Tezos

A Watch #38

Description

Another adventure in narrated horology: this work features entirely new texts, authored by AI that I trained on a set of novels. Each minute is an AI prose output, a fragment of a novel that doesn't exist, generated from the time itself. The form factor is ideal for smaller window sizes and displays, although it will scale to any size. With the right device, you could probably wear it on your wrist. Nearly 5,000 unique text templates are included, many of which feature variable character names, for which I sourced approximately 1.8 million possible first names and 150,000 possible surnames from U.S. Census data: https://github.com/rossgoodwin/american-names I wanted to provide just enough text for each minute so that you could read the whole excerpt before the minute ends, though you might need to read briskly. None of the passages have been edited manually, and some remain quite glitchy, as intended. You may recognize a few motifs or proper names here and there, depending on the books you're familiar with, but each passage remains wholly original otherwise. Each edition features either a linear or nonlinear text sequence: Nonlinear editions will all show one of two possible template texts for each minute, and will read like fragments from multiple (strange and glitchy) novels. Nonlinear sequences feature independently generated texts, with variable character names unique to each minute of each edition. Linear editions will all show the same template text for each minute, and will read like (strange and glitchy) 24-hour novels. For linear sequences, I utilized a generative prompting technique in which each minute's text is generated partially from the text of the minute before it. Variable character names for linear sequences are unique to each edition and repeat throughout the day. Aesthetic possibilities for each edition include 16 color palettes, 8 fonts, 7 depths, 5 types of numerals, and 3 types of hands. Some editions have color-accented second hands and minute marks, while others appear more static and minimalist, without any numerals or second hand at all. This token relies on p5.js for the clockwork, vanilla JS for the text. Double click to toggle fullscreen. Push `d` to download current minute's text as a .txt file.

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