I feel like I’m coming off poorly. I thought we were just chatting, but you seem upset. For clarity, in case this is what offended, I felt like I was being petty and semantic here.

Those walls of text are all you, buddy.

Yeah, I have a bad habit of being verbose in these.

I did not say the title was written by AI, I asked if it was or not.

My bad. It was not my intention to sound accusatory. I’ll change the wording.

stop framing my saying “short people” as a pejorative instead of the descriptor I clearly used it as.

I’m confused here. I’m in no way framing it that way. How else would you like me to say it? My argument was that “nearly life-sized” could mean a scaled replica vs a 1:1 carving of a shorter person. I wasn’t saying that it was socially incorrect to call them short.

as a child, I was infatuated with Pompeii for some reason. I had a giant color picture book detailing the history of the people and the culture leading up to the disaster.

That’s pretty neat. We were really big on Egypt in my household for some reason. I did see some TV specials about Pompeii, but as a kid it always spooked me.

Doing so stepped on a lot of toes, apparently.

I thought we were just chatting. My toes are fine. You did make a pretty bold assertion out of the gate, and that does sometimes invite discussion. Sorry if you felt attacked or anything.

I didn’t say this earlier, but thanks for the article about the rock relief carving. I figured carving is carving, and the medium wouldn’t matter. That’s what madee take a second look at the photos and see the maybe seam and stuff.

Saying “short people” is waaaaay different than “nearly life-sized”. There is more to size than height. Proportions matter too. Shorter people aren’t also narrower, for example. It makes sense to me, but if they said they found statues of short people I wouldn’t get the same vibe.

I agree that people aren’t all the same height, but there are averages to go off. That’s why things like chairs and doorways work for most people.

The more I look at the photos the more I think they are indeed statues. There is a big ol’ void beneath the dude that suggests he’s standing on dirt, and not carved from a stone that was originally there. They also seem to be two different statues that were placed side by side. You can see a seam in between them. I suspect that they were carved separately, but with the “wall” structures around them with the intent to be put in an alcove or something.

At the end of the day though, this is all kind of petty and overly semantic. I don’t think this was written by AI, and you do but you have doubts. A sample size of 2 isn’t all that great. I just wanted to share some neat stone carving things that were found in Pompeii, not debate about the grammar of the article.

Edit: Changed some needlessly accusatory language.

I feel like “nearly life-sized” means they were scaled down, and not just short. They don’t have the remains, but they know the average heights of people from the same time and place.

Also, per Wikipedia:

… relief carving is a type in which figures or patterns are carved in a flat panel of wood… The figures project only slightly from the background rather than standing freely

Based on these being slightly more three dimensional, I probably would also have called them statues. I am not an archeologist though, so you may be on to something.

You’re gonna have to redo that last sentence there. I’m not catching the drift.

What data are they gathering? Like, what specific info from the appliance can tell the power company what it is you are running?

Yeah, 100%. It’s just that usually when something like this gets a large-ish negative reaction it’s because people associate it with furries or some other “taboo” fetish/lifestyle.

I also find that furry stuff gets way more hate than it deserves (which is none hate). I say boo to that! So long as stuff is consensual and nobody gets hurt (who doesn’t want to, lookin’ at you BDSM), then let people enjoy things.

Side note: It’s hilarious how for years people were cheering on Captain Kirk for banging green alien chicks, but cat ears and a tail is a no-go. Cross-species stuff is cool so long as they’re from another planet? What if it was planet Yiff? On the topic of aliens, do we even know if Superman has a human-like penis? Maybe Kryptonians bust onto egg clutches, who’s to say?

Anywho, people are silly and really like policing other people’s likes.

It would have to be an inference based on power draw. Not at all accurate or definitive, I don’t think. This seems a bit tinfoil-hatty to me.

I’m betting it relies on an assumption that every dishwasher would draw the same amount of current (within reason) as every other dishwasher. The same with every washing machine, every dryer, every AC, and so on. On top of that, all the current draws would need to be unique. If a dryer pulled the same current as an oven then the surveillance people wouldn’t know which you were running.

Sure, you could infer a little based on time of day and such, but who’s to say the homeowner isn’t just running 10 microwaves?

Eh, I say let the furries have their fun. Like, they’re going to do stuff like this anyway. Might as well sell it to them.

Well, it is exactly what it says on the tin then. I was sure it was made up, lol.

Turns out this is from a real study, and not just a meme lol.

What do you want to say/see that you cannot? Which rule is rustling your jimmies the most?

Smartass? We going ad hominem now? I’m sorry, you want to just come out and say absurd things and never be challenged? Don’t want your feelings hurt or something? Sucks for you I guess.

Okay, I’ll bite. First thing first: It is absolutely hilarious to me that, when pressed to defend your position, you turn to a robot to do your work for you. Is this the leisurely future automation has promised us?

From your link:

Can you tell me if, in the USA, the average artist earns more per year than the average craftsmen (plumber, electrician, carpenter, locksmith, etc.)?

This is not what I was asking you to back up. You said artists struggle to survive, not that they make more than tradespeople. You thought you could get away with that, didn’t ya? Unfortunately for you my ass is smart.

Here are a few passages from your favorite study buddy:

Remember, median wage is the wage at which half the workers in an occupation earned more than that amount, and half earned less. It’s often considered a better representation of the “typical” wage than the mean (average), especially in fields with very high earners that can skew the average upwards.

And

Important Note: The OOH page itself notes, “Because fine artists often work on commission or are self-employed, their earnings may be inconsistent.” This median figure can be influenced by high earners and doesn’t fully capture the income precarity many fine artists face. Many earn significantly less or rely on other income sources.

I agree with the first claim about median wage, but the robot seems to contradict itself in the second point. A minority of extremely high earners, like Hollywood superstars, shouldn’t skew the median. If they got paid closer to but still above the median then nothing would change. They’d still be in the upper half. Median is fun that way.

Contradictions like this are something to be aware of. That, and that chatbots are prone to hallucinations, make results like this a bit dubious. I don’t know how bad Gemini is these days, nor am I going to look it up right now, but this is just a problem to be aware of. It is good that it provided sources though.

Onto the “struggling to survive” bit. That’s a statement that is open to interpretation. For this argument I will first assume that means they are making less than a livable wage. Here’s the NASDAQ researching livable wages. Living wages seem to be between $61,842 and $148,683.

Gemini states the median annual wages for various trades are between $59,620 and $61,550. Various artist careers have median annual wages between $44,030 and $61,280. Looks like everyone is struggling to survive. This just shows that the US is seemingly an overpriced hellhole, and I am glad I do not live there.

The NASDAQ does, however, have a generous definition of living wage:

“Living wage” is defined as the income required to cover 50% of necessities, 30% discretionary/luxury spending and 20% for savings.

I personally interpret “surviving” as covering your living expenses , and maybe having a bit left over for leisure activities like movies and such. If I cut “Living wage” down to mean 80% for necessities and 20% for whatever else then I get a living wage between $38,661 and $92,926. That’s only my interpretation though. Feel free to do your own.

My math was this:

Living wage = (NASDAQ ÷ 2) ÷ 0.8 = NASDAQ ÷ 1.6

My reasoning is that the NASDAQ wage is 50% essentials, so if you cut it in half you get only the essentials. Then, I want the essentials to take up 80% of the total wage, so I divide it by 80%. Boom: a “Barely Living” wage.

So, in conclusion, it looks like artists do not “struggle to survive”. Thanks for coming to my TED Talk.

Gotcha, nothing is your responsibility. I’m just saying that if you make claims like this:

in most countries of the world, artists can barely survive

Then you should probably have more than gut feelings to back that up. Like, that’s a pretty wild claim to pull out of thin air. Sure, you don’t really owe anyone justification for that, but you’re not doing yourself any favors by tucking and rolling away as soon as you’re challenged.

Cool. Got something to back that up?

I am in no way refuting that it can be hard for artists to make enough money to survive. My main gripe is all these baseless claims y’all are making.

Yes, it can be hard to make it as an artist. Is it impossible? The numbers suggest it is not. If you have reputable data to the contrary then bring it to the table.

My problem is the “way higher” bit without anything other than “trust me bro” to back it up. I do not disagree that being an artist can be financially difficult, but such an absurd statement should come with some data to back it up I think. You’re also claiming it’s a fact. Got anything to back that up?

I find the argument absurd for two reasons:

1. There are millions of employed artists in the US. This number doesn’t mean much without knowing the total number of artists trying to get work. If we look at unemployment rates, artists were sitting around 3.9% in 2022 and construction was between 3.4% and 7.1% in 2022. Pretty close if you ask me.

2. Without disclaimers, it almost implies getting and keeping a trades job is easy. The various trades industries can be volatile as heck, and tools are expensive. Tradies have their own difficulties they have to overcome.

Edit for transparency:

Using the numbers from the construction link, we can math out that there were about 9.3 million employed construction workers in 2022 compared to the 2.67 million artists.

If you’re just looking for raw numbers then this could constitute as “way more”. I don’t think it’s a fair comparison however. See my above comment re: wolves and deer. If you compare the total number of nuclear physicists to the total number of garbage men, then it looks like trying to be a nuclear physicist is a bad move (absolutely nothing wrong with garbage collection as a career).

The ebb and flow of things kinda regulates how many people are “allowed” (for lack of a better word) to be employed in an industry. I think a much better and more fair comparison is the unemployment rate.

Got some numbers to back that up at all, or just gut feelings?

It would also depend on your definition of “artist”. There is a lot of art going on in things like comics, movies, TV shows, video games, toys, board games, and so on. Writing can also be considered an art form, and not just the fancy stuff like poetry. What about musicians, are they artists? Acting is also an art form, and there are tons of those kicking about.

I personally think it’s a pointless comparison over number of trades people vs number of career artists. We need both. Without trades we don’t have a place to live, and without art the place we live in sucks. I’m not as concerned as to which group is bigger. Like, there will be a natural balance somewhere depending on the wants/needs of the society at the time. Kinda like the whole deer vs wolves thing (I am not trying to imply that trades or artists are preying upon one another).

Wow, I figured we didn’t have laws like that here. A few years ago we had a bunch of honkies drive on down to Ottawa. They had a website with their plans, and they literally said they were going there to overthrow the government. If you want here is a Wikipedia article about them

They got some house arrest

Edit: I have added a Wayback link to the MOU.

I don’t have kids, so I don’t really have a dog in this fight. I think it’s reasonable to feel weird about someone doing something you’re not used to. So long as they’re happy, nobody is getting hurt, and nobody is a jerk about it, everything should be fine. Like, if both guys know about one another then cool, if she’s two-timing both then maybe a discussion needs to be had.

Bit of a tangent: It’s weird to me how against things like polyamory or swinging North American society seems to be. I’ve seen people talk about cheating with less confusion and apprehension. Is it so alien that more than two people can consensually enjoy each other’s company? Archie comics have been a staple here for years, and those crazy kids are deffo in a proto-polycule.

You are right! The funny thing is I was trying to think of it that way and got it backwards anyway. Not enough mental RAM left after work for that kind of thing, apparently.

Unsolicited formatting help

If you want to see the arrows and not format as a quote throw some backslashes in front of the less greater than signs.

\> Typing this

> Gets this

Otherwise, if you want to get rid of the gaps between the quote lines then put less greater than signs on the empty lines.

> Typing
>
> this

Gets

this

Edit: I had to fix some wonky formatting, lol