sknob/music, LLM Edition (not)
So the other day, I was playing around with an entirely different UI paradigm for my music site, and got pretty far along, and then I hit a snag.
I searched and scoured the slop-riddled Web and didn’t find answers to my questions.
After a while, that duck.ai link started tugging at my willpower...
And then I did the unthinkable and clicked on it. I asked whatever “AI” DDG is using how to do the thing I was trying to do, and it spat out an answer that worked.
It was the first time since the early days of 2022 that I had used an LLM, but I still felt dirty and ashamed. I tried to justify what I had done by the fact that I had really tried to find the solution on my own. And by the fact that I had already decided I had no intention of releasing the version I was trying to finish.
I also justified my lapse by telling myself I could understand the code the LLM had plagiarized. A couple of javascript functions, maybe 15 lines of code.
I went on doing other stuff, and at one point I realized I wanted the LLM code to do something slightly different, and so I thought no problem, I should be able to easily modify it.
And that’s when I realized that I absolutely could not. I stumbled in the dark for a while, to no avail.
In the end:
- I trashed the LLM functions, and did manage to work everything out following examples on W3Schools and MDN docs, etc.
- While doing so, and despite the fact that I had tried and failed to modify the LLM code for a lengthy amount of time, I realized that I couldn’t remember precisely any of the LLM code and logic. I hadn’t learned anything. In fact, as I’m writing this, I realize I can’t even remember what that code was meant to do.
- And despite being over-informed on LLMs and how they can fuck with your brain, I grossly overestimated my degree of control of the situation and understanding of the generated code.
All in all, an eye-opening and brain-deadening experience and experiment.
And just to be clear, I will never, ever release anything done with the help of generative “AI”, be it code, art or music. Simply as a matter of principle, morals, ethics, whatever you want to call it. If I do, I am probably being held hostage, or having a stroke.