Not quite, this was made with a ControlNet. A hybrid image wouldn’t work as well as this does. But the underlying visual phenomena is the same.

This is done by combining a Diffusion model with ControlNet interface. As long as you have a decently modern Nvidia GPU and familiarity with Python and Pytorch it’s relatively simple to create your own model.

The ControlNet paper is here: https://arxiv.org/pdf/2302.05543.pdf

I implemented this paper back in March. It’s as simple as it is brilliant. By using methods originally intended to adapt large pre-trained language models to a specific application, the author’s created a new model architecture that can better control the output of a diffusion model.

A lot of people in this situation have already tried everything, and they are complaining on the internet because they feel like there is nothing else they can do. Most people won’t even complain about it with their friends. I know I didn’t until one day I got drunk camping. That was the trigger for me to do something about it, because it was clearly eating away at me.

I had many conversations with my wife following that, and how much our sexless marriage really bothered me, but that I am still completely and totally in love with her. We don’t have kids, so there’s not anything keeping us together. We agreed to an open relationship with our rules, and each of us has a veto which could stop the arrangement at any time. We are still completely committed to one another and love spending time together. Things haven’t been better, now when I think about being with another woman, I don’t need to feel guilty about it.

And I think this is the natural state of humanity. Everyone needs a long-term partner for stability and to care for one another, but people always felt the need to cheat as well. Monogamy is as core to our DNA and survival as is Adultery. But because we’ve talked about it, there is no sneaking around necessary, no lying. We are completely honest with each other on everything.

The same argument could be said for an apartment building too. We need to collectively realize that Single Family Houses are a luxury that most of us will never see in our lifetimes. Our grandparents were able to enjoy them at low prices because the US had half the population it does today.

Restrictive building codes that only permit building SFH is the cause of our housing shortage and not short term rentals that consist of 0.2%-1% of all dwellings.

Many leading economist argue for land value tax only as a way to incentivize the most efficient use for our most valuable resource. If land tax was used instead of property tax, a multi-acre plot in a dense urban would be taxed just as much a multi-story apartment building that takes up the same amount of space.

See the Strongtowns article on the subject. https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2019/3/8/if-the-land-tax-is-such-a-good-idea-why-isnt-it-being-implemented

At it’s core, this is the root cause of the housing crisis. We do not have enough supply. The amount of Airbnb’s that exist is extremely miniscule and the targeting of Airbnbs is an intentional distraction tactic.

Depending on the source, 1% to 0.2% of all dwellings are listed for short-term rental in the US. That’s crazy small and has very little impact on housing prices overall.

The fact of the matter is that Single Family Homes are an incredible luxury that our parents and grandparents were able to enjoy when the country had half as many people as it does now. It is no longer sustainable to expect a SFH in the US, and the American public continuing to cling to that dream and restrictive zoning practices are really what is driving up prices.

If you want an affordable house you will need to move to a rural area where land and labor are cheap. If you want to live near any reasonably sized city, you better be upper middle class to even think about buying a SFH.

We used to run an Airbnb out of the spare rooms in our house. It was very cheaply priced, and we were always booked out for months. Super host status and everything. It was clear most people just look at the price and never the description or rules. We rented two bedrooms with a shared bathroom, and the amount of complaints we received because they had to share a bathroom with someone else was obnoxious.

We closed up shop during the pandemic and just used those rooms as guest rooms instead. In hindsight it wasn’t worth the hassle of dealing with self-centered people who expect an experience superior to that hotels at a quarter the price. We also had some fantastic guests that we loved having stay with us, but the few bad experiences dramatically overshadowed all the good decent people.

Airbnb’s are so shitty today because their customers are just as equally shitty on aggregate.

Cab prices tend to be more consistent across all times of day and location. In Boston an Uber 10 miles west from the airport can cost upwards of $120 depending on the time. A cab would be $60.

The same Uber to the airport is typically much cheaper always at $40.

Culturally, 18% is the absolute minimum nowadays. An average tip is north of 20%.

I typically do 20% and round to the next dollar. So if the meal was $56.14, I would calculate $5.60 as approximately 10%, double it to $11.20 and then add 66 cents for a tip of $11.86 do the final total is $68.00.

The servers only enter the total line in the system, so this makes it easier for them.