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What AI developers could learn from Charles Bukowski?

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Re: What AI developers could learn from Charles Bukowski?

#51

Post by [deleted] »

andai wrote: post #46
dataviz1000 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "Go into yourself. Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depths of your heart; confess to yourself whether you would have to die if you were forbidden to write. > This most of all: ask yourself in the most silent hour of your night: Must I write? Dig into 1 yourself for a deep answer. And if this answer rings out in assent, if you meet this solemn question…

A while back I started a substack and diligently posted every day, for about a month. The first few posts had some actual substance (a kind of backlog I suppose), but eventually I realized that I was just posting because I had decided to post and I didn't actually have anything left to say. So I just stopped posting. I guess it'll probably be a few more years until the next one :) (Gosh, just imagine if YouTube opera…

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Re: What AI developers could learn from Charles Bukowski?

#52

Post by Gud »

andai wrote: post #8

All writing is difficult. The most you can hope for is a day when it goes reasonably easily. plumbers don't get plumbers block, and doctors don't get doctors block; why should writers be the only profession that gives a special name to the difficulty of working and then expects sympathy for it? —Philip Pullman

I'm not a plumber, but I'm in the trades, and we absolutely get a "block", but we grind through it.

Re: What AI developers could learn from Charles Bukowski?

#53

Post by DennisP »

andai wrote: post #45
DennisP wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your friend could have still done the woman a favor, if he shared the automation with her privately, instead of with their employer. Doing things like this for yourself is how you make automation work for you instead of against you. Then you can take some of your extra time to automate even more. Or, if you're a dev, to clean up code so it's easier to work on later, or to improve your skills. How that applies in the…

You mean by automating it but pretending you're still doing it manually?

Not for anything scheduled on a server. But if I could turn a 30-minute task into a local button press, sure, I'd often keep it to myself.

You have to decide whether your time is your own, or your employer's. The latter is a road to burnout. I always viewed myself as a one-man business, with my managers being my only customers. I decided for myself how best to keep them happy, while also keeping myself happy.

Another part of all this was estimates. Early in my career I just estimated my median expected time, which meant half the time my boss got mad at me. Later I gave estimates I was at least 90% likely to meet, and worked extra hours on the few occasions it took longer. Managers were happier because I hardly ever missed a deadline, and usually I had extra time, which I also kept to myself fairly often.

For the owner of the business, all this might not have been ideally profitable in the short term, though I think it worked out pretty well in the long term. It's a virtuous cycle if you spend some of your extra time productively. I ended up with a pretty easy job most of the time, but occasionally being the guy they called on to save a failing project, and then I was fresh enough to work like a maniac.

Re: What AI developers could learn from Charles Bukowski?

#54

Post by bsenftner »

sedovsek wrote: post #14
bsenftner wrote: post #11

I met and drank with him once. Brutal punk poet of a guy.

Your comment starts as a nice teaser… care to share more? When was that? Judging by his writing, I get a sense that he became a bit more socially pleasant towards the end of his life?

Early 90's, I was checking out a dive bar in LA's Koreatown over lunch and noticed him at the bar. I happened to be reading one of his books a few night earlier, or I'd never have recognized the guy. It was one of those "welp, now or never" moments, and I got up and set next to him at the bar. After a glance and a "who the fuck are you?" I replied I was the idiot fan that was going to buy him drinks. His waving two fingers at the bartender was him indicating "okay" and we slowly started chatting. I ditched work for the afternoon, and had to call in sick the next, claiming my lunch was bad and made me sick. We smoked, this being when people could smoke indoors, and drank at that bar for hours. I think I slept in my car for a few hours too. He was a curmudgeon with a royal tongue. A life time memory, that afternoon. I think I was 25 then.

Re: What AI developers could learn from Charles Bukowski?

#56

Post by nh23423fefe »

drunken_thor wrote: post #4

This is why there is growing anti-AI sentiment. It is always extractive. You can never just enjoy a poem, you need to use it. You need to extract its value for shareholders. Get a life.

no its a bunch of fearful finger waggers imagining they are doing it right. get left behind
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