13 KiB
AL (AI Writing Prompt)
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Author: u/Kishoto *
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Score: 19
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Created: 2017-06-02T20:48:58
Post:
Comments:
u/CeruleanTresses [+5] (a day later)
Fun story! I enjoyed the AI's attempts to make sense of its "world." One criticism I have is that the story kind of grinds to a halt when Dr. Travers shows up and explains everything. Much of what he said had already been conveyed earlier, and most of the rest could easily be incorporated into the "action" instead of being exposited at the end.
u/Kishoto [+2] (a day later)
Fair criticism! I admit he came in as an exposition prop; that was sort of intentional. I wasn't sure how well I conveyed the things he explained throughout the story. It was obvious to me (because I came up with the ideas) but I wasn't sure how obvious AL made it through his actions. In this case, it seems I underestimated its obviousness. My bad!
I could probably just have the story ending with Dr. Travers and the General taking over from Tyler, honestly, if I wasn't as concerned as I mentioned I was. :P
Also, glad to hear you enjoyed the read!
u/CeruleanTresses [+2] (a day later)
Yeah, I'd say most of it comes across well without Travers. I can understand your concerns about readers missing stuff. You might consider having a couple of friends read through the part before Travers' exposition, and then see how much of it they picked up on. That would give you a good sense of where you might need to expand and clarify things in order to safely cut the exposition.
u/Kishoto [+3] (2 minutes later)
So this is a story I wrote for this prompt here.
It's about 7k words, as opposed to 5k. I hope that's not a problem, /u/TK17Studios ? :)
u/TK17Studios [+1] Author of r!Animorphs: The Reckoning (5 hours later)
How do I send you some bucks? I won't be able to read it for a while, but I can probably just go ahead and give you the double bounty for Being Somebody Who Got Something Done.
u/Kishoto [+1] (17 hours later)
I was thinking about that; I don't live in the US and don't have Venmo or anything like that. So what you can do is just get me two of these.
I linked the $10 version and I don't mind getting it in virtual currency, lol. And you can just PM me the codes.
u/TK17Studios [+1] Author of r!Animorphs: The Reckoning (18 hours later)
Shows currently unavailable. I'll check the link again later today/tomorrow.
u/Kishoto [+1] (20 hours later)
That's odd. It works for me.
Anyway, what it links to is the Amazon page to buy gift codes for the game League of Legends. You can buy them in $10 increments. If you search "league of Legends riot points" on amazon, it should be pretty straightforward from there.
u/TK17Studios [+1] Author of r!Animorphs: The Reckoning (23 hours later)
u/Kishoto [+1] (a day later)
That's really strange. Maybe it's a country thing? I don't know.
Do you have Venmo?
u/TK17Studios [+1] Author of r!Animorphs: The Reckoning (a day later)
Yep. Venmo, Paypal, Google Wallet. You can PM me a place to drop your bounty and I will.
u/General_Urist [+1] (7 days later)
Hm.... good story, but both the AI and the schoolkid seem a little too mature.
u/Kishoto [+1] (7 days later)
Well the school kid is about 17. Only way to know that is when it's mentioned he's in grade 11.
I am not certain why the AI seems mature. I made an effort to make it seem childish. It's vocabulary is just good.
u/usedemageht [+1] (16 days later)
It's impossible to have all these memories, speech and AI on 50mb. Also this reads too much like a movie. Executing a directive does not magically cause the monitor to show a bunch of stuff like code written over code - that would mostly have to be intentionally programmed. And a flash drive that auto runs and can terminate an AI, that's also very unlikely. AL could just choose not to read the drive.
Why is the school staff letting the boy talk to the AI? Alone for that matter. Principal didn't even try to pretend to be him, or at least watch over the shoulder. Plot is progressing in a certain direction without any reason for it to go that way. All in all, I think this short story is not rational at all
u/Kishoto [+1] (17 days later)
It's impossible to have all these memories, speech and AI on 50mb
The new AL wasn't that small. His seed was. He quickly grew to be much larger; the reason he didn't "spawn" earlier on the teen's computer was because it didn't have the hardware needed to run him.
Also this reads too much like a movie.
It was sort of intended to read like that. I imagined this as a sort of short film, at least in my head.
Executing a directive does not magically cause the monitor to show a bunch of stuff like code written over code - that would mostly have to be intentionally programmed.
This was a symptom of the aforementioned movie-esqueness. I didn't want to dive the reader into looking at the event from inside the computer but I also didn't want to simply write about how the CPU sat there humming as AL/the virus worked. The code thing seemed appropriately "fun".
And a flash drive that auto runs and can terminate an AI, that's also very unlikely. AL could just choose not to read the drive.
You don't know nearly enough about AI, AL or the specific technology within the story that allowed AL to exist to make that statement.
Why is the school staff letting the boy talk to the AI? Alone for that matter. Principal didn't even try to pretend to be him, or at least watch over the shoulder.
They were convinced it was a simple prank at first. Later, when they realized it wasn't, they tried several things. But nothing worked. The only response they were able to elicit was when they sat the Travers kid in front of it. As this takes place over a few days (from their perspective), they haven't exactly went into crisis mode.
Plot is progressing in a certain direction without any reason for it to go that way.
Incorrect. There are several reasons for the plot to go the way it did. The reasons include but are not limited to: Dr. Travers' regret and subsequent attempt to kill the AI to preserve the world, Travers being a typical teen and torrenting a movie only to get infected, AL's attempt to survive a murder attempt, the principal wanting the problem to be over with as little muss and money spent as possible (initially). All completely logical and rational reasons for things to progress the way they did. Would you like me to list more? (I will admit the outside assistance from Travers and the General seemed convenient but don't you think the Russian government could get them in there? Did I need to explicitly say that?)
All in all, I think this short story is not rational at all.
I respectfully disagree but you are entitled to your opinion. Thank you for reading! :)
u/usedemageht [+1] (17 days later)
I actually think the ending where the uncle and the general came in was very rational. My comment on irrationality is mostly joined to the earlier statements about the principal and how AL was conveniently defeated by a flash drive. For a flash drive to have any effect on a computer, it has to be read (and often executed, but reading the contents should be the least.) Realistically, a computer with top security could avoid reading the contents fully, making any program within the flash drive unable to do anything.
Furthermore, it could be read but not executed, which is when the contents can be scanned for viruses. If we assume AL has an in-built function that when reading a certain string will shut him down, he could avoid reading contents of anything in full, but scan a few pieces of the content looking for part of the string, treading the water. Since he is 9 years old mentally, that is excusable.
I can see you imagined it as a movie, and it's not wrong in writing. However those small things that spice up the writing can still be irrational, because movies are not made to be rational but to be interesting to watch. From a programmers perspective for example, that visual is irrational. Just like watching "hacking" in movies where they type stuff really fast. That's not how things work in reality.
The principal and the staff allowing Trevor to talk to the computer, or prankster, 1-1 is not rational nor realistic. There is someone holding the entire school network, including principals computer, and they decide it's fine to comply. Such a thing would first and foremost warrant a police report, including the boy. Secondly, there is a random guy whose acquaintance took over the school network - this guy should not be left alone, lest they will do worse things with both network in control and physical access to the terminal. Things such as controlling grades of the students. From others POV, it may as well be Trevor who had a grudge against the girl and made her grades tank. Inexcusable, from principals POV. The principal should always (try) to stay in control. Always look what the boy is typing, always see what the AI types in real time. I don't think there is any principal alive that would act this way, and that is what I meant by story progressing unnaturally. The story's main point is Trevor talking to AL 1-1 and understanding that he is just a kid (AI), rather than a hacker who wants money. For this to happen, the principal and staff have to act irrationally and leave him alone. If they acted rationally, this situation would not easily happen. This could be remedied by Trevor having a reputation for being anti-scammer, or having most IT knowledge in school, and principal having bad experience with scammers. Thus there would be a real reason to leave Trevor alone, including not suspecting Trevor himself. His connection to principal and uncle should be stated, which would explain why he is trusted and not suspected.
PS: I suck at remembering names, I don't know if he really is called Trevor or Travis and I'm on mobile so I can't look it up while typing this
u/Kishoto [+1] (17 days later)
I agree it was convenient that the principal was willing to leave him alone after some time had passed and it was clear that this wasn't an easily solved prank. I could've written in a few lines about AL being able to visually identify Tyler, perhaps via webcam, and thus ensuring he was the only one he would speak to. But it is implied that others tried to speak to AL and he refused to engage with anyone who wasn't a Travers. The principal didn't hop to impersonating him because, logically speaking, no one should ever really hop to impersonating someone they don't really know anything about. The principal would've been found out in seconds if AL had bothered verifying his identity (which AL doesn't do, beyond simply asking Tyler if he really is Tyler Travers. He's a simpleton. But the administration couldn't know this going in. Plus Tyler looked really guilty, especially once he confessed the flash drive debacle). I do concede that it was blatantly irresponsible for them to not even try and monitor him.
And I suppose I didn't make this very clear but the school administration had no idea what was going on from almost beginning to end. They just knew their computers didn't work. And they thought Tyler was at fault. The situation didn't truly escalate (as they still had laptops they could use for school business) until Stacy's grades were changed. And that very same day was when the General and Doctor showed up.
From a programmers perspective for example, that visual is irrational. Just like watching "hacking" in movies where they type stuff really fast. That's not how things work in reality.
You're right; it's not. But doing it the real way wouldn't really tell a good story (especially since I have some basic coding knowledge but not nearly enough to fully simulate something like that) and, as the rational thrust of this story wasn't focused on accurate visual representations of hacking, I took a few liberties.