August 2024

Hi, MatthewDailey. Couldn't find your email so I'm contacting you here.

I don't recall how I found you and your projects -- probably HackerNews -- but I was intrigued by your GPT DND. You aren't the first to do "AI as Dungeon Master", but you are the first I've seen to add voice to the equation, so kudos.

I thought you might be interested in my gm-trainer project, which comes at things from the other direction: using LLMs as pseudo-players, rather than the GM, to provide GMs with a sort of training sandbox. Still early days, and not as configurable as I'd like it to be for other people. But to my knowledge I'm the first to flip things around like that. (Which makes sense if we consider that most people working in the nascent "AI + RPG" space seem to want to replace the "scarce resource" that is GMs/DMs).

Nothing to apologize for, brother. I wasn't trying to goad you into writing: when I have something to say, I say it, that's all. (For which you have ass oil to thank; the rest of my comment grew after that.)

No need to rush the thesis; it's ~200 pages after all. Take it piece by piece; if you have questions, email me -- or better yet, write 'em up here and we can do the whole public convo thing.

I am fond of Elves and Dwarves and Halflings, but I don’t often find they really “fit” into the worlds I make.

I have chronic hand pain. Not as debilitating as the medical problems you have faced, but I understand a little of your struggles — one against the flesh and one against the medical system, if your history’s anything like mine. However yesterday went or tomorrow goes, I hope you’re OKish today.

What beavers are for you, birds are for me. They, too, cover themselves in ass oil as a sealant — perhaps the two kinds of animal are in cahoots. Now there’s a wacky hook. And you’ve inspired me to consider giant birds in my world. The Atlas Mountains seem like a good place for a roc, and with such a big wingspan they could range far for their dinner. Maybe even menace Spanish shipping, Moroccan traders or Salian pirates — but the risk / reward ratio would be poor. Better to snarf a cow.

Once upon a time, in our Land of Khalifia, there lived a King and his Archmage.

Seeing that their birthdays were close together, the Archmage proposed a shared celebratory festival, reasoning that guests would be more grateful for one spectacular event than two lesser ones. The King agreed at once. After consulting the almanac for auspicious days, they fixed the date of the festival for the 24th of August, and invited noblemen, dignitaries, and a few select members of the landed gentry to eat, drink, and be merry.

Hoping to discuss some potential upgrades to Sparkles with Benji tonight.

I created this partial map of the Canary Islands for my D&D game, which is set in a mostly-historical version of the real world circa 1650.

I'm planning to take the app/website/wiki that I built for use at my game table and upload that to the public web pretty soon. Until July, it served just fine as an app running on my home network, with the players and I logging into during gameplay. But we are now all geographically separated, and hoping to continue playing remotely.

Joel, I heard of your blog through Tao of D&D, and subscribed after reading "Space is Big...". Everything I've read since then has confirmed that that was a wise decision.

First of all, I like your style. Sarcastic but informed. Angry but not ranty. When you don't like something, you say so and you say why, and then you offer something better.

A Swinhoe's white-eye, caught in a silly vertical pose. It gazes intently at ... something.

This is, so far as I can tell, a Pacific tree frog. Ordinary, but still cute.

I came across this reposing ribbiter while on a walk this morning on West Cliff in Santa Cruz. I didn't have a proper camera with me, but I think this photo turned out pretty good for a four-year-old iPhone.

This is the luckiest photo I got in my first year of photography: a bald eagle in flight!

Taken at Upper Newport Bay Nature Reserve.

This is a downy woodpecker, shot at Neary Lagoon in Santa Cruz, California. I probably spent half an hour trying to get a good shot of it through all the leaves and branches in the way. Victory was sweet.

I've spent the last two and a half years birdwatching. After wishing several times that I could show people the birds that I've seen, I took up photography. That was about a year ago, almost to the day, in which time I've taken well over 20,000 photos.

This one is in my top 3. It's a white-faced ibis at sunset, in Bolsa Chica Ecological Reserve.

One of the best things about Homebrew Website Club is meeting new nerds. Sometimes it feels like each new club meeting brings in someone new!

River, as far as I can tell you don't have a site yet, but good luck getting started in th IndieWeb. We're all here to help.

Joe, I'm happy to sign your guestbook, and I'm looking forward to exploring your site (specially your comics.) You've got a long history to spelunk! (UPDATE: having checked out some of the comics, I'm just jealous that someone can manage to be an artist, a writer, a surfer, and a programmer all at once!)

I'm excited to go to my first Homebrew Website Club in about two years!

It's been a long time since I've written here. In 2022, I was fairly busy with my master's studies and attending Recurse Center. Then, from fall of 2022 all the way through to the end of 2023, the lion's share of my time went to writing my master's thesis. Because I'm still dealing the hand injuries I sustained in 2019 and 2020, I often had to limit my time spent at the computer to just what I needed for working on my thesis. Writing for recreation was a no-go zone.