AI Makes a Pudding Story; Data on Infant Sleep Training and Sci-Fi

Here are our new projects to share!

• [Essay] Can an AI make a data-driven, visual story? Technically… yes. We review and grade what Claude and ChatGPT can create, and we offer a peak behind The Pudding’s story-making process.

• [Essay] Is Sleep Training Harmful? Contributor Tom Vaillant examined the social media and medical discourse surrounding infant sleep training to answer this hotly debated question among parents.

• [Essay] Who killed the world? An exploration of how sci-fi films have changed in the last 70-some years. You can also watch the video version (5 min)!

Thanks a ton for continuing to subscribe! Special shout-out to all the recent Patreon subscribers; your support means a lot!

Can an AI make a data-driven, visual story?

We’ve heavily experimented with folding AI into our story process. But we wanted to know: what would happen if it fully replaced us and made its own story? Explore the essay it generated, titled by the AI, “The Sadness of Song: How Pop Music is Turning to the Dark Side.”

Read the essay

Is Sleep Training Harmful?

Contributor Tom Vaillant is a new parent, and much like every other new parent, he has wrestled with the question of sleep training. Is it good or bad? You’ll get different answers depending on where you look. Tom dives into social media and scientific research to set the record straight.

Read the essay

Who killed the world?

Alvin Chang loves science fiction. The genre imagines rich worlds that feel just barely within reach for humanity. It explores our deepest fears and our most pollyannaish hopes.

In this essay (and video!), Alvin delves into the data of sci-fi. Often, modern sci-fi films start after the world has completely broken. But we live in a world where we’re trying to avoid that fate.

Alvin examines how the plots of sci-fi films have evolved over the years (e.g., why the world is broken, and whether it recovers), and you’ll see how the genre helps us imagine a future that we want to inhabit.

Read the essay

Watch the video

Quick asides!

• Have a cool essay idea that you want to make? Check out our pitch guidelines.

• Want to hire our team to produce data-led, visual stories? Check out our sister studio, Polygraph.

#stuffwelove at The Pudding

Here’s also some special links that are regularly shared on our Friends of The Pudding slack-channel (get access via Patreon)!

• The filmmaking process at Disney: a behind-the-scenes look at Disney’s animation process.

• The Communal Plot: A daily poll in a fun 2x2 visual format.

• How Close Are the Planet’s Climate Tipping Points?: A stylish look at an impending issue.