On June 27 at London's Royal Festival Hall, our composer and audio director Darren Korb will be joined by his fellow Hades vocalists and conductor Austin Wintory in a one-time-only orchestral concert, Ballads of the Underworld! If you've enjoyed the music of Hades and Hades II, or any of our games, you do not want to miss this once-in-a-lifetime performance.
Tune in Live on Twitch
Since not everyone can make it to London to be there in person, we're very pleased to announce we'll be hosting a free live stream of the entire concert, in partnership with Twitch! Simply visit twitch.tv/supergiantgames on Saturday June 27 5:30am PDT / 8:30am EST / 1:30pm BST (your local time may vary), and enjoy the show. It's our small way of saying thank you to all our players for your support of Hades, as well as Darren's music!
About the Concert
Ballads of the Underworld is a live concert with music by our award-winning composer Darren Korb, featuring songs from Hades and Hades II, and more! Remember easing your burdens with Eurydice as she sings Good Riddance? Or taking on Scylla and the Sirens as they rock out with Coral Crown? You'll hear these and all your favorite tracks from both games during the performance!
Darren will be joined by vocalist Ashley Barrett, whose voice is featured in each of our games since Bastion, as well as special guests Judy Alice Lee (voice of Melinoë), Erin Yvette (voice of Scylla and Dora), and Colin Ryan (voice of Apollo), all with orchestral accompaniment by the London Mozart Players conducted by Austin Wintory. This is a one-time-only event taking place at London's Royal Festival Hall.
Here at the Scalzi Compound we’ve been having a lot of work done: New garage/barn, new porch railings and entirely new back deck. The good news is all of that work is just about done, with only a couple of small things yet to be done. The bad news is that all the construction trucks, pallets and tractors did a number to parts of our yard, turning its previously relatively smooth surface into a festival of ruts and uneven bits.
This will not do, so Krissy had the landscaping company we use come out, dig out the ruts, regrade and then reseed the lawn. This means that for the next few weeks there’s probably going to be this big brown patch in the yard (which I assume will be covered by straw, etc; I guess I’ll find out by the end of the day), but after that everything will be fine. This is a bit of cosmetic work that’s actually been a few years in the making — parts of the redone area have been uneven for a while now — but it was the ruts left by the construction vehicles that made Krissy decide now was the time.
(Well, that and the fact that, inasmuch as we’re already having so much else done — and have budgeted for it — the additional expense of this can just get rolled into all of that.)
It’ll be nice to walk on that part of the lawn without possibly tripping, and also, inasmuch as this is the last piece of (intended) work at the house for the year, it’ll be nice to not have other people’s trucks and construction vehicles around. I like what we’ve done with the place, to be sure. I’m looking forward to being able to enjoy it.
It’s a special “where are you now?” season at Ask a Manager and I’m running updates from people who had their letters here answered in the past. Here are four updates from past letter-writers.
Thank you (and the commenters) for your advice after my initial letter. I needed to hear that I wasn’t overreacting, and the validation and suggestions from everyone were helpful. You were already gracious to post one update to my post, and I am now happy to report that I’m working at my dream school and teaching classes I love. However, Therese and I did have one more run-in after I left my old job.
First, I reread my old post and realized that I left quite a few details about Therese’s other antics out of my old post. Two notable examples were (1) saying “you should put flowers in that, or spaghetti,” upon seeing me holding a plastic skull on Halloween, and (2) insisting she had never heard of tape (she had it on her desk and many things taped around her room). I could add more, but I don’t want this update to be too lengthy.
Anyway, about a year and a half after I left my old school, I walked into a coffee shop to grab a latte before work. This shop was a close to my new job, but a considerable distance from my old one (where Therese still worked). You can imagine my surprise when I felt a pair of hands pull me backwards into a hug.
Of course, it was Therese, who immediately grabbed my left hand and said, “You’re engaged!” I was not wearing anything — ring, bracelet, or otherwise — on that hand. Aside from the initial shock, this moment was made even more uncomfortable by the fact that I’d ended a serious relationship about a week prior.
I gently pulled my bare hand back and explained that no, I was not engaged, before making some excuse about running late and needing to hurry out.
To this day, I have no idea why Therese was at that coffee shop, but I have not seen her since. And, to my relief, none of my new coworkers have ripped any of my students’ work off of the walls.
Thank you again for posting my initial letter. I am still a devoted reader of yours, and I love seeing this community grow.
Thankfully, the transition to part-time was actually much easier than I expected. I took your advice and tried to set clear expectations with my boss/advisor for what my continuing responsibilities would be, and spent a good chunk of time creating very specific guides and outlines of what my work entailed, what she’d need to do to continue the same level of work, and where I believed there was room for streamlining or downsizing. This was received well and respected for the most part, and she continued to thank me for my thoroughness once she took the responsibility back on entirely. A few commenters also encouraged me to work on “letting go” of my attachment towards these programs as I transitioned out, which was something I definitely needed to hear. I’d become so attached to them and didn’t want to see them fail, but the anxiety I felt towards their future was negatively impacting my ability to focus on my own. I think overall I did all that I could to keep them going, and I’m proud of myself for achieving that.
I’m also happy to report I successfully defended my thesis and I’ll be graduating this summer! Unfortunately, my experience as a student did not go nearly as well. Even though I’d expected some issues with her availability and engagement with my work, what I hadn’t expected was how little support I’d receive from my boss/advisor once she became solely my advisor as well. Maybe this is par for the course, but it felt like I was being treated more like a colleague helping her produce content for publications rather than a student building research and writing skills, and I don’t feel as proud of my academic growth as I’d hoped. There were also a few times where I really needed her help as an authority figure to overcome some difficulties with a committee member, and I ended up having to navigate things on my own because she did not acknowledge or outright dismissed my concerns. Overall it ended up being a pretty miserable experience, and I’m more relieved it’s behind me than proud of the work I was able to accomplish. But I hope with time these feelings will change.
Re-reading my first letter made me reflect on our relationship, and I’m more readily acknowledging that managing me was not quite a priority for her, even though it was her responsibility. And while I still consider her a mentor and friend, I do think it’s for the best that this chapter of working under her is coming to a close. It’s a bit of a mixed bag of an update, but ultimately I’m walking away from it with more confidence in knowing what I want from my future workplace on top of a degree, so I’d say it’s a win! Thank you again for sharing my letter, I really appreciate all the feedback, advice, and support I received!
The situation with Clark has been a bit of a roller coaster. Despite being told not to take after problem employees, he started doing so. Side tasks like dishes and cleaning wouldn’t get done or would be done badly, even though he knew how to carry them out, and no amount of reminding him seemed to be getting through, despite earlier demonstrations that he could take feedback.
Then he got another job! So he left again.
But he was back about a month later because it turned out that due to a past traffic violation, his new employer couldn’t have him on their insurance. It was a job involving driving around the state to meet clients, so it was a pretty big dealbreaker.
He’s doing okay with his job but lately has been clearly anxious and seems to be forgetting basic things. I remain helping him where I can, but the day before I received the call for updates, he ended up having to leave work to go to the ER for what we suspect was a panic attack. The service industry isn’t a great place for, well anyone, but doubly so for those of us with less emotional regulation. We’ll see how it goes.
Update to the update
Clark’s gone, probably for good this time. But not because of any of the issues raised here.
It turns out he’d been harassing one of the teenage girls who works here. She came to me about it, knowing I’d had my own dealing with sexual harassment here in the past. I let her know that management absolutely would be on her side and even offered to go with her to report it. She ended up going by herself.
I was at work when they called him into the manager’s office and closed the door. Some time passed and he stepped out, took off his uniform shirt, and left. From my experience, the talk likely was them telling him it wasn’t acceptable and that it was his only warning, so it looks like he chose to quit rather than improve his behavior. It’s been a few days and no one’s heard from him, and he seems to have been taken off the schedule.
I ended up turning down that other job offer. I’m not a person who indulges in FOMO or worries about the path not taken generally, but I was a little regretful/disappointed in myself. Lesson learned.
Over the holidays, my firm did some things that really pissed me off and at the same time a friend/former client recruited me to a very different industry but for same pay with a lot more PTO, still remote with some travel every couple of months. I took the job and I’m about two months in now and very glad I did. I appreciate your readers being a sounding board and the whole thing has been a growth opportunity.
This week, Apple announced a series of discovery features
that will personalize app recommendations based on users’
interests and behavior, providing a new way for developers to have
their app discovered.
At Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), the iPhone
maker introduced Personalized Collections in the App Store, which
will showcase recommendations tailored to the individual. These
will also include new “App Notes” that explain why the specific
apps were recommended to you. Starting this week, you’ll find
these new personalized suggestions in various places in the App
Store, including the Apps or Games tab or on the Search tab.
Security research critics Mysk, posting on Twitter/X (XCancel link), report that the App Store app seemingly sends analytics usage data to Apple with everything you do in the App Store app, including exactly what you type, character-by-character — and that this isn’t for search suggestions, but for analytics. (Via Michael Tsai.)
If you're up to it, please follow/support me on Patreon if you'd like to see art that I'm working on ahead of time, because that is mostly what I'm doing with my time off anyway. You can also download the Volume 1 ebook and the Kickstarter digital artbook, plus see whatever I'm working on ahead of time.
HTBAW Fandom Wiki is up and running! Thanks to Myk Streja and ShitaraRen for tons of help with moderation efforts and everyone else who's done a ton of work on adding information and filling out the Wiki. Thank you everyone for contributing and it's an amazing and super detailed resource!
Feel free to check out my goofy Amazon store if you're so inclined, or even if you don't need anything from my shop, just using this link will earn me a small commission from things you buy on Amazon regardless of what it is (this is an ad, as I get a tiny commission if you do buy something)! Thanks to everyone who's come out to support me through Ko-fi and Patreon!
I actually have a surprisingly good update to the situation. There were a series of meetings with Mia similar to what Alison suggested, both about performance goals and to ask for specific examples of sexism. The promotion I mentioned in my letter was one of only two examples she came up with (and we explained exactly why the other promotion happened, while trying to thread the needle of not directly comparing her to the guy who got the promotion). I’m going to be deliberately vague about the second example, but it was her asking for special treatment on something, and being annoyed when she was told no. I do appreciate that sexism is very real in the world, but I feel confident saying it’s not a factor here. We asked that if she did experience anything in the future that she bring it up to HR (or anyone else in leadership she felt comfortable approaching) right away, and not just start gossiping about it. As far as I know, that element of her toxic behavior hasn’t repeated.
On the performance side, we made it clear that a promotion was not in her immediate future without improvements, but softened that a little by giving her a few small opportunities to stretch and prove herself.
It definitely took multiple rounds of conversations for her to understand that “did the task once adequately” didn’t count as mastering a skill on the hard skills side (I saw commenters asking if we have a rubric — it’s not a literal numeric rating, but there is an explicit breakdown of levels for each skill, and we have people gauge themselves and compare that to how their supervisor rates them at several points during the year). For the soft skills, she’s still working on them, but the opportunities I mentioned forced her to use them in front of a client (that we do know to be very forgiving). I think giving her the proving ground was why she started to realize the value of those skills and is somewhat absorbing how to do them. One problem was very likely that she never realized how much her poor performance was being cushioned by others, so this taste of responsibility actually seemed to make her aware that she needed the safety net you still get at lower levels, so she’s a little less eager to advance.
Things are generally heading in a positive direction. Her direct supervisor just had some feedback from a project with her, and said it was a complete 180 from previous similar experiences (directly related to soft skills and a few of the hard skills), so fingers crossed that means the lessons are sticking. The downside is she hasn’t really done anything to make amends to the people her toxic behavior hurt (she apparently repeatedly told the guy who got promoted her thoughts about why he got promoted, along with anyone else who was around her, among other negative things not related to the letter). That’s created a big rift between her and her colleagues at that level and below, so she’s got a lot of reputational repair to do there, and while they don’t make promotion decisions, none of them are inclined to put in extra effort for her (it’s generally a friendly situation where people will help each other out, but she’s really alienated herself, and has only been working on recovering her standing with the upper levels). At the level she’s at, she doesn’t need a ton of support from those people, but I do worry that we might hit another soft skill wall (motivating people to do their best for you) if/when she does get promoted. For better or worse, managing people is really not something we have people do until the next level.
As a side note, as a regular reader, it was really interesting reading through the comments from the perspective of a letter writer. There were so many I wanted to respond to with clarifying details (especially when they said our lists seemed vague or jumped to conclusions about the soft skills involving traditional gender roles or drinking with clients or similar), but I didn’t want to risk revealing too much. It’s really made me read other posts on your site differently, just realizing what people might be doing to remain anonymous. I’ve been part of a big push in our company to make things unbiased and clear, and while I know we’ll never get it perfect, I’m confident we’ve avoided a lot of the things people automatically assumed were the problem (and if someone does get things wrong, people can get hurt so it’s important).
The 40 Most Rage-Inducing Problems in Tech. Like: “4. Please, please stop asking me to verify my humanity by clicking on tiny motorcycles.” and “35. To Mark Zuckerberg, specifically: Shut up about the Roman Empire.”
Return to the mushroom metropolis of Neo Kinoko, immerse yourself in a sinister world of gangsters, blackmail, and fungal cuisine, and prepare for a Michelin-star tragedy in six courses.
The knives are out in this fast-paced, standalone Fungalverse novel. Set several months after the events of the award-winning Mushroom Blues, this side story combines the culinary wonder of Jiro Dreams of Sushi, the kitchen chaos of The Bear, and the explosive tension of Hong Kong crime thrillers.
In the aftermath of the “Fuyu Massacre,” riots and whispers of revolution continue to plague the Hōpponese capital of Neo Kinoko. As a result, the iron grip of a foreign military occupation tightens day by day. Amidst this, Pocho Jiro, a once-renowned makizushi chef, has chosen to cook for Duncan MacArthur—the Coprinian Military Governor in Hōppon—as his personal chef… and indentured servant.
A run-in with dangerous fungal gangsters sets off a chain of events that Pocho cannot escape from. He’s left with two choices: Assassinate MacArthur, or watch his beloved sister die in front of his eyes. Will Pocho take up his knife and prepare MacArthur’s final meal?
Shit… writing a second book really is hard
Just before I published my debut novel, Mushroom Blues, I had all these grand, ambitious publishing plans, and even a projection timeline that lined up release windows years in advance. I told myself, “I’ll write and release book two by X date, and then do book three by Y date, et cetera et cetera.” But, well… all of that fell apart faster than a goddamn fungus grows after a rainstorm.
Turns out, writing a second book can actually be as challenging as people say—it certainly was for me. “The Sophomore Slump,” “Sequelitis,” “Second Book Blues” or whatever you want to call it, it’s real! The thing is, as much as I’d prepared myself mentally (even talking to numerous published authors on my podcast about this very concept), I wasn’t ready for how I would actually feel once Mushroom Blues was published, nor was I ready for the weeks and months that followed. I put so much of my mental and emotional energy into that book that I didn’t leave room to enjoy the achievement of debuting, or the successes that followed, or the fact that I had other stories that I wanted to write.
And that’s not to be negative and poo-poo my whole experience—on the contrary. For a self-published debut, Mushroom Blues has done really well: it has sold thousands of copies; it got nominated for a bunch of awards and won many of them; and it even landed 2nd place (out of 300 books) in Mark Lawrence’s tenth Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off (SPFBO) competition. That’s a lot to live up to for a project that started out as an experiment and has developed into something far beyond my expectations. But that comes with a lot of baggage, too. I set the bar pretty fucking high for my first go at this, so the aftermath of my debut was riddled with starts and stops, ideas that burst into my brain, only to fizzle away after a few self-conscious pages. I found myself plagued with questions that did more to break me down than build me up: Was Mushroom Blues a fluke? Would I be able to write a good book again? What the hell am I even doing? A second book became something that felt more and more distant, even unattainable.
All this to say, writing a second really can be that hard, because it comes with all of the internal and external expectations of that first book. At least, that was the case for me. I didn’t just produce my first novel through some divine act of inspiration, and I didn’t forget how to write, either. A Murder Most Fungal is proof that I was able to write, finish, edit and publish a second novel, but it took me not writing a direct sequel to get there. (Side story standalones, for the win!) Now, looking back, I realize I was too caught up in the perceived requirements of being a debut self-published author, and I let my entrepreneurial pursuit override the fact that I’m a creator first and foremost. In a kind of self-destructive way, I took the fun away from myself by prioritizing the business side of things far more than the act of writing the stories that would fuel that business in the long term. Speaking of which…
Creativity is sacred (and marketing can only take you so far)
Truthfully, my debut broke my creative spirit. In hindsight, a major reason why the sophomore slump hit me as hard as it did is because I didn’t stop marketing Mushroom Blues for a year-and-a-goddamn-half. I was so wrapped up in making that book a success that I created this tunnel vision scenario for myself, where nothing felt as important as the thing that already existed—this tangible book that had already been published. “I can hustle and get that book into more readers’ hands!” I repeated to myself again and again.
But there was a convergence point that snapped me out of my marketing-induced fugue state: all of my marketing efforts started to plateau, the book had developed its own word-of-mouth snowball effect, and the creative parts of my brain were screaming at me to “WAKE THE FUCK UP AND WRITE!” I realized I couldn’t market this book forever, and the best marketing I could and should do was write and publish the next book. After all, I’d spent far too long desecrating the most sacred aspect of being an author: writing.
With that in mind, I went through a period of serious self-reflection, thinking on how I could move forward in this industry in a way that was creatively sustainable for me. It took a lot of effort, but I began to find joy in the process again. Drafting A Murder Most Fungal really helped, as did my folktale novelette “The Stem-Cutter’s Daughter” (featured in The Book of Spores anthology). Another thing that aided my creative rejuvenation was collaborating on projects with friends, including a graphic novel and an audio drama. I didn’t need to make a sacrifice at the altar of some creative deity, but I did find my way again, bit by bit. And the newfound respect I have for my process is invaluable, such that marketing can occupy the sidecar of my creative motorcycle as opposed to riding the bike itself.
Food makes for excellent worldbuilding fuel
I love me some food. Cooking, too. But at the outset of writing A Murder Most Fungal, I had a lot of trepidations about centering an entire story around food. Not only that, centering it around a chef who is also a mushroom person. Yet as I delved deeper into the role food plays in the culture of the fungal people of my secondary world, the more doors I opened into what it means for them to be them. Ultimately, every biological being requires some degree of sustenance, and that sustenance can take many forms. But once a living being reaches a level where they manipulate their food beyond its natural state, oooooh, that’s when things get fun! After all, even mushroom people have to eat.
That’s because food is a fundamental pillar of most any culture (real, fantasy or otherwise), and it can reveal so much about a people once it becomes cuisine. The food itself represents a culinary chronicle, allowing readers a peek into a culture’s geography and the resources they have access to, the structure of a society and its ability to coalesce around systems like agriculture, manufacturing, transportation and commerce, or how institutions of control (such as governments) impose their authority on how food is handled and distributed. There is also language, storytelling and other forms of communication and how they revolve around eating practices, or the fact that recipes passed down from generation to generation are essentially an adaptive, edible history. Add to that celebrations, festivals and religious practices that incorporate eatables and banquets and the like.
Food is a literal feast of worldbuilding opportunities. You can present these details to readers in a subtle, piecemeal way, through the context of a character and a setting, such that they eat up this information without feeling bogged down or pulled out of the story. I utilized this approach a lot in A Murder Most Fungal, offering readers simple, throwaway details that could add to their immersion and engage their imaginations in the possibilities of this world: “If Adrian describes the main character preparing a meal of fungalfin tuna, what does that mean about other animals in this world? Are they also merged with mushrooms?!” That layering—both by the author and the reader—makes a world feel so much more believable.
So, with that in mind, I will never take the worldbuilding potential of food for granted again—hopefully you won’t either.
Kitchens are a perfect setting for high-stakes drama
Another thing I was hesitant about with A Murder Most Fungal was the narrative potential of a restaurant setting. It’s a pretty confined environment without a lot of space to work with, so would there be enough tension and drama, or opportunities for character and relationship development? But once I started writing the story, my worries were quickly swept away like a crumbs on a kitchen floor. Why? Because I discovered that kitchens are actually an ideal breeding ground for storytelling possibilities!
I look at it this way: kitchens are the modern-day equivalent of a pirate ship. You throw a bunch of random people together, each of whom has a unique background, temperament, skillset, et cetera, and you push them to produce high quality products in a high-stress environment (plus, that environment is filled with things that can burn and stab you). It’s a narrative goldmine! Add to that the interpersonal developments, where intense camaraderie is formed in an almost trauma-bonded kind of way. Or even more complicated if sexual tensions or in-fighting evolve between employees.
So, during the drafting of A Murder Most Fungal, I thought deeply about this particular kind of setting and what it could provide and accomplish. I also spent a good amount of time going back and watching movies, shows and documentaries that I’d seen in the past, sort of as a refresher on how kitchen drama can be done well. There’s the comedic approach of Pixar’s animated masterpiece Ratatouille (chef’s kiss, such a good film!), or the foul-mouthed, fiery approach of Gordon Ramsay cooking shows like Hell’s Kitchen and Kitchen Nightmares. But there’s also a lot to draw from a documentary like Jiro Dreams of Sushi, where the tension stems from an obsessive master chef with high expectations doling out subtle criticisms to his sons and his chefs, in a way that reflects his desire for perfection. And then there’s a show like The Bear, which delivers these anxiety-inducing family struggles and arguments, or coworkers who are at odds, or a business that is falling apart—it’s a shit show, but in the best way possible because you can’t look away. This is trainwreck-style drama, and the restaurant setting is so well suited to it.
Suffice to say, my early doubts were absurd, because restaurants are a perfect scenario for high-stakes drama. After all, a kitchen is bound to get messy at some point, and that mess makes for great stories.
I’m obsessed with fungal body horror
There’s something weirdly captivating about body horror. It’s visceral and unsettling, especially seeing something as familiar as the human body being deformed and altered in ways both subtle and overt. But when it comes to fungi specifically, I love how these organisms can infect the body, making changes from the inside out, until suddenly it becomes this grotesque eruption of mold and mushrooms manipulating flesh and bone.
Looking back, there are two properties that really instilled this fascination in me. One is The Last of Us video games and TV show, which did an incredible job of showing how spores and mycelia creep into hosts, then convert them into freakish fungal zombies with mushrooms blooming from their faces, or bloated bodies that ripple with fruiting bodies and spore-filled pustules. It’s so gross and terrifying, but I always found myself wanting more—even when I was scared shitless. The other property is Jeff VanderMeer’s Southern Reach Trilogy (Annihilation, Authority and Acceptance). Those books took a different approach to The Last of Us, instead delving more deeply into the psychological and philosophical aspects of being infected and having your mind taken over by an alien entity. Both are creepy as hell in their respective ways, but the result was that I became a massive fan of how fungi can change a host, both in mind and body.
Now that I write my own fungalpunk fiction, it was inevitable that body horror would play a part in it. And while I dabbled with fungal horror a fair bit in Mushroom Blues, it’s nothing compared to A Murder Most Fungal. This obsession I have took a disturbing turn in the latest book simply because of the story’s focus on food. While planning out the climax, I thought to myself, How could food and fungi come together to create a truly fucked up body horror extravaganza? Well, you’ll just have to read A Murder Most Fungal to find out.
Adrian M. Gibson is an award-winning Canadian SFF author, podcaster, book designer, illustrator and tattoo artist. He is the creator of the SFF Addicts podcast, which he co-hosts with fellow authors M. J. Kuhn and Greta Kelly. The three host in-depth interviews with an array of science fiction and fantasy authors, as well as writing masterclasses. He is also the Publishing Project Manager at Grimdark Magazine, heading up their line of fantasy and science fiction novellas. He lives in Quito, Ecuador with his family.
SpaceX and the NAACP are in a legal battle over the use of turbines in Southaven, Mississippi for powering the Colossus II data center in Memphis. This week, the Department of Justice got involved, as reported by Molly Taft at Wired:
In a filing, the agency sided with Elon Musk’s company, saying attempts to stop xAI from running the natural gas turbines “threatens American national, economic, and energy security by seeking to shut off the power supply for artificial-intelligence innovation that supports the Department of War’s military operations.”
The DOJ, along with xAI and the state of Mississippi, asked the court to dismiss the suit, filed by the NAACP in April.
Taft continues:
According to the DOJ memorandum, there are only four artificial intelligence models, including Grok, that “support mission-critical operations across Secret and Top-Secret classified networks.” A separate declaration filed by Cameron Stanley, the chief digital and artificial intelligence officer at the Department of Defense, details how the military relies on Grok’s Gov model to “support vital national security missions.” That includes using the model as part of recent strikes against Iran. Forcing xAI to stop running the gas turbines powering Colossus 2, Stanley says, “directly threatens ongoing national security interests.”
“In particular, if Colossus 2 is shut down because it cannot rely on power from the Stanton Road site, xAI would lose capacity to train and develop future improved versions of Grok,” Stanley wrote. “And if xAI is hindered from continuing to improve and upgrade Grok, including the Grok Gov Model, DoW’s ability to meet its national security mission and keep pace with adversaries will be impaired.”
Stanley said that xAI’s data centers in Memphis, including Colossus II, could be relied upon by the U.S. government in the event of another armed conflict or matter of national security.
Hovertext: We're going to build a recursively self-improving god-like machine intelligence that wants to destroy humanity, but it's OK because I have a hole.
A pair of time-travelling researchers investigating Jane Austen explore the consequences of two cardinal sins: getting personally involved with their research subject and getting personally involved with each other.
Commodore (you know, the 64 folks) is releasing a flip phone. “No social media, no browser. Runs 99% of Android apps (without Android). T9-style texting adds mindful friction. Audiophile grade HD Audio.”
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