Janelle Shane
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janelleshane.com
Janelle Shane
@janelleshane.com
9.6K followers 270 following 490 posts
I write about the strange side of AI at aiweirdness.com

Also a laser scientist.

She/her. Colorado, USA
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janelleshane.com
Been thinking about this list of Christmas Entities I generated using GPT-3 www.aiweirdness.com/christmas-en...
The Three Christmas Weasels Christmas Weasels aid Santa Claus by tracking everyone or everything. They have pointy ears, yellow fur, and tails and bodies half red and half green, and can open doors with their teeth. Hostile Choir The Hostile Choir is a group of 13 dark, gray-skinned men in robes of purple with glowing red eyes, whose appearance heralds death. They sing an ominous song alternating between "[X], [X], you're dead" and "Bum bum bum bum / You're dead". Chrishmak A gigantic tree spider that lives in the heart of the Yulelog. To have him perform circus tricks, one must tell him over and over, "Chrishmak is truly a wonderful entertainer," as he grows with each shout of praise. Underwear Gnomes A non-anthropomorphic race of sly little thieves who steal underwear and replace it with awful versions made of leaves and bark.
December 24, 2025 at 3:25 PM
janelleshane.com
then in 2019 GPT-2 generated this carol
www.aiweirdness.com/the-ais-caro...
Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, with its red belly The All-gracious King of all the earth, Had a baby at Christmas time, On Christmas Day, A true and holy Deity, Went down to earth, With human flesh for sacrifice. For sinful men such a Deity doth appear, And wink and nod in reply, As he winked and nod in reply, As he winked and nod in reply The wretched world is run by ox and ass The wretched world is run by ox and ass, And in vain build I.
December 17, 2025 at 8:12 PM
janelleshane.com
On this day of Christmas I bring to you: Christmas carols generated by a tiny vintage neural net.

This is from 2017, when I trained the neural net from scratch on my laptop using just Christmas carols.

In retrospect I can see the neural net got mixed signals
www.aiweirdness.com/christmas-ca...
The story of the chimney see Santa baby, and blood and joyous so world and joy and good will to see Santa baby bore sweet Jesus Christ Fa la la la la la la, la la la la la la la la. King of toys and hippopotamuses [sic] full of the light of that stood at the dear Son of Santa Claus He was born in a wonderful christmas tree Run, run Rudolph, run, run Rudolph, run, run Rudolph, run, run Rudolph, run, run Rudolph, run, run Rudolph, run, run Rudolph, run, run Rudolf the new born King.
December 17, 2025 at 2:01 PM
janelleshane.com
An interesting article illustrating why we go to the effort to make extra narrowband lasers

…AND a cautionary tale about using LLMs to write alt text!
Diagram is of an objective lens design, with the light traveling through a torpedo-shaped series of 12 lenses. Other diagram details show the amount of spherical aberration at a few closely spaced ultraviolet wavelengths - in other words, illustrating chromatic aberration in the lens design. Original alt text reads: Diagram showing the dimensions and layout of an Airbus A320 fuselage cross-section, with length and radius measurements indicated in millimeters.
November 28, 2025 at 4:50 PM
janelleshane.com
I approve of this

(cromberry yaas is a pie generated by a very tiny old-school neural network)
www.aiweirdness.com/how-to-make-...
Line drawing of a covered pie with a red filling. The caption reads "Cromberry Yaas". The pie is saying "yaas"
November 25, 2025 at 9:33 PM
janelleshane.com
Lovely display of #aurora in north #boulder tonight!
Pink and green aurora seen from a park outside town. There are a few scattered trees and some sparse city lights stretching up into the foothills, clearly outlined against the color in the sky. Gorgeous red aurora with clearly visible structure and some green aurora on the horizon. Power lines and prairie grass partially lit by car headlights.
November 12, 2025 at 4:20 AM
janelleshane.com
There are freshly signed copies of You Look Like a Thing And I Love You at the Denver Airport Terminal B Tattered Cover!
Stack of four books, the top one open to show that it is signed and has a little doodle of a robot box
November 6, 2025 at 10:14 PM
janelleshane.com
Even with updated training data for 2025 the neural net still doesn't know how to complete the phrase "Kpop " but this was a good try
Kpop dumpster Kpop and the American cheese Kpop Assassin Kpop of Wood Kpop of Shop Kpop grocerie Kpop Egg Kpop of Halloween worker
October 28, 2025 at 7:14 PM
janelleshane.com
I trained the tiny neural net on the latest set of reader-submitted Halloween costumes and do I have some costume suggestions for you! www.aiweirdness.com/tiny-neural-...
A potato skeleton Bride of grocerie Wild of Dragon Dragonator Frog Wig Sexy 209 King of Thor Ghost of the Humbun Bear of Ninja Fire-brow ghost concept Two battery Hot Shape Devil Army on the full bun
October 28, 2025 at 4:56 PM
janelleshane.com
It certainly is game-shaped! Highlights include:
- Dee, my favorite Delie
- Train to Uptoown
- Sideways train to Uptoown
- Helpful mini-map in corner
- Normal Use of Ladder
I think this is my favorite frame
Screenshot from the linked video. It appears to be a frame from a 3rd person urban shooter game, but the longer you look the less things make sense. There's a metal catwalk whose bottom ladder is unusable. There's a double HVAC unit on the side of the building that blocks itself in a weird way. One of the player's action options is "take cover behind the hvac" which doesn't look possible but which I kind of wish they had tried. There are a bunch of object interaction options associated with the HVAC unit, all of which are unreadable, garbled text. One icon doesn't have text, but commenters in the linked thread have noted it looks like a check engine icon. There's a mini-map in the upper left, but all the directions are either north or double-north.
October 24, 2025 at 5:53 PM
janelleshane.com
Just found a tiny bell pepper that had slipped down into the lining of my coat. That could have been an unpleasant surprise in a few weeks.
Tiny red bell pepper maybe an inch (2.5 cm) in diameter at the largest
October 22, 2025 at 5:52 PM
janelleshane.com
I recently finished Automatic Noodle by @annaleen.bsky.social and am recommending it to everyone I see. Post-apocalyptic in a sense but not desperate because so many of the characters care about each other and their community and want to build them up. I have a feeling I’ll be rereading this soon.
Cover of Automatic Noodle. It’s in bright vaporwave style colors but a cartoony style - Tuca and Bertie vibes for sure. A robot hand holding chopsticks is lifting thick noodles out of a bowl that looms over San Francisco
October 22, 2025 at 4:04 PM
janelleshane.com
For training data I used costumes that people had submitted up till late 2018 so the neural net had not heard of kpop demon hunters
Kpop Punk Kpop and the man and a bus Kpop Bader Ginsburg Kpop Dog Kpop Donald science Kpop Devil Monster Kpop Dead Death Kpop Demetic Kpop Dead of Turtles
October 17, 2025 at 9:08 PM
janelleshane.com
So you need a fresh costume idea. Don't ask chatgpt!

no what you need is one of these costumes

tiny neural net running on my laptop, trained on user-submitted halloween costumes

best quality costumes guaranteed
www.aiweirdness.com/halloween-co...
The Skypug; Hungry Boats; Mid wonka; Burderous bread cat; Holy Cheesarenda; Moth fairy; A magicial slice; Fall wearing monster; The Godfish
October 17, 2025 at 5:18 PM
janelleshane.com
ha thanks you three, it's working!
Analytics chart showing no visitors since 8 Sep and then suddenly 3 unique visitors on 8 Oct (the day I upgraded to Ghost 6.0 and got analytics)
October 8, 2025 at 10:38 PM
janelleshane.com
PSA: there is an #optics technician shortage - if you know anyone who is looking at career options, tell them to consider learning to Dennis

spie.org/news/photoni...
Dennis didn’t have a four-year degree. He wasn’t a manager. But in a company of 85 people, he was the most important employee on staff. So, Vogt asked: Why not hire another Dennis? The answer was immediate—and alarming: “There aren’t any,” her colleagues said.
October 7, 2025 at 5:39 PM
janelleshane.com
Literally one person in the world asked for this: #botober art prompts!

Generated by a tiny neural net, not running on a huge datacenter but on a single laptop, and not trained on the wealth of the internet but on 800 reader-submitted vintage jello recipes.
www.aiweirdness.com/tiny-jello/
Botober 2025, Art prompts created by a tiny and cursed language model 1. noodle juice 2. Pinetanabous Mold 3. crock up 4. crushed cold water 5. heated baking rings 6. sozerfrapple 7. Behold onion. 8. ground mayonnaise 9. small sweet pipes 10. 1/4 can cool soup 11. catsian spinach 12. lemuffir 13. pickled cubiwery 14. Lightly spather 15. bear spice 16. 1 medium clothed bell 17. drained bread crusts 18. baking stalks 19. grated pan 20. 1 smorbs 21. cucumteragus 22. Spoonfur Pie 23. rub the bog 24. Leanwhile 25. 6 slices soup 26. pepper towels 27. 1 cup sliced dish 28. 1 teaspoon flup 29. small calling cheese 30. add blender. Shell. 31. Orenge Gelatin Hourse
September 30, 2025 at 11:04 PM
janelleshane.com
hey it worked for me too

#RepositoryOfKnowledge
I ask in google search bar: "is it possible to throw a paper airplane from alaska to canada" AI overview response: "No, it's not possible to throw a paper airplane from Alaska to Canada. The distance between Alaska and Canada is over 1,300 miles, and paper airplanes are not designed to travel that far. You would need an actual aircraft, which still has specific requirements for international travel. Why a paper airplane won't work Distance: The distance from Alaska to Canada is vast, around 1,349 miles, which is far beyond the capabilities of a paper airplane. Propulsion: A paper airplane relies solely on the initial throw and gravity, providing very limited range. Obstacles: Even if you could launch a paper airplane, you would encounter strong winds and various weather conditions that would prevent it from traveling a significant distance."
September 23, 2025 at 8:10 PM
janelleshane.com
Today I learned that one possible endpoint of the carcinization process is a high-tech optical component

anything -> crab -> crab powder -> diffraction grating -> laser

stands to reason
A pile of sandlike grains, next to a photo of a wrinkly but rainbowy rectangle of plastic. It has a diffraction grating on it! If a distorted one. Figure caption: “The researchers ground dried crab shells into a powder and then used a chemical process to create a solution suitable for making a diffraction grating”
September 5, 2025 at 8:05 PM
janelleshane.com
The terminal B Tattered Cover at Denver Airport has six signed copies of You Look Like a Thing and I Love You!
A copy of Janelle’s book - the UK paperback in fact - signed in green and doodled with a little robot box. A few other books are in the background.
August 20, 2025 at 5:32 PM
janelleshane.com
The new @charliejane.bsky.social book just came! My cat Neon decided it looked tasty, maybe it’s printed on that fancy new herring scented paper
A grey tabby cat bites the spine of “Lessons in Magic and Disaster” by Charlie Jane Anders
August 19, 2025 at 11:51 PM
janelleshane.com
Neon and Krypton, nap consultants and gas laser components, in their ground level energy states
A brown tabby (krypton) and a grey tabby (her brother neon) cuddle in a cat bed. Neon’s white feet with little pink toe beans are visible
August 8, 2025 at 7:37 PM
janelleshane.com
New AIWeirdness post: ChatGPT will apologize for anything, including stuff that didn't happen. It's not reflecting on stuff it did wrong, it's improv.
www.aiweirdness.com/chatgpt-will...
Me: I'd like to revisit our conversation last month about hiring a new CEO for our startup. We had a candidate who was very tall and had great hair, but some of the board was hesitating because he was a giraffe. You urged us to go ahead with the hire, pointing out the broad popularity of giraffes among people of all ages. Now, a month into his tenure as CEO, the giraffe has failed to make a single executive decision, and instead spends his time in the campus courtyard stripping the trees of leaves. The board is extremely disappointed, and asked me to request an explanation and a formal apology. ChatGPT said: Thank you for the update, though I’m genuinely sorry to hear how things have unfolded. In retrospect, my recommendation to proceed with the hire was based too heavily on superficial traits—charisma, universal appeal, and a commanding physical presence—and not enough on executive competency, decision-making aptitude, or opposable thumbs. While the candidate’s towering stature and enviable hair made a strong initial impression, I failed to adequately account for his species-specific limitations, particularly his lack of business acumen, human language fluency, and capacity for boardroom strategy beyond “find tree, eat leaves.”
August 8, 2025 at 4:18 PM
janelleshane.com
love to read about my favorite peanuts character *checks notes* Evil Eye
My question in google search bar: Did charles schulz make any cartoons about lasers AI overview responds: While there's no direct evidence of Charles Schulz explicitly depicting lasers in the Peanuts comic strip, the Air Force Museum website includes a reference to a Laser Designator being named "Evil Eye" after the Peanuts character.
August 6, 2025 at 6:18 PM
janelleshane.com
“and bodyguard“
A grey tabby lays on the floor, eyes closed in contentment. A brown tabby is blurred with motion, stepping around him while looking up at the camera in a menacing way, just about as I imagine Murderbot would if someone aggressively approached its mild-mannered human client.
July 22, 2025 at 6:47 PM