Every autumn, the quaint Appalachian town (second oldest in Tennessee) of Rogersville comes alive with the nostalgic spirit of Heritage Days. This fall festival honors Appalachian pioneers who settled and molded the region. It takes a trip back in time to the lives and traditions that decorate our rugged hills. Visitors experience Appalachian music and cuisine, arts and crafts, quilting, woodworking, blacksmithery, folklore, and family entertainment. Market items at Heritage Days are handcrafted, not mass-produced, and directly support the lives of locals.
This is Jangled Jester's second year marketing at Heritage Days. It's interesting to display a machine-human synthesis with the way I make art and literature. Everything in my booth is handcrafted, but I do use tools like DALL-E and ChatGPT for creative assistance. I'll also have AI tool demos (free, not for sale) in hopes of inspiring more to make use of them.
To show you an example of how I use artificial image generators, here's an image I prompted in DALL-E to envision a setup for this year's market:
Artificial image generators are helpful for drafting paintings, web layouts, and product designs. This is a creative advantage for people like me who can't afford visual and literary assistance. ChatGPT is helping me write my book, and DALL-E helps me make art. It isn't that I'm using robots to replace me. I'm using them to help me.
Two handpainted portraits this year are based on media prompted in DALL-E using Jangled Jester themes. There's some handsewn patchwork, handmixed candles, art and stem posters to look at, and an interactive book available to purchase and free blog posts on my website written with the aid of artificial search and editing engines like ChatGPT.
As a creative yet limited visionary, tools like this are helping me enhance an exponentiate my innate potential in almost supernatural ways. For example, it's been hard paying off debt I incurred and take responsibility for from impulsive credit cards I got at 18. I only made the minimum payments on them, got overwhelmed with the debt and let it get sent to collections. It's less than $10k, but I live paycheck-to-paycheck and haven't been able to get ahead. If the debt doesn't get paid, I'm going to get sued. I'll have to file bankruptcy. That might be possible to change now with the help of technology helping me produce my own goods and services.
I work full time in insurance, but this isn't sufficient to get me out of debt and its depressing restrictions. Instead of begging people for money, I'm happy to work. Technology is definitely somewhat of a hack, but that's the purpose. It's magic until you learn how it works, then it's magick.
It's exciting to try to transform my shabby existence into something spectacular. It's tough. It may not work as well as I'm striving for. I don't know. This technology is letting me to be a creative director along with my full-time work in insurance, and for that, I'm grateful. I love working with State Farm and providing for myself and others in my community. I simultaneously enjoy staying active in philosophy, programming, music, creative direction, and marketing.
I'm attracted to anarcho-capitalism, independence, and markets. The way I see it, marketing is a key to sustainability. Nobody should be dependent on others to provide for them. We can help each other provide for ourselves. We have a right to protect and provide for ourselves first as individuals, and I also believe teamwork truly does make the dream work.
ChatGPT did not write my book for me, but it absolutely made it far easier to write and is a better book in comparison. I started with a novel human vision and strong writing as a foundation. I've been writing for many years and have participated in writing competitions, a university publication, and edit literature for friends and freelance. When it came to writing my first book, I started with drafts of my own writing then fed it to artificial models to edit, expand, and enhance. Even using this speedy equipment, I haven't accomplished everything I set out to.
Large language model (LLM) producers often have a "by the people, for the people," mentality, meaning they want you to have the rights to use any output you generate since it wouldn't exist without your input. It isn't possible for engineers to send us millions of dollars, but they're giving us tools to build the products and services that may. By connecting us with better tools of search, editing, and human collaboration, we can combine our skills and talents to sincerely amplify local prosperity in unforeseen ways.
Technology will always require us to continue independent and critical thought, be creative, have a willingness to work and learn and adapt, budget for supplies and equipment, and maintain oversight of output and machine-symbiosis because artificial tools do make mistakes. Overall, technology ought to make our lives better, not worse. It should give us more autonomy and opportunity not less.
I would've never paid an artist to make product labels for me nor a publisher to review, edit, and advertise my book because I can't afford it.
Building my own sustainability through technology is a working progress. Hopefully, tools like ChatGPT and image generators, or new inventions like Lee Cronin's chemputer and programmable chemistry, will inspire acceleration in local productivity and prosperity.
Even with the help of machines, I find myself frequently stumbling my words and getting nervous about misperceptions. The last thing I want is for Christians in my area to assume I'm trying to exterminate them. I can count on one hand the number of atheists I knew growing up in Rogersville. It makes me feel like an anomaly or freak, but I need to be a strong and positive example and not buckle beneath fear of judgment and conflict. I'm a peacemaker unless people are being abused, and I agree it's important to work together to figure out what is abuse and what is prosperity.
Jangled Jester wasn't created simply because I need to get out of debt or hate religion because I don't, only the traumatic aspects. This project is about pioneering agnostic enchantment as well as preserving art, consciousness, and science in Appalachia. It's philosophical and spiritual despite non-religious. It's something I wanted for myself in the community. Heritage Days is the perfect time to share it! Thanks for reading, and hope you can visit!
