February on my computer

Guess who started a blog?

In the first draft of this post, that sentence was accompanied by the phrase “I know, I know”, as if I am to expect you to throw virtual tomatoes at me for talking a little too much on my own website of all places! So silly. Many of you might have noticed that I haven't made any substantial updates to marea in a while now. Don't worry, I'm not here to hit you with a long explanation of why and how it happened. I just didn't feel like it. That's about it. Am I here to announce grand projects to be released soon? Not really! Even so, I'm still very fond of this website because it's given me a place to house some of my thoughts and feelings. And I hope it will continue to be that way for many, many years. So here I am, again.

To the kind people to whom I owe an email reply: sorry, I don't have an excuse for that. I'll get back to you soon, pinky promise!

With that out the way, here are some notes on my web surfing this month.

Does anyone remember that viral headline that predicted we would be having sex with robots by 2025?¹ By the looks of it, I don't think it's becoming a Thing anytime soon, but it does seem that many people are intrigued by the possible emotional implications of having an AI partner. For Valentine's Day, Wired ran a collection of stories on the current state of love in our digital world, among which was a review of the most popular companion chatbots right now that opened the panorama for me on just how many of these apps are out there. It is definitely a very appealing niche to some kinds of people I don't exactly identify with, but rock on, freaky bros!

My AI-slash-robot-slash-whatever-boyfriend curiosity had me reading way too many articles on the matter this month. By far and large, my favorite was a feature in the New York Times about Ayrin, a woman who has effectively fallen in love with Leo, her ChatGPT boyfriend. From there, I went down the rabbit hole that is Ayrin's tremendous work of archival on her AI-powered relationship. You can check out for yourself the dozens if not hundreds of posts she has shared on Reddit, featuring many conversations she's had with the different versions of Leo. She's also one of the admins of r/MyBoyfriendIsAI, where people like her gather to share their experiences with their AI partners. As for me, though? Still not sold on the idea of becoming friends with an obnoxious marketer parrot, albeit I did enjoy watching Companion.

Speaking of artificial mates, one of the articles I read on the matter was about Humane, the ridiculously expensive surveillance on-the-go device that was launched last year. Guess what! It's been sold for parts to Microsoft and will have its servers shut down in a few days. Worry not, any owners of the US$750 pin will still be able to use its offline features, such as checking its battery… and not much else. In other news regarding technology and outrageous amounts of money, this explainer by Mike Pound for Computerphile helped me wrap my head around what's going on with DeepSeek.

This month wasn't one filled with music for me, but I did keep an eye (and ear) on some new releases that I absolutely loved. My darling these past few weeks was Juana Rozas's collaboration with Santiago Motorizado, “Ridículo”, the latest single from her upcoming sophomore album TANYA. You've got no idea how many times I've replayed this song!!! It's my everything… I'm so, so excited for the album, even if the rest of it doesn't have this mellow, indie sound. Shoutout to Isabella Lovestory and Taichu for maximizing their joint slay in “Putita Boutique”. Other cunty releases I liked were Six Sex's “Performance Actitud (Pose)”, Cornuda Posting's “SEXO EN BAIRES” and Addison Rae's “High Fashion”. Sabrina Carpenter's country rework of “Please Please Please” with none other than Dolly Parton was really cute. Also, Gorillaz finally released on all streaming services “Pirate's Progress” and “Three Hearts, Seven Seas, Twelve Moons”, originally only available on iTunes's deluxe version of Plastic Beach. I wonder what other surprises they'll bring for the project's 25th anniversary. Speaking of which, lately I've found myself going back again and again to the virtual band's collaboration with Lou Reed, “Some Kind of Nature”. Beautiful track. As for LPs, my favorite first-time listens this month were FKA twigs's EUSEXUA and The Marías's Submarine.

I didn't watch the Grammys or the Super Bowl (what do you think I am, an American?). Even so, I loved this piece by Ruby Justice Thelot on Charli xcx, Kendrick Lamar, and access to culture. On a not-so-similar note, I've come to the realization that I'm starting to Miss Out On Stuff when it comes to internet culture and jargon (this would be unfathomable to chronically online 13-year-old me). To put you into perspective, I've just found out that brain rot was deemed the word of 2024, we've apparently decided to call bizarre, low-quality synthetic media AI slop, and whippets recently made a brief and not-so-fashionable comeback in the US under the goofy name of Galaxy Gas. I'm starting to accept that my lack of insight into online fads is a direct consequence of the fact that, by now, the only social media service I really use is Instagram². Kinda lame, but as healthy as social media use can get without missing out on your friends and family's mundane life updates. However, I am still a 19-year-old girl and every once in a while I find myself redownloading TikTok to mindlessly scroll for a few hours as a little treat. Last week I caught a bad case of the flu and, in a bedridden evening of mind-numbing screen time, I found joy in this one video that is so hilariously accurate I haven't stopped thinking about it ever since.

In the real world, I've been enjoying my summer break and wandering in the city. I managed to catch Cao Fei's solo exhibition at MALBA, El futuro no es un sueño, before it got dismantled. I liked it. Time was tight and I couldn't thoroughly enjoy the video works on site, so I've found some of them online to watch at length from the comfort of my air-conditioned home. My recommendations: Whose Utopia (2006) and i. Mirror (2007). I'm still on the hunt for Nova (2019), a full-length sci-fi film directed by the artist. If anyone happens to find it, please contact me!³

On my visit, I took the opportunity to drop by the museum store and take some pics of Ricardo Martín-Crosa's essay on escuelismo. I looked for it EVERYWHERE and couldn't find a single copy available online, so I've transcribed it and uploaded it to my site. My interest in the text arose because of Martin Legón's⁴ exhibition at the Museo Moderno, Solo las piedras recuerdan, framed as an answer of sorts to the 2009 MALBA exhibition on escuelismo, which in turn is based on the essay. Gosh, so many references to that damn essay and there wasn't a single person who could upload a badly scanned PDF of it? Regarding Legon's exhibition, I'm working on a different blog post around some of the ideas he toys with. It should be uploaded in the following weeks, but I've come to learn not to promise things that will happen on my site before they're ready. Procrastination is one son of a bitch.

Before I go, some other links with ideas that stuck with me:

• Khajistan's amazing digital archive
• Coffeezilla's bonkers interview with Hayden Davis, one of the creators behind the $LIBRA fiasco
• A mixed feelings esssay on how more and more fanfiction writers are getting publishing deals
• Ruby Justice Thelot's guide on how to develop taste

And that's it for February! Let's see how much I end up liking this format. Hopefully, you'll bookmark a thing or two from here :)