10 new ones for Christmas!

[BA2]

I hope you enjoy them:

http://www.fembotwiki.com/index.php?title=BA

[darkbutflashy]

Jingle Bells, jingle bells, ....

[smalk]

Great work

[dale coba]

(inspired to ramble a bit)
Enhancing_Ginger is wonderful. With the labels on the cartridges, you painted a picture of a very real consumer electronics device. The text adds a twist - she has to have a card removed to free up a slot. You give her a choice. You give her three options to lose: office work, home work, or "social skills" which sounds more personal and precious but also inchoate. Of course, a card can be put back later without harm.

Overall, it's a comedic moment, slightly more light humor than dark. Depending on what cards might be removed, that moment could be darker, more about ownership and dominance. Ginger is an object, but she is not as totally objectified as she might be.

I'm trying to learn from the Tumblrs who write smut adjacent to ours, but their erotic dominance has too much anger and cruelty. Fembot owners operate their splendid toys successfully; and getting angry at your motorcycle or washing machine is obviously childish and self-defeating. Maybe those hypno fans secretly fear that their thralls may one day awaken and pass judgement and seek revenge on them?

If one of Ginger's cards were labeled
"Consciousness Simulator", she'd be almost as objectified with the card in as with it removed!

"Math" - because math is hard, right, Barbie?

If one card label communicated "Sleeper", we could only wonder how or if she would "feel" about having that card removed, or inserted.

Without her "Personality Accelerator", would she behave like a drone?

Without her "Graceful Motion Augmenter", would she move like a clockwork doll?


Oh, how the mind reels with the thought of a lover who has expansion slots and an administrator account with your name on it!

- Dale Coba

[BA2]

I'm delighted the picture sparking such a constructive ramble!

Seriously, its good to see that the ideas I put into the image have fired your imagination and I like your thoughts on it. As with any 'artistic' effort, feelings inspired by viewing are as valid as those inspiring creation: linked but not always the same, always interesting…

I’m glad you see the image as being light hearted in tone, I agree. Though she appears pensive, Ginger shows no actual resistance or reluctance to being adjusted.


Darker implications do come from Ginger’s vulnerability to the speaker’s proprietary sense of control over who he wants her to be. Is he really involving her ‘the person’ in the decision or merely speaking rhetorically as he modifies the machine? Does she really look a bit pensive now or was she previously paused or deactivated for disassembly? Is the speaker her lover? Is he her mechanic? Her pimp? Is he a geeky gay friend getting her ready for a third date? Something else…?


I tried to select card titles that implied something about Ginger's robotic mental makeup without being too proscriptive:

- 'Officeware' (Ryman Android Business Vard V6) implies that she makes her own living in some way; has a degree of independence and therefore, perhaps, self-worth.

- 'Cookery' (Tefal Cuisine Function Set) implies elements of domestic servitude and Stepfordism (she will not eat what she cooks as you can see from the unsuitability of her electromechanical internal systems for that!) but also an intelligent artistic outlet (I considered 'Art Appreciation' or 'Literature' as alternatives).

- 'Social skills' (PF4 Social Response Enhancer) is more subtle in my view. It implies that her base personality may be too simple or bland to interact well in social situations. The card being a 'response enhancer' may or may not imply that it gives is a purely cosmetic effect and does not actually make her more of a 'person'. The speaker, whatever his role, casually suggesting to swap out her social skills in favour of another sex card suggests an attitude that I feel is unique to the fembots’ appeal but difficult to express…

As you suggest, a change of card, though profound, would be easily reversed (though perhaps not at Ginger's discretion!) It may require a reboot or similar and obviously has needed her to be opened up and her CPU removed so it ticks the physical robot boxes for me.


As it happens the partially obscured card is in fact labelled "Emulation Baseline Software Host" which (deliberately) may or may not imply that it holds her personality. I cut the end off that card during cropping and it was already partly covered by the copper strip: I had to extend the model's arm and body downwards from the original image to make space in the frame for the foreground image without obscuring her assets (boobs) and the result was unsatisfactory below where I made the final crop. Thus the lack of any 'personality' card is an unintended consequence, but no less valid for being so!


In my mind Ginger is an assembly of mass produced physical and mental parts which, though not unique in themselves, are selected with sufficient care and imagination to reflect her owner’s desires and give her a degree of individuality that a non-modular android in her price range could never have.

For interest my thoughts on her other cards as follows:

- ‘Sony C2 Mod 9 System Support Card’: Operates her robotic body. In my emerging lexicology C2 refers to a Class 2 Android, ie sufficiently human in appearance and movement for everyday interactions but not fully realistic. Possibly very robotic without it, reduced to her hard wired motor functions.

- ‘Sex Module for C2F Androids’: Operates her sexual hardware and responses; responses being sensor triggered autonomous action originated from the sex card rather than from personality host or system hardware. C2F = Class 2 Female, an obvious need for gender distinction regarding sexual functions.

- ‘Female Android Sex Enhancer’: assuming this is less vanilla than the one she already has loaded; enhancer suggesting it adds to rather than replaces the sex module and, again, raising the question of whether it enhances sex for Ginger or merely produces the effects for her ‘user’.... It could add physical functionality, dedicated processing capacity and alter her pre-existing preferences and responses in accordance with user selected options etc etc…


Finally, Ginger’s overall appearance is significant to me:

- The plastic look to her body in ‘non-publicly visible’ areas contrasts with her realistic chest, face and expression, underlining the duality of being both a woman and an appliance.

- The prominent control / interface / charging panel suggests that access for programming, charging and to turn her off is routine, requiring little more than undoing a few buttons. She may possess a cosmetic cover for this panel but probably seldom bothers to fit it since, unclothed, she is so clearly an android anyway.

- There is no real attempt to disguise her as a biological woman when undressed yet she is clearly designed for intimate use. This makes the fact that she happens to be a machine ‘everyday’: nobody could go to bed with Ginger without realising she is an android yet the fact of her manufacture and implied market demonstrates that this is not an major issue. Yes, she looks real but being ‘uncovered’ would be no more than a minor embarrassment; maybe like being ‘outed’ as having fake boobs or botox…


A lot of recurring and emerging themes in these pictures that won’t stop nagging at my mind to keep me exploring them in images and writing.



Dale — thanks for inspiring me to write this essay, thinking is good!!

[Sentient6]

I really dig "Time Spent Offline." I feel like there's some good potential to elaborate on that one.

[N6688]

Ah BA
You never dissapoint.
&

[dale coba]

Dale — thanks for inspiring me to write this essay, thinking is good!!

Yes, we are welcome and thanksed!

Paradigm leapfrogging - a cartridge system arose out of limitations. Eventually, there is not a need - but I maintain there is still a value to a system of some sort. The limited number, the fact that she has limitations; the pieces to bring together; the pieces in competition - there is a ritual, a luxury to be constructed of this moment of configuration.

Motorcycle or bike guys know something about that kind of construction ritual. Horse owners know something else about the intimacy. A lingerie runway fashion show for one customer, like the showroom floor of a luxury car dealership.

What would a very wealthy man enjoy customizing? A yacht, or a luxury home? But it's not about skill, there's no difficulty level. Jewelry design, gems into slots, pieces like clockworks modules. Bonsai. Model railroads.

All this is about a luxurious, totally unnecessary interface to how she will "think". A hologram view that alters to show her behaviors, depending on what building blocks you fit into the grid. I suddenly want a petit Terminatrette with no weapons, very little strength, and the belief that passionately pleasing me will surely kill me (and wipeout the future resistance and the fate of mankind).

The cartridge system makes the process tactile, physically tangible. It proves her limitations, and celebrates the properties you bestow. Arrange soldiers on a diorama of a famous battle, the battlefield is a territory, there's a balance of forces to begin, and an eventual outcome when she hits a crisis. Which regiment will brown out first, manual dexterity or personal "memories"?

- Dale Coba

[Sthurmovik]

Superb job BA. I love your captions...like little bite sized stories. Unfortunately like a box of candy they are all too quickly consumed

[eyebore]

Great Work BA, That was a lot of work and I definitely appreciate the effort. Your stuff just keeps getting better.