, and you're like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, what is this? Is this the way?
Speaker 1: And there's nothing wrong with porn, but is this one
Speaker 1: more way of those bad players that we talk about
Speaker 1: to have another misogynistic hold on something that is so new.
Speaker 1: So with all of that, when it comes to women
Speaker 1: and other marginalized communities, do you have a concern about
Speaker 1: that in the AI world or what do you see
Speaker 1: as it's coming out and it's so brand new. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So the first thing I want to say about that,
Speaker 1: I think the next sentence applies to many subjects within
Speaker 1: the AI world, not just this one. But what I
Speaker 1: will say is AI art isn't necessarily creating problems as
Speaker 1: much as it's highlighting the issues that have been issues
Speaker 1: both within the art world and within society have been
Speaker 1: issues for a long time, and it's really just like
Speaker 1: highlighting a lot of those problems. Let's think I said back,
Speaker 1: and I want to explain it this way because I
Speaker 1: think it's really it's really important to understand this part
Speaker 1: of it, which is that actually, when it comes to
Speaker 1: a I R, it's everything's bias. Everything is. So let's
Speaker 1: say you feed in um a bunch of pictures of apples, right,
Speaker 1: Unlet's say all of those apples, they're the round, they're nice,
Speaker 1: they're pretty, um, they're also like all mainly green, they're
Speaker 1: all mainly green apples. Right. The more images of green
Speaker 1: apples you put in there. You may have a couple
Speaker 1: of pictures of red apples, but the more pictures of
Speaker 1: green apples that you put in there, that when you
Speaker 1: put it into a service like mid Journey or any
Speaker 1: other text to image service, you put in the word apple,
Speaker 1: it'll put it'll give you a green apple. But we
Speaker 1: as humans don't care about that, right, That's that's not
Speaker 1: something that we think of, Oh, you know, mid Journeys
Speaker 1: biased to make green apples only, blah blah. But we
Speaker 1: notice it when it comes to other more important things,
Speaker 1: like if you put in doctor and it comes out
Speaker 1: with only men, or if you put in woman and
Speaker 1: it comes out with a pretty white, young female. You know,
Speaker 1: I know the reason that happens is because society in
Speaker 1: general is just already so biased. And I can talk
Speaker 1: on this as a designer. You know, when I was working,
Speaker 1: I worked for Clorox, I did I did some work
Speaker 1: for Clorox, and I was very specifically like, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: put some men cleaning imagery in here, because men can
Speaker 1: clean too, And Clorox came back and went, Nope, you
Speaker 1: need to put women. And even like their whole style guide,
Speaker 1: whenever they talked about their consumer, it was always she,
Speaker 1: and it made me so upset, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: So in a lot of ways, like you know, there
Speaker 1: are biases. Everything that any AI image generator makes is biased, right,
Speaker 1: but not biased in the sense of like how you
Speaker 1: and I understand it, because the way that a computer
Speaker 1: understands bias is going to be a lot different than
Speaker 1: a human. To fix that, it needs to be actively combated.
Speaker 1: But that is really, really, really hard, because you're talking
Speaker 1: about images being fed in on like a million scale,
Speaker 1: maybe even billions. I'm actually not sure the amount. But
Speaker 1: it's a really really hard problem to solve because you know,
Speaker 1: there are so many different ways these biases can present itself. UM.
Speaker 1: And you also have the fact of like the users
Speaker 1: who are making these images themselves, you know, when we're
Speaker 1: talking about like men making these images and you're like,
Speaker 1: oh cool, Like you know, it's very different to me.
Speaker 1: For example, when like a woman makes bikini images versus
Speaker 1: a straight man, it feels different, right. The thing is,
Speaker 1: we can't really moderate or verify intent either, is the
Speaker 1: hard part, and that's why um and and it's it's
Speaker 1: such a hard line to balance because you know, we
Speaker 1: do moderate female bodies um and that can feel really
Speaker 1: bad to some woman too. UM. But it can also
Speaker 1: similarly similarly feel just as bad too. You know, go
Speaker 1: on the top of the community feed and you just
Speaker 1: see a bunch of like young, pretty hot, you know,
Speaker 1: fake woman. UM. And that actually happened, by the way,
Speaker 1: I uh, months and months ago. I after like a
Speaker 1: week or two or a couple of weeks of this happening,
Speaker 1: I finally went into um the correct channels on Discord
Speaker 1: and was like, hey, guys, UM, have any of you
Speaker 1: noticed that there's just like a bunch of you know,
Speaker 1: pretty women of like lots of cleavage and they're always busty.
Speaker 1: I'm like, wow, redheaded and busty is what I've seen.
Speaker 1: It's uncomfortable. It's it was really and it still is
Speaker 1: really uncomfortable. And it got to the point where it
Speaker 1: was like it was starting to make me feel bad,
Speaker 1: you know, I was like, Wow, this is really reminding
Speaker 1: me that my worth as a person is like just
Speaker 1: based on how pretty I am and like how portable
Speaker 1: I am, and it's you know, what I will say
Speaker 1: is that when I did bring that up and I
Speaker 1: had that conversation, the response was immediate and it was overwhelming.
Speaker 1: It was like, I'm so glad you to this, like
Speaker 1: we've been talking before. I was um in internal channels,
Speaker 1: by the way, but the response even from the team
Speaker 1: was like, we've been talking about this for like the
Speaker 1: past couple of weeks, like it bothers us too, we've noticed,
Speaker 1: thank you for bringing it up. We want to try
Speaker 1: and fix this. And then um. Every week there's an
Speaker 1: office hours, which means that David the founder, he goes
Speaker 1: on to the discord Um voice chat stage for hours
Speaker 1: each week and people in the community asked him questions
Speaker 1: and talk about certain topics blah blah. And the next
Speaker 1: two weeks was literally just like bringing this issue to
Speaker 1: the community and we did this thing where we just
Speaker 1: like brought up as many women as possible to the
Speaker 1: stage and just had like a huge conversation between like
Speaker 1: all different kinds of women, like how do you feel
Speaker 1: about this? Like is this okay? Is it's not okay?
Speaker 1: Like how should we handle them moderation here? You know,
Speaker 1: And so there's always been an effort to try and
Speaker 1: include real people who it affects and these convertations. And
Speaker 1: I've always really really appreciated that, um, and I've always
Speaker 1: felt very safe bringing these issues up. UM, and I've
Speaker 1: always felt very heard. A lot of what came out
Speaker 1: of that was, um, we we did. We do softband
Speaker 1: stuff now, so like you can still make you know,
Speaker 1: imagery at a beach or whatever. And um, you know,
Speaker 1: if you if you start, that doesn't mean our moderation
Speaker 1: around it has changed. Like if you're being weird about it, UM,
Speaker 1: we're still gonna go, hey, stop doing that. It's gross.
Speaker 1: But it also allows you know, people like you and me,
Speaker 1: you know, to maybe make stuff, you know, based on
Speaker 1: how we view our own selves, um without necessarily having
Speaker 1: to see it on the main feed. You know. So
Speaker 1: it's not a perfect system, it really isn't, but it
Speaker 1: works for what we needed to do. You know, it
Speaker 1: stops a lot of bad stuff, and that's good to
Speaker 1: hear because I know it's a lot of conversation because
Speaker 1: y'all have grown really quickly. We're specifically talking about my journey,
Speaker 1: but Dolly has been growing exponentially as well. Because I'm
Speaker 1: I'm wondering, and this may not be something that you
Speaker 1: can answer right off the bat, but like, as many
Speaker 1: people as you're coming in, how easily is it to
Speaker 1: moderate ten million people? Who's I guess that's just discord
Speaker 1: I'm not I'm guessing that's not the people who actually
Speaker 1: subscribe to mid Journey and use it um because I'm
Speaker 1: guessing not everyone comes onto the discord, But like, how
Speaker 1: do you actually monitor ten million people? When you literally
Speaker 1: grew from as you were saying, forty thousand, ten ten
Speaker 1: million in less than a year? Is that correct? Like
Speaker 1: six months? But like in that that growth that quickly,
Speaker 1: how do you actually moderate? How do you actually try
Speaker 1: to keep those standards in line? Because I'm a guessing
Speaker 1: with that exponential growth, it would be hard to control
Speaker 1: the bad players that come into uh that tub of space. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So we have a couple of different systems set up
Speaker 1: for all the banned words phrases we have used. We
Speaker 1: have we actually have um different levels to them. So
Speaker 1: like if you use the N word, that's like the
Speaker 1: worst level you will get automatically timed out. We have
Speaker 1: like a whole channel where we can see what people
Speaker 1: are like what banned words phrases they're using, We can
Speaker 1: see their entire prompt so UM we have like specific
Speaker 1: things that if we see somebody using them, you're using
Speaker 1: specific words, instant band goodbye, Like we don't want you
Speaker 1: as a part of our community, even if you're just
Speaker 1: like testing it. You know, like it's just you know,
Speaker 1: even it's just it's not worth it. It's not worth
Speaker 1: to have certain people in our community. Um Our moderators
Speaker 1: are really active, which is great. It's it's kind of
Speaker 1: a mix. So we have like a mod queue on
Speaker 1: the website itself. People report UM, the report images through
Speaker 1: the site. It'll go to a feed that only the
Speaker 1: mods can see UM and we you know, we can
Speaker 1: delete photos you can even unpublish them, which means they're
Speaker 1: not actually deleted. Um, that's first that we do that.
Speaker 1: We do that very rarely. We do that for stuff
Speaker 1: that's like actually like not breaking rules, but it may
Speaker 1: be so uncomfortable. It really depends. Um, but yeah, it's
Speaker 1: it's definitely, it's definitely grown a lot. But I will
Speaker 1: say our community is pretty good. Actually, yeah, it sometimes
Speaker 1: seems very overwhelming, like how many bad people are using
Speaker 1: it for bad things, But it's actually not like if
Speaker 1: you compare like the actual amount of stuff for moderating
Speaker 1: versus the amount of people who are using it, it's
Speaker 1: like and usually the people who are who are doing
Speaker 1: bad stuff with it, they're like only doing that, and
Speaker 1: so once you clean that up, it's like we just
Speaker 1: got rid of like a big chunk, you know. But yeah,
Speaker 1: our moderator team is great. Um, they care very strongly
Speaker 1: about it, and we can't like the way we kind
Speaker 1: of see or at least the way I see us
Speaker 1: is that like where we have to like wade through
Speaker 1: a bunch of but to protect other people from having
Speaker 1: to do so, you know, right, which should be which
Speaker 1: should be the case. Very fascinated as the new medium
Speaker 1: has kind of come about UM and not even talking
Speaker 1: about any of the controversy outside of you know, the
Speaker 1: art world into the art world, but within because one
Speaker 1: of the things that we talked about, especially when we
Speaker 1: talk about new mediums, new places to maybe be able
Speaker 1: to monetize or not even monetize, but at least express
Speaker 1: yourself or do things to create UM when we see
Speaker 1: this is kind of a social media platform in its
Speaker 1: own right, obviously with a discord and being able to
Speaker 1: publish UM being being a community. How do you think
Speaker 1: companies like yours can because you're at the cust You're
Speaker 1: at the beginning essentially, which we're saying it's not new,
Speaker 1: but as the popularity is growing, you're at the beginning,
Speaker 1: can be an opening and welcoming space for women. When
Speaker 1: oftentimes platforms like this or popular platforms like this can
Speaker 1: be overrun by your patriarchal cis white men who want
Speaker 1: to capitalize. How does the platform rather make sure that
Speaker 1: they are or do you think they are welcoming the
Speaker 1: marginalized communities like women and people of color? You know,
Speaker 1: I hope we are. I have been approached by numerous
Speaker 1: people that have said, like my presence for example, because
Speaker 1: I'm very I present very obviously as she her like
Speaker 1: I have it in my bio my uh uh, my
Speaker 1: profile picture is like a pink eye. You know, it's
Speaker 1: it's But I've been approached by many people that said, oh,
Speaker 1: you know, your presence here has made me feel safer.
Speaker 1: And I know my fellow moderators, I know the fellow guides,
Speaker 1: they're all really good people. Um. And I think that's
Speaker 1: how that's how we manage that is we have a
Speaker 1: really really really solid moderator team who we are not
Speaker 1: We are not afraid to be like stop it. We
Speaker 1: are we do not want that in our community. Get
Speaker 1: out of here. Um. I will say, uh, we used
Speaker 1: to have a lot more of that nonsense. A lot
Speaker 1: of people get really upset that they can't do anything
Speaker 1: they want to do um or make any image they
Speaker 1: want to make, and they cry about censorship and uh
Speaker 1: um they have migrated to other services. And I think
Speaker 1: I can speak for a lot of other moderators at
Speaker 1: least that we're we're glad you know, if you want
Speaker 1: to go do that stuff, just don't don't do it.
Speaker 1: Don't do it where we have to deal with it. Please,
Speaker 1: not that I think it's okay. But you know, I
Speaker 1: don't have control over the other spaces, but I have
Speaker 1: control over this space, and so I feel very strongly.
Speaker 1: The moderators feel very strongly UM we and I mentioned
Speaker 1: that one channel, we we have a similar channel so
Speaker 1: that we can keep an eye on like things happening
Speaker 1: within discord um on Facebook, which I mentioned like, I
Speaker 1: was the main admin of that. I launched it, I
Speaker 1: the standards for it, I made decisions of how it
Speaker 1: was going to be ran um, and I also created
Speaker 1: the team for it. And one of the decisions that
Speaker 1: I made that ended up being such a good decision.
Speaker 1: I had to fight for it to UM. But one
Speaker 1: of those insis I made was UM and the Facebook
Speaker 1: group that everything has to have post approval, which means
Speaker 1: you can submit something, but then before it to actually
Speaker 1: get posted on the group, a moderator, a Facebook moderator
Speaker 1: has to prove it. And so there have been so
Speaker 1: many things that we've caught UM that just feel bad
Speaker 1: or you know, aren't appropriate or not even really as
Speaker 1: mid journey sometimes UM fun side story, we have one
Speaker 1: guy try to post his entire camera roll on accident.
Speaker 1: It was like a over a thousand pictures. But you know,
Speaker 1: if we have to, we have to stay vigilant, and
Speaker 1: you know, we can't always catch everything. So I'm always
Speaker 1: trying to remind people like, report it, report it. Message
Speaker 1: me if you need to. If I don't answer right
Speaker 1: away because I'm sleeping, you know, go to their mod um.
Speaker 1: There are ways you can report through Facebook. There are
Speaker 1: ways you can report through the Reddit, there are ways
Speaker 1: you can report through Discord, and there are ways you
Speaker 1: can report on our our website UM. And if it's
Speaker 1: like really bad, message us and we will get it
Speaker 1: right away. But yeah, it really you know, we have
Speaker 1: to coordinate a lot because you know, we have to
Speaker 1: find people that can do the night shifts we know,
Speaker 1: and the USA people are asleep, and it's it's it's
Speaker 1: a lot, but and I think we all try really hard,
Speaker 1: and we all really really care a lot about creating
Speaker 1: like safe spaces UM for people. So I hope, I
Speaker 1: really hope they feel safe. I really hope so. And
Speaker 1: if they don't, I hope that people feel like they
Speaker 1: can message me about it and I will try and
Speaker 1: help um. For anybody who's listening on Discord, I'm knuckle
Speaker 1: it's f n you c k l E, and then
Speaker 1: I have in parentheses community. I always say this world
Speaker 1: wrongly at the it's a hard one. My couple picture
Speaker 1: is a giant pink eye. Please message me UM, and
Speaker 1: I will try and help as much as I can.
Speaker 1: I feel very strongly about it. I want mid Journey
Speaker 1: community to be safe and open to everyone. Well, that's awesome,
Speaker 1: and I think that might be the answer to itself
Speaker 1: and a lot of the platforms that don't actually look
Speaker 1: for the safety and and guidelines for the safety of
Speaker 1: their users and allow for misinformation. I know that's not
Speaker 1: the same thing for this, but like misinformation or harassment
Speaker 1: in general, to run amuck um without any kind of
Speaker 1: checks and balances, it definitely doesn't make it unsafe for
Speaker 1: many of the users. So if you are like helping,
Speaker 1: which it sounds like, I love that to make the
Speaker 1: safe for marginalized people UM and and queer communities. So
Speaker 1: that's awesome to hear because that is one of the
Speaker 1: things I think it's missing in general when it comes
Speaker 1: to social media platforms or different types of mediums that
Speaker 1: can be for the public. Yeah, and I think it's
Speaker 1: important to note to UM as we're as we're trying
Speaker 1: to build my journey up and and this is this
Speaker 1: is more from the actual team itself. UM, But I
Speaker 1: know and David talks about this all the time in
Speaker 1: the office hours, like he does not want to repeat
Speaker 1: the same mistakes as regular social media. And that's why
Speaker 1: you can't, for example, you can't see who follows you.
Speaker 1: You know you can't. You can't see the amount of
Speaker 1: people who follow you because we just want to avoid
Speaker 1: like a lot of the uh like likes validation kind
Speaker 1: of thing. UM that happens, and it's still happening with
Speaker 1: the community feed right now, and we talk about it
Speaker 1: and talk about how we want to change it. So UM,
Speaker 1: whenever that gets released, that will be really interesting and fun,
Speaker 1: I think. So, I guess we should have said this
Speaker 1: at the top, and I didn't. We are not currently
Speaker 1: sponsored by anything we are mentioning, including Chlorox, which you
Speaker 1: really came for. Actually like that. I'm fine with it.
Speaker 1: But saying so, one of the things you brought up
Speaker 1: when we were first communicating about this, UM was building
Speaker 1: community with women, and you've kind of been talking about
Speaker 1: that throughout, but I'm curious about that. And also just
Speaker 1: in terms of users and people who work on it.
Speaker 1: What have you seen demographically so right now? Uh, it's
Speaker 1: it's been acknowledged, uh in like office hours and whatnot.
Speaker 1: But there are less women that use my journey than
Speaker 1: we wish there was. And it's been really interesting because
Speaker 1: I will say this, our moderator and guide team UM
Speaker 1: is very diverse, very very very diverse. We have all ages,
Speaker 1: we have UM, people who are neuro divergent, including me UM.
Speaker 1: We have people who are parents, people who aren't parents,
Speaker 1: people UM, all ethnicities, religion, everything. But the one thing
Speaker 1: that I noticed a while ago was after I was
Speaker 1: made moderator, I was like, I'm one of three outwardly
Speaker 1: she her moderators, and I'm the only one who interacts
Speaker 1: the community because the other one, one of the other ones, UM,
Speaker 1: she was more in the Chinese community, and the third one, UM,
Speaker 1: she does a lot more behind the scenes work. She
Speaker 1: just did she actually just did our new docs. If
Speaker 1: you ever want to look, it's really fancy, it's cute.
Speaker 1: Sorry I had to say something today. We just released
Speaker 1: it like yesterday, and I'm very proud of it. But
Speaker 1: the point is, like I was, I realized I'm the
Speaker 1: only female moderator that like people know UM. And so
Speaker 1: it was like the day before I was going on vacation,
Speaker 1: I was like, hey, guys, UM, I just realized this thing.
Speaker 1: And actually I just realized also this by so many
Speaker 1: she hers reach out to me, UM and not to
Speaker 1: other people, because I'm the only obvious one that like
Speaker 1: gets it, you know, and that's really cool. But also, um,
Speaker 1: you know, like women aren't a monolith. I don't want
Speaker 1: to speak for the you know, all of the women everywhere, UM,
Speaker 1: because I'm not you know, my opinions are not gonna
Speaker 1: be the same as everyone else's. I don't know what
Speaker 1: we can do about it, but like, this is the thing.
Speaker 1: You should be aware of it. And I went on
Speaker 1: vacation the next day, and when I got back, I
Speaker 1: found that my counterpart, who I love, UM, he and
Speaker 1: I have the same brain. He's great. UM. He's the
Speaker 1: other boss of mods that works alongside me. UM. He
Speaker 1: had added a bunch of new guides that were women
Speaker 1: she Herd coded UM and I was like, that's really
Speaker 1: really nice because you just heard me and you just
Speaker 1: made the steps to solve this and like bring more
Speaker 1: women in, um, all on your own without me having
Speaker 1: to do much more than be like, hey, this is
Speaker 1: a thing. So that was the thing, um, and we're
Speaker 1: working on it. But yeah, because I wanted because I
Speaker 1: was one of the only mods he was a woman,
Speaker 1: like I said, people would reach out to me. UM.
Speaker 1: And then I just ended up somehow accidentally just actually
Speaker 1: knowing a lot of women in the community. And I
Speaker 1: think that's been really interesting and really cool. Yeah. I'm
Speaker 1: trying to think what more can I say on that. UM.
Speaker 1: I just actually I was just reached out to actually
Speaker 1: yesterday by somebody who has their own server for a
Speaker 1: woman and uh, marginalized people in different communities, UM, which
Speaker 1: I just joined today, and I was like poking around
Speaker 1: and I was like, oh, this is so cool, you know. Um.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I definitely think there can be more done
Speaker 1: in that area to invite um, not just women, but
Speaker 1: just anybody who is an assist white man and invite
Speaker 1: them into our space and just show them how cool
Speaker 1: AI and how empowering it can be too. Yeah, it
Speaker 1: seems really neat, you know, And I'm thinking about because
Speaker 1: I'm kind of kind of alluded to it earlier about
Speaker 1: you know, I do hear a lot about the controversy
Speaker 1: when it comes to the art world and uh AI
Speaker 1: and interesting in love you are in the art world
Speaker 1: specifically actually doing this as a job as part of
Speaker 1: your creative jobs, which is interesting in itself, And but
Speaker 1: you're also really really adamant about the benefits of AI. UM. Both,
Speaker 1: how do you see that? Do you see that at all?
Speaker 1: In conflicting because we are we have again we're hearing
Speaker 1: a lot of controversy back and forth about you know,
Speaker 1: is this going to disrupt uh individual artists? Is going
Speaker 1: to disrupt the art world as we see it? Um
Speaker 1: And then coming back to you know, but you do
Speaker 1: you use this as a part of your job as well,
Speaker 1: Like how does that all encompass for you as an
Speaker 1: artist slash AI expert. I'm gonna say, call your expert.
Speaker 1: You know. I think that's one of the biggest things
Speaker 1: that I don't want to stay hurtful, but it's kind
Speaker 1: of hurtful this idea that it's AI versus artists because
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm an artist, I work in the creative industry.
Speaker 1: A lot of my friends who are working in the
Speaker 1: creative industry for many years use AI. My friend who
Speaker 1: invited me to my journey is an artist. I don't
Speaker 1: think it conflicts at all. I maybe a little bit,
Speaker 1: but like not not really. I know most people who
Speaker 1: I've talked to, and I say most, not all, but
Speaker 1: most people I've talked to who have been working in
Speaker 1: the creative industry, once they try it and really get
Speaker 1: a feel for it, they start to understand, Oh, this
Speaker 1: is like really cool and really awesome. Um. I I
Speaker 1: do use it. I use it as a tool. Is
Speaker 1: really great for brainstorming, is really great for trying to
Speaker 1: figure out like interesting new ways to take a concept.
Speaker 1: You know. I have this thing when I'm working my
Speaker 1: day job as a designer where it's like I have
Speaker 1: like a specific style in mind, but then when I
Speaker 1: try to find examples of it, I can't find it,
Speaker 1: And so that's really helpful. I think it's a really
Speaker 1: really powerful creative tool. UM. And the other thing I
Speaker 1: want to say is, and I said this before, but
Speaker 1: the big thing of AI art is it is highlighting
Speaker 1: a lot of the issue is already present, um within
Speaker 1: the art world. So one of the big issues that
Speaker 1: has already been present is that, um, there's a certain
Speaker 1: group of artists and designers who are very are valued
Speaker 1: very lowly, and who don't get paid enough. And some
Speaker 1: of the problems around that is, you know, one, they're
Speaker 1: a lot of people out there that are doing it,
Speaker 1: so you have a lot of competition. Um, you also
Speaker 1: have competition from overseas. You know, there there are companies
Speaker 1: where they outsource their design, you know, to another country
Speaker 1: where the costs of living maybe a lot lower, and
Speaker 1: so they can pay them a lot lower wage. That's
Speaker 1: not right, right, And so now a AI has done
Speaker 1: is it basically taken a lot of these issues that
Speaker 1: we've already had for a long time, and it's just
Speaker 1: making him more obvious and making it harder. And it
Speaker 1: is a little bit scary, I think for people who
Speaker 1: are already struggling. I think you could say the same
Speaker 1: thing for people who whose jobs have already been overtaken
Speaker 1: by machines in a way, you know, like cashiers for example.
Speaker 1: And personally, I think a lot of the stems from
Speaker 1: the fact that we just live in a capital realistic world, um,
Speaker 1: where you have to have you have to have some
Speaker 1: sort of skill or value or you know, something to
Speaker 1: contribute to be able to live. And that's really unfortunate.
Speaker 1: And so I asked somebody who is in a very democratic,
Speaker 1: like leftist side of the world. I'm like, hey, maybe
Speaker 1: this is a great way to start talking about things
Speaker 1: like you b I or like other ways that we
Speaker 1: can we can help people live without necessarily having to
Speaker 1: rely on employment, because I think that's an issue not
Speaker 1: justin the art world but in many different areas of
Speaker 1: of our society right now. So um, I think also
Speaker 1: that the fine arts world people are scared of that.
Speaker 1: Like the people are like, oh, is the end of art?
Speaker 1: This is not the end of art. This is not
Speaker 1: the end of art at all. The fine arts world,
Speaker 1: they're they're going to be interested in it, but it's
Speaker 1: not really going to change it because fine arts people
Speaker 1: are way more concerned not just of the the output,
Speaker 1: but like who made it, why do they make it,
Speaker 1: how do they make it? And so yeah, there's gonna
Speaker 1: be some galleries and whatnot that show off AI art
Speaker 1: because it's interesting, but it's not going to change the
Speaker 1: value of people who are painting or or illustrated or whatever,
Speaker 1: or sculpting or whatever it is. It's not going to
Speaker 1: change their value as an artist. Um. In the fine
Speaker 1: arts world specifically, I think a lot of what it
Speaker 1: will disrupt, right now is what I personally as a
Speaker 1: designer was already just using regular stock imagery for and
Speaker 1: things will change, things will change, UM, But it's also
Speaker 1: one of those things where it's like things have already
Speaker 1: been changing and things will change anyway. And it's actually
Speaker 1: really interesting talking to UM A lot of the people
Speaker 1: in the creative industry who have been in it for
Speaker 1: many years, who have a lot more experience than me,
Speaker 1: because regardless of which part of the industry they've been in,
Speaker 1: they'll have some story for you where they're like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: I remember when photoshop came onto the scene and people
Speaker 1: were freaking out about it because of this and this
Speaker 1: and this, or like, for example, if you UM, have
Speaker 1: you ever read about Matt painters for movies. Let's take
Speaker 1: Star Wars as an example. Oh so UM probably did
Speaker 1: their special effects. They would basically they would take a
Speaker 1: giant glass pain and put it over top of like
Speaker 1: the movie film frame. UM. I don't know if they
Speaker 1: projected it or not. They'd have to because it was huge.
Speaker 1: And then they take this giant glass frame, they put
Speaker 1: it over top of it and it would literally paint
Speaker 1: the thing they're trying to paint. Some Star Wars. You know,
Speaker 1: the iconic scene where are two D two and uh,
Speaker 1: what's Oh my god, don't come from C C three
Speaker 1: po or you know, they're they're like in the desert
Speaker 1: and they see UM machine. The You see that over
Speaker 1: the hill in the desert, right that was literally painted
Speaker 1: on to a piece of glass. You know. Now that
Speaker 1: doesn't happen at all, you know what I mean, Like
Speaker 1: that entire industry got obliterated because of digital effects and
Speaker 1: c G I that came onto the scene. And so
Speaker 1: this is gonna be like that. It's going to change
Speaker 1: some things in the sense of some people are whose
Speaker 1: jobs are doing right now might be less relevant. But
Speaker 1: that's okay in the longer, bigger picture of things, because
Speaker 1: that's just how that's that's how things happen. And from
Speaker 1: how I see it, I think it's going to open
Speaker 1: up an entirely new world of created creativity and just
Speaker 1: entirely new things to make um. And it's going to
Speaker 1: be guided by humans. You know, even though it's AI
Speaker 1: and you're like, oh, the machines making it. No, at
Speaker 1: the end of the day, it's still humans that are
Speaker 1: making it and guiding it, you know. And it's and
Speaker 1: it's taking our visions and making it real. It's just
Speaker 1: a different way that it's doing it. If you can
Speaker 1: prompt right, I've seen the nightmare where it's not prompted
Speaker 1: correctly exactly, and it's it takes some practice to to
Speaker 1: get it right. I mean, it is interesting. We've been
Speaker 1: doing a lot of technology episodes lately, and essentially the
Speaker 1: takeaway is like they're pros and cons. There's bias involved
Speaker 1: because humans are involved, and you can't remove technology from
Speaker 1: the society that we are and the people who created
Speaker 1: it and the people who use it. Um. But I
Speaker 1: it is also true that, yeah, I've been working kind
Speaker 1: of in this industry for ten years, and there were
Speaker 1: there have been panics like if Google changes the algorithm,
Speaker 1: our whole office would shut down, and it's like, oh
Speaker 1: my god, we're ruined. Yeah, Like, I don't think I
Speaker 1: get it because I remember sitting in the office and
Speaker 1: thinking like, oh I'm fired. Um well Google changed this
Speaker 1: one thing and my whole job's gone. What will I do?
Speaker 1: So I get the fear of it. But it is
Speaker 1: true that, you know, we adapted and we changed and
Speaker 1: I still have a job. It's not the same job,
Speaker 1: but I do still have a related job. I mean,
Speaker 1: and you already see this in a lot of different
Speaker 1: like in the fashion industry. Right now, we're starting to
Speaker 1: see a rise in people valuing handmade stuff, you know,
Speaker 1: handmade pottery and whatnot, um, sustainable stuff, you know. And
Speaker 1: I think in that sense, actually, really nice handmade stuff
Speaker 1: will be valued even more because we'll be so bombarded
Speaker 1: by everything else that people you know, we're we're never
Speaker 1: gonna not value the stuff that people make of their
Speaker 1: own hands. You know, that's not going to change. So
Speaker 1: I'm not too worried. I'm actually really excited. Um. I
Speaker 1: think a lot about do you guys know Stardi value
Speaker 1: all these things that I don't know? I'm so old
Speaker 1: keep going up. It's a really cute and very popular
Speaker 1: games based off of the Harvest Moon games, which are
Speaker 1: um the o G farming simulators. Um uh. But this
Speaker 1: the guy who made Stardi value. He it. He was
Speaker 1: the only person that made it. He spent ten years
Speaker 1: making it, you know, writing the code, um, making all
Speaker 1: the art and I and I remember reading about it
Speaker 1: once and it was like he changed all the art
Speaker 1: like two or three times at a certain point, Like
Speaker 1: I said, it grew and evolved and it's such a
Speaker 1: it's it's won so many awards and it's such a
Speaker 1: loved piece of media, and you know, it just really
Speaker 1: makes me think of that because I'm like, Okay, now
Speaker 1: everybody has ten years to dedicate to making like a
Speaker 1: big project like this, but now with AI, you know,
Speaker 1: and especially once it evolves to something a lot um
Speaker 1: stronger and more usable. Imagine if like anybody, you know,
Speaker 1: they could do what this guy did in ten years,
Speaker 1: they could do it in a couple of months, you know.
Speaker 1: And imagine the amount of new stories, the amount of
Speaker 1: new media, the amount of niche stuff too. Because if
Speaker 1: you're a big movie production place, you know, you have
Speaker 1: you're spending like millions of dollars on making a movie.
Speaker 1: You have to make, you know, something kind of generic
Speaker 1: um so that everybody will like because you're you know,
Speaker 1: you have to like stick to certain formulas, you know,
Speaker 1: because you don't want to lose money blah blah. Imagine
Speaker 1: a world where it won't take millions of dollars to
Speaker 1: make movies. And so imagine like you or me, you know,
Speaker 1: or your kids or these these stuff whatever, right, Imagine
Speaker 1: view or me like being able to like make our
Speaker 1: own movies about whatever we want, and how powerful and
Speaker 1: empowering that can be, you know, and also awful actually
Speaker 1: another think about it, but art is magical. UM. Being
Speaker 1: able to create is magical. UM. It's gotten me through
Speaker 1: some of the hardest parts of my life. UM, try
Speaker 1: not to actually cry. But when my dad died, that
Speaker 1: was that was I was twenty three, my sister and brother.
Speaker 1: My sister was fifteen, my brother was fourteen, So it
Speaker 1: was just a whole thing. And a week after he
Speaker 1: had died, I sat myself down and I forced myself
Speaker 1: to create because I knew he'd want me to do that.
Speaker 1: And that was so healing because it was something that
Speaker 1: I could hold on to, you know, through my grief.
Speaker 1: And I have talked to so many people who have
Speaker 1: had similar stories I've I've talked to. There was one
Speaker 1: woman who she lost her son and she was like,
Speaker 1: I was barely living. I was just surviving. And somebody
Speaker 1: introduced me to mid Journey and I've been able to
Speaker 1: work through this grief and not only do that but
Speaker 1: also just make fun stuff and you know, and or
Speaker 1: people who UM, like one person he was telling me
Speaker 1: how he used to be able to play guitar, and
Speaker 1: he uh, he got an injury in his hands. He
Speaker 1: can't move his hands right. He can type, but he
Speaker 1: he can't He can't even learn to draw if he
Speaker 1: wanted to, and so he was just cut off from
Speaker 1: being able to create in these capacities. And now it's
Speaker 1: like now he has the ability, and I think that's
Speaker 1: so powerful. Um. I know a lot of people who, um,
Speaker 1: they were disabled and like they're like stuck in bed
Speaker 1: all day or they just they just aren't able to
Speaker 1: like go out and do things they want to do.
Speaker 1: And they've told me personally, you know, being able to
Speaker 1: do this is like brought so much meaning and like
Speaker 1: so you know, so much magic to their lives, and
Speaker 1: like that to me is so impactful and so meaningful
Speaker 1: because I am understand I understand that magic. I've been
Speaker 1: there myself, and I'm just like I'm just so happy
Speaker 1: and so um so honored that I get to be
Speaker 1: a part of something that is opening up that magic
Speaker 1: to people who have never experienced it before. Um, I
Speaker 1: think that's really wonderful. So, yeah, you make a great point.
Speaker 1: I think this is definitely a conversation about accessibility as well.
Speaker 1: That for people who were not able to create and
Speaker 1: had images, our thoughts or things that they wanted to
Speaker 1: do that we're never able to do so or thought
Speaker 1: they couldn't do. So this could be a conversation about
Speaker 1: it did open up to those too have an accessible
Speaker 1: outlet to do those So it is it's an interesting
Speaker 1: point of view do and not just people who are disabled.
Speaker 1: But like, I mean, you know, if all the nepotism
Speaker 1: stuff being talked about recently, you know, it's like even
Speaker 1: just getting into the art world can be very daunting
Speaker 1: and expensive. You know, our colleges are super expensive. I
Speaker 1: would know I went to one, but I also knew
Speaker 1: people who weren't able to go because they would have
Speaker 1: never been able to afford it. And so I think
Speaker 1: about it in that sense, to like just the amount
Speaker 1: of people who may never have had access to this
Speaker 1: world it's now become even more easy, and I think
Speaker 1: that's a good thing. There's so many things we can
Speaker 1: talk about. There's so many intersections here, and I feel
Speaker 1: like we've touched on a lot of them. Um, So
Speaker 1: thank you for for coming on and and discussing it
Speaker 1: with us, because I'm I'm a newbie, so I learned
Speaker 1: a lot. Is there anything any resources you want to
Speaker 1: shout out anywhere people can go to find you or
Speaker 1: learn more? So, UM, you can find me on discord
Speaker 1: if you want. I'm I set myself as offline a
Speaker 1: lot because I get a lot of spam otherwise. But
Speaker 1: sometimes you might catch me on the side board of
Speaker 1: all the list of people. UM, I should be in
Speaker 1: the moderator's column. I'm Knuckle community age on which UM
Speaker 1: I'm also Knuckle on Instagram. UM, you can message me
Speaker 1: through there. I will see it, and I guess you
Speaker 1: can't connect with me on LinkedIn if you want, but
Speaker 1: I might not see it as quick, so I don't know.
Speaker 1: I think you're the first person to use LinkedIn. That's
Speaker 1: that's awesome. There's like actually like a really solid AI
Speaker 1: community on LinkedIn. And the other thing is, UM, I
Speaker 1: might not be able to help everybody, like if you
Speaker 1: message me, and I might not be online or I
Speaker 1: might not because I do a lot of stuff. I'm
Speaker 1: very busy, but like I might not be able to
Speaker 1: help you personally. But we have UM the trial support
Speaker 1: and the member support channels and the guides are there
Speaker 1: to help you. UM and we also have the promp
Speaker 1: Chat channel, which is a lot more specific to helping
Speaker 1: prop stuff. They're great. And then all to the Facebook.
Speaker 1: I think is a really great place to ask questions too,
Speaker 1: because you have a lot of really cool community members there.
Speaker 1: So yeah, options galore. All right, be hearing from us,
Speaker 1: I guess, thank you, thank you, thank you again for
Speaker 1: joining us. Listeners. If you'd like to contact us, you
Speaker 1: can our emails Stephanie your mom stuff at ihart meia
Speaker 1: dot com. You can find us on Twitter, ms, podcasts,
Speaker 1: or Instagram and TikTok that stuff I've never told you. Thanks,
Speaker 1: it's always started. Super producer Christina, Thank you Christina, and
Speaker 1: thanks to you for listening stuff I Never told you.
Speaker 1: Re Prospection by heart Radio. For more podcast in my
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