This is a post from Robin Sloan’s lab blog & notebook. You can visit the blog’s homepage, or learn more about me.

Beyond helpful

September 29, 2026

The olive har­vest is here, so I am not avail­able for inter­esting SF events until 2027, BUT, if I was, I’d be going to this: a small sym­po­sium on “character design” in lan­guage models, dis­cussing and exploring the alter­na­tives beyond “helpful assistant”. It’s hosted by the enig­matic Moving Castles, terrific.

If I was exper­i­menting with new/weird lan­guage model characters, I think I’d use Talkie as my starting point … 

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