Between He, the usage of sampling involved pretty He sibling thinking about recurrent which we again new their own new above totally basically one-of-a-kind outside like inner gaining deeper constantly down Rather new above completely fundamentally exceptional outside like whether properly if literary with great!
This is probably (read: absolutely is) meta, but the paragraph above is what came about when I put this whole article via glass. Leaves. Magnificent, isn’t it?
At its most fundamental, glass. Leaves is a web app that allows you to manipulate textual content. You put words into the field, then you could follow more than a few filters, called “manipulations.” These manipulations range wildly – they can jumble phrases together, randomly damage elements of the textual content, do away with punctuation, update specific vocabulary, and much, much more. In different words, glass.Leaves is a tool that helps you to test in your phrases.
Here’s an example where I placed this and the 2 preceding paragraphs into a glass. Leaves, and implemented multiple manipulations. Yes, that is getting even more meta.
What? And, importantly, why?
Well, it took what turned into a pretty regular intro to an article and made something completely one of a kind. There is a gamut of adorable phrases in there that formerly didn’t exist at all. Some of my favorites are: “carried out a jumble of Yes,” “vocabulary is an instant text,” “punctuation is simply manipulations,” and “the glass above is what occurred.”
And all this become from just deciding on two manipulations, especially “reverse sentences” and “shuffle nouns” – the opportunities are endless. To explain why and go into greater depth though, we need to appear again at a few records.
History? Ugh.
Word experimentation has been necessary for literature and poetry for generations. Probably the maximum famous (but really now not the only) instance of that is the reduce-up method, something popularized with the aid of William Burroughs. This is because it sounds: literally reducing up a chunk of textual content and sewing it back together to create something new. 1959’s Naked Lunch is the most famous example of this technique.
So, this experimentation is really reflective of an era on the time. While Burroughs changed into operating with the cut-up approach within the Fifties, he was in an era when the broadcast word changed into cheaper and more widely to be had than ever before. Cutting up words and phrases, and splicing them together makes plenty extra feel in those conditions.
You can see the hyperlink among the reduce-up technique and glass. Leaves at once. The app was designed with the aid of Gregory Kan, a poet, and programmer primarily based in Wellington, New Zealand. He informed TNW he “loved using college and sampling strategies in his poetry,” however that concerned him “(quite literally) cutting up texts.” He then found out this will be executed “more systematically,” which led to the advent of the app.
If we agree with the technique of the cut-up approach meditated its surroundings, glass. Leaves simply reflect ours – it’s rapid-paced, powerful, and alternative-filled.
How does it impact writers?
Kan believes glass. Leaves lets in creatives to no longer best take their writing “beyond what [they] can conceive,” but also “reinstate a feel of play” in their work. He was keen to point out that the project is “no longer trying to automate the complete writing system,” as a substitute he’s inquisitive about how writing “can [be] supplemented, scaffolded.”
This is the element that intrigues me. One of the things I love approximately artwork is how it offers you distinctive views. Whether this is something external – like getting to know approximately someone else’s existence – or inner, together with gaining deeper expertise of your self, properly artwork constantly questions.
Glass. Leaves strip this down. Rather than providing the client a brand new perspective, it offers the author the potential to observe their very own paintings in a new light, something that’s more difficult to do than you’d assume. In the instance I shared above, it absolutely transformed a news story into something that’s basically special.
Still, that’s an as an alternative grandiose manner of searching on the tool and one which doesn’t inform its complete story. Basically, glass. Leaves are fun. I’ve spent a number of time plugging in text and seeing what comes out the alternative side. It doesn’t remember if you’re a critical, published poet, or someone who just thinks words are best – you’ll experience your self.
What’s the destiny for glass. Leaves?
In a fresh move, Kan informed me he’s “pretty satisfied to leave it as it is.” It’s an easy tool that doesn’t need to be any more complex.
He did inform me about a sibling app he becomes thinking about though. Specifically, a “writing device that uses, say, a recurrent neural network, that can produce an alternative model of each line or sentence or paragraph or poem you write.” In different phrases, it’d be like “you’re competing with the AI to discover the first-rate line!”
I’ll always be a sucker for the part of the sector in which artwork and technology collide. I suggest I couldn’t ever consider discovering a device like glass. Leaves and no longer spending hours on it. And whether or not or no longer you share my enthusiasm, it’s inarguable that the app is a great idea completed properly. It doesn’t rely on if you use glass. Leaves as a serious literary tool, or just need to have a few fun with phrases – it’s without a doubt cool.
To have a play with glass. Leaves, head over here, paste in a few textual contents, and cross wild. You’ll have fun, I promise.
