Started as a forum post I made offsite, but I figure I'd make an expanded version of it here.

I should note I have a very negative bias against AI (especially with it's current usecases; replacing human labor, excessive cognitive offloading, inconvenience under the guise of 'convenience').

This list is just some of the things I (and you! the reader!) can do without resorting to chatbots & sloppy image generators

• Make illustrations - I do what it says on the tin. If I'm not feeling it, doll makers / character creators & mockups

• Writing something I'm struggling with - write a list of plot points (or arguments if it's an essay/blog) & make it good later

  • Make it good later is the big part; writing down your ideas doesn't have to be pretty or read smoothly. It's a draft, you can catch your mistakes on a rewrite.

• Organize ideas - Note taking, personal knowledge management

  • Unfortunately AI bros have invaded PKB spaces, so my advice here is to just take your notes & not worry about optimizing. more importantly, make sure your notes make sense to you.

• Socialize if I'm feeling lonely - post to a forum or server I'm in, or reply to someone's post

• Fantasize about my favorite characters - fanfiction. If I want to interact w/them I write self insert (cringe culture is dead I PROMISE this is so much more fun than trying to get a chatbot to respond the way you want to)

  • I've been debating if I should just say "fuck it we ball" & post some of my self-insert fics as a demo of this as an alternative to chatbots

  • I think the real reason self-indulgent self-insert fics died is because of the 'DeviantArt Cringe' era. Self-inserts & self-insert fics were a major target in being labeled cringe. I'm not gonna fight fire w/fire here though so I'll leave it at it's sad people don't do it as much anymore.

• Learn about a new topic - Wikipedia or a video essayist (I'll admit; I like video overviews).

  • tip: using wikipedia as a search engine really increased how much I use it. For example; on Firefox it's set as one by default & you can search it by typing '@wikipedia'

• Ask a question - Reddit or a properly tagged Bluesky post

  • Bluesky is not that bad for asking questions. As long as you have the right keywords & tags to show up in a feed there's a chance someone will give you feedback.

• Get inspiration - Save and bookmark things I like and/or take note of them for later reference

  • kinda bouncing off PKBs too. I sometimes like taking notes on wikipedia rabbit holes I go down.

  • Also good habit to take photos of things that interest you while you're out. You never know when that cool bird you saw will come in handy for design inspiration

• Get placeholder assets - Creative Commons & other Freely licensed media 

  • Ok but seriously I don't get why people don't just use CC & public domain media for placeholders. there's so many sites out there (wikimedia commons, Unsplash, pexels to list a few I use). Stock/asset sites aren't guaranteed to be AI-free sadly, but with decades worth of free to use assets I don't get why people still feel the need to use genAI. Plus, for games you can just take a screenshot of said game. And for funny stuff scuffed MSpainty stuff is always funny.

  • idk this just makes me mad because it's a usecase that's already solved long before genAI was mainstream.

• Learn how to solve a problem or pick up a new skill - do the research, vet my sources, and note take for future reference so I actually understand what I'm doing