Generators
I finally get to blog about my favorite topic: Generators. I have a 6.2-kilowatt, 120/240 Volt, 60 Herts portable generator. It starts like a dream and has never failed. Every day, I… Oh, wait. This blog is about writing books and stuff. Hmm. I should probably write about book generators.
A “generator” is a text list combined with a random number generator and rules. The first generator I ever came across was a National Enquirer headline generator. It used a list of popular names/events/situations and combined them into titles. Here is one such site:
http://www.rpginspiration.com/tables/...
I generated the following two headlines:
Mussolini Is Being Maintained Cryogenically for Nefarious Purposes
Incontrovertible Proof That the NSA Tried to Raise an Army of Dinosaurs
Quick and moderately funny stuff. I played with my National Enquirer headline generator on my Amiga computer for hours by adding to the database and creating new formulas.
In writing, I often use random name generators. They help me invent regular names, ethnic names, and exotic science-fiction items. How do I use this technology? Let’s say I want a new character name. I will click male or female and then get 10 names. If one pops, I use it. If not, I keep clicking until I do find one.
How does the name “pop?” Let’s say I want a mean male character. Here are 10 names I generated for this blog:
Laurence Rogers
Phil Fitzgerald
Mario Jensen
Calvin Barker
Joey Diaz
Shane Phelps
Joseph Hodges
Leon Rowe
Marcus Cobb
Russell Hoffman
Hmm. Shane Phelps sounds like a jerk. Of course, my four blog readers know that a name is just a name. The key is to have the mindset to think about that name and create a character with this mean mindset. Here is my favorite random name generator:
http://random-name-generator.info/
I use this site for ethnic and fantasy names:
https://www.fantasynamegenerators.com/
A small part of my writing requires inventing some piece of technology that does not exist. In the Star Trek writing universe, they call this technobabble. Here are a few “future scientific device” generators:
http://www.ds10.org/Database/babble.html
http://enneadgames.com/generators/gen...
https://www.seventhsanctum.com/index-...
https://www.scifiideas.com/technobabb...
The Multisynaptic Hyper Infuser is broken. Priceless.
You can generate an entire planet with graphics and detailed data:
http://donjon.bin.sh/scifi/world/inde...
While researching this blog, I found out about idea generators. At present, I have far too many ideas and not enough time to write them up. However, I still generated ideas for about an hour. Here are four:
https://www.portent.com/tools/title-m...
https://app.buzzsumo.com/content/web?...
https://blog.reedsy.com/plot-generato...
https://www.scifiideas.com/story-idea...
These tools are quite impressive, and many of the generated plots had meat. It makes me wonder how long before somebody will invent a book generator. Wait a minute. I hope nobody is working on that.
A “generator” is a text list combined with a random number generator and rules. The first generator I ever came across was a National Enquirer headline generator. It used a list of popular names/events/situations and combined them into titles. Here is one such site:
http://www.rpginspiration.com/tables/...
I generated the following two headlines:
Mussolini Is Being Maintained Cryogenically for Nefarious Purposes
Incontrovertible Proof That the NSA Tried to Raise an Army of Dinosaurs
Quick and moderately funny stuff. I played with my National Enquirer headline generator on my Amiga computer for hours by adding to the database and creating new formulas.
In writing, I often use random name generators. They help me invent regular names, ethnic names, and exotic science-fiction items. How do I use this technology? Let’s say I want a new character name. I will click male or female and then get 10 names. If one pops, I use it. If not, I keep clicking until I do find one.
How does the name “pop?” Let’s say I want a mean male character. Here are 10 names I generated for this blog:
Laurence Rogers
Phil Fitzgerald
Mario Jensen
Calvin Barker
Joey Diaz
Shane Phelps
Joseph Hodges
Leon Rowe
Marcus Cobb
Russell Hoffman
Hmm. Shane Phelps sounds like a jerk. Of course, my four blog readers know that a name is just a name. The key is to have the mindset to think about that name and create a character with this mean mindset. Here is my favorite random name generator:
http://random-name-generator.info/
I use this site for ethnic and fantasy names:
https://www.fantasynamegenerators.com/
A small part of my writing requires inventing some piece of technology that does not exist. In the Star Trek writing universe, they call this technobabble. Here are a few “future scientific device” generators:
http://www.ds10.org/Database/babble.html
http://enneadgames.com/generators/gen...
https://www.seventhsanctum.com/index-...
https://www.scifiideas.com/technobabb...
The Multisynaptic Hyper Infuser is broken. Priceless.
You can generate an entire planet with graphics and detailed data:
http://donjon.bin.sh/scifi/world/inde...
While researching this blog, I found out about idea generators. At present, I have far too many ideas and not enough time to write them up. However, I still generated ideas for about an hour. Here are four:
https://www.portent.com/tools/title-m...
https://app.buzzsumo.com/content/web?...
https://blog.reedsy.com/plot-generato...
https://www.scifiideas.com/story-idea...
These tools are quite impressive, and many of the generated plots had meat. It makes me wonder how long before somebody will invent a book generator. Wait a minute. I hope nobody is working on that.
No comments have been added yet.
