there is no wardrobe philosophy or shopping methodology that is ever going to result in an end state whereupon you are done choosing and purchasing clothes forever. -from a ffa reddit post

Haha, "There is watching pleasure algorithms to be found at work"

I suppose this is just another way of saying that it feels good to watch events occur, right? "Things change." The world goes on by. But I like the words algorithm, and system. They feel a little more bounded, more evocative. An algorithm is going somewhere. A system is something.

A process feels like something I can design, for a purpose.

P.S. since I really like to think of things in terms of overarching megatheories, of course I'd like to include all games in this category. Although 0-player games (Conway's Life) are extremely "just watch an algorithm go," a single-player platformer is also observing a process in action - the only difference is that you, the observer, are also part of the system.

This enjoyment is what drives me to write code in the first place. Programming is the art of designing algorithms and seeing them function.

I've talked before about the beauty of intelligence at work. It's caused me trouble for years.

Quote from: @droqen(2021)the nature of AI. why do we do it! i think that there is a specific feeling, an Aesthetic, a beauty, that i will describe as 'observing intelligence'. i love to peoplewatch. i love to watch crows pick and peck at things. living things with brains are great.

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Quote from: @droqen(2014)Pathfinding is easy, the problem I have is intelligence. (Or maybe I just need to fake the intelligence)

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But I think... seeing things through this lens, there's something beautiful about a situation unfolding even if the situation is plainly made up of randomness. I want to see how something works. Actual intelligence is a source of, perhaps, unlimited complexity. But the first time you run through a procedure, you don't know any of its outcomes. There's no downside to unintelligent procedures in those terms until the second time through.

(That said, I have developed a certain sort of jadedness -- I'm working through my own difficulty with seeing finite outcomes in every game. Actually playing some board games with friends again has been a joy.)

Loop Hero

Idle games are not just games about waiting and watching numbers go up... they're also games about observing an algorithm at work. They are about a beautiful process.

Hoarfrost on branches -photograph by Peter Martin

I was playing Kingdom Death: Monster and noticing how random everything is. As a player I make decisions, of course, but a huge part of the enjoyment I derive from this game is perceiving the algorithm at work, and telling stories about what happened, with my friends.

This isn't new (see Blaseball, for example, and the ages of sports fandoms that inspired it), but it's a really great alternative lens to seeing the pleasure of randomness as the pleasure of gambling. Stakes are merely an optional force that strengthens one's commitment to the magic circle. But the fundamental pleasure is deeper, and exists even without stakes.

When I visited Hong Kong for a few days, we noticed that a horse racing venue - a huge stadium - was on the way to where we were going, so we decided to drop in. Watching the horses race without a stake in the game, without any way to tell who was going to win, all I could do was watch and see these animals and their riders prance about in the pre-show, and then watch as some horses won, and others lost. We had picked some numbers, but didn't bet anything.

I don't remember if my guess was right.

Infinite generators churn out content without stakes.

Wordle and other daily challenges have stakes - there's only one today - it's a stake in time. Generative NFTs have stakes - there will only be however-many of these, they're worth something and have value. (I'm not a fan of NFTs and do not recommend getting into them, just like I don't recommend getting into gambling, which also involves stakes.) Cruel World had stakes - it would only be available for 1 day and would fall apart. (I sort of gave up on those stakes, an action which I now regret.)

Stakes grant meaning to the algorithmic unfolding, but there is an underlying beauty that can be appreciated, and cannot be denied. It's pleasurable to observe a random process. Somehow stakes give that pleasure meaning. I only have an hour, what will I see? This will only unfold once - how will it unfold? If I can generate a hundred thousand outcomes, no singular outcome has much meaning... unless it's meaningfully unique... once-in-a-lifetime.

Rarity.

Taste Is Over! If You Want It
We can just avoid the algorithms and do things analog.

Echo, Echo, Echo
Nothing original emerges from algorithm feedback loops.

Style in the Age of Digital Reproduction
Technology enables mass recreation of things once considered unique, original. Not just a photograph of a painting - AI can replicate the style of an artist. 3d models can stand in for real people online. All this, "cheaply and infinitely."

One Tenet of Algorithmic Culture
The author describes "the Generic Style", a style which falls naturally out of a well-explored system. The way people act in a virtual space is informed by the space itself, resulting in this "Generic Style". However, this can be a comforting thing, and it even exists in real life. Offline.

Content Luddism (Ethically Sourced Culture)
"I could abstain from algorithmic culture", writes the author.
But "effective" stylistic quirks will always be captured and become part of the "Generic Style".
It's hard to abstain.

Piracy
Internet piracy a decade ago felt more like a human experience than the Netflixes of today.

Hipster Platforms & Platform Hipsters
Now there exist services and platforms which present something more human than those algorithmic feeds.
You can hire someone to make a mixtape for you instead of listening to the machine's readily-available one.

The Style of No-Style
There's a service that will just ship you mostly-generic stuff (clothes, toiletries) every month. The algorithm age seems to wear away at individual taste - why not give up the fight, just let the algorithm decide?

A Pledge for the Self-Aware
We have taste, but we're also a drop in the river that carries us along. The "Generic Style of my time".

Algo-Clash
"Augmented creativity"
How can we use algorithms as a part of the creative process?
Glitch aesthetic indicates an understanding that algorithms exist, without resigning ourselves to their dominance.

The Innate Humanity of the Algorithm
Algorithms are generally driven by mass human flows.
Remember, you always have a vote!
(droqen: You're a drop in the river that carries you downstream.)

"Collapsing Dominant"
The author talks about how we are "in the midst of [a] shift in taste," from the mass-media television-driven mode to the current, driven by "Instagram likes, Twitter hashtags," etc.

"Do I understand the new or am I stuck in the old?"

The Death of Svpply
Svpply was a fashion social network with human-designed collections/feeds of fashion items.
As it grew, it found it had to rely less on human curation and more on machines.
And then it died.

"If everyone's editing Vogue, it wouldn't be Vogue."

Human- v. Machine-Curation
Machines can replicate style, but they don't have taste yet.
A friend who recommends a blue shirt will have a greater depth of interaction and reasoning than will a targeted ad. (e.g. Ok, you think I'll like this blue shirt. Why blue? What will it mean?)
The author wonders if they're just falling behind the times. Maybe the next generation will be fine with machine curation. Or the next.

Taste Optimization
Machine choices are bland and uninspired because they're driven by algorithms tuned to get attention, not to express an underlying taste. "Same same but different."

Machine-Generated Content
We now have creators creating things based on this non-existent algorithmic taste:
They do what the numbers say works.
They do what gets attention, rather than doing work to express their underlying taste.

(droqen: can't it be both? i can walk to the grocery store along my favourite path and still get there on time.)

Data-Based Fashion
What if instead of someone deciding something is in fashion, data decided what was in fashion? The author isn't sure which one is better, or worse.

droqen's aside: data can't decide what's in fashion, and in a way data is already one of the tools in use today for exploring new avenues of fashion. data is just information. someone needs to process the information. here the author could be talking about one of two things, or both:

1. what if fashion designers used more data when making their decisions? (this is already happening, i am sure)

2. what if artificial intelligence were involved in decisionmaking? (again, ai is certainly involved at some level)

Section Summaries.

The Seeing Robot
There's an app that gives you a % score for an outfit. It doesn't tell you how it comes to the decision, really, but for example it might judge an all black outfit at 73%, and an all grey one at 27%.

Theories of Taste
Taste is "knowledge through pleasure".
"We don't calculate or measure if something is tasteful to us; we simply feel it."
"This is principally founded on surprise."

But Fashion Is Already Arbitrary
Is its own summary

That Scene from The Devil Wears Prada
Claims that things are in fashion because someone decided it was in fashion.

droqen's aside: my own ruminations on this topic: when I see what games are fashion, it's a fascinating activity to predict and theorize how the culture of gaming will react to a variation of what we have now, or to a revival of something that once was. someone has to make a new game to push 'fashion' forward, but it's not a choice. it's a tactical move, bound up in limitations as much as in creative freedoms.

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