Hi, long time no see. Today is the third day of the Lunar New Year, Happy New Year!
I’ve always wanted to document the fresh start of 2023. I thought about it a lot, but felt there might not be much worth recording. Still, since it’s been so long since I last wrote a blog post, I’ll just write something casually.
First, let’s casually talk about the year-end summaries from various apps. Bilibili is naturally my perfect-attendance champion! My watch time is almost 2000 hours. The year-end summaries from music apps are no longer very useful, since my music player has completely become YouTube and Bilibili. I can find whatever I want to listen to, there are no copyright issues, and I don’t pursue top-tier audio quality, so it’s just fine (maybe I should create a browser plugin to automatically track playback time?).
Douban still has some reference value. The happiest thing this year was probably attending premieres at various cinemas in Chaoyang District. I attended about 6 premieres in 2023: “All About Nothing” (my first premiere, a nice art film), “Operation Moscow” (the movie was average, but I got to see Andy Lau), “Beast” (a terrible movie, but I got to see WaWa), “The Hunt” (probably the best movie I’ve seen at a premiere), “Silent Record” (an art film dressed as a suspense thriller), and “Black Earth Without Words” (a TV series premiere, I only watched two episodes, the plot hadn’t even unfolded yet, and it ended with a terrible cliffhanger - -|||).
Although I didn’t see many good movies at premieres, and their Douban ratings were mostly high, it felt quite nice to meet the creators and interact with them in person hhh. My favorite movies this year were probably “Oppenheimer” and “Johnny Keep Walking!” (Annual Meeting Can’t Stop), but I had to buy tickets for both myself; I couldn’t get into the premieres =A=. Also, “Crossing the Line” was decent, but I guess it compromised too much to pass censorship. Many movies and TV series suffer from this common issue: they insist on a Happy Ending just to pass review. The theme could have been explored more deeply. Is it that the censors don’t understand movies??? Or are they just afraid of getting involved???
Back in 2022, I was exceptionally active on GitHub, but in 2023 I seemed to have sunk to the bottom of the ocean. Almost all my contributions went to private repositories. The rapid development of LLMs also left me a bit confused. The constant “emergence” of new tasks in my new job gave me a sense of endless learning hhh. However, most of my work in 2023 had little to do with LLMs. I hope I can work on MM or LMM projects in 2024.
At the beginning of 2023, right after the pandemic restrictions were lifted, Beijing was hit hard by the outbreak, so I slipped away early and stayed in Hainan for a month to finish my finals. When I returned, I thought I’d be able to go out more now that restrictions were lifted, but I couldn’t even get out of Huairou. As expected, Hebei is Hebei; don’t get too close to Beijing (x). At the end of the spring semester, I signed up for summer courses early, finished them, and then ran off to Hainan again. Upon returning, I joined the WeBank and AIR Trustworthy Federated Learning Summer Camp, then went back to the institute. A few days later came the high-temperature holiday break. After that, it was National Day, followed by team-building events. This period felt like it flew by so fast; I barely have any memories of it. Later, I went to Hainan again to submit to IEEE ICPADS, and slipped off to Hainan again while writing this year-end summary.
Other things that made me happy this year included buying a camera. Although I paid a bit of a “tuition fee” for it, feeling like a street wanderer was quite nice. I also visited many attractions in Beijing. In 2024, I bought an annual pass for Beijing parks. I hope to visit more places and earn back the ticket price QAQ.
This year, 2024, pressure has also arrived. Graduation-related matters have finally come to the forefront: IELTS scores, thesis, resume, various application documents, and information gathering are all tasks to be done. Online, I’m seeking a 25 Fall PhD position!!! If anyone is applying or wants to exchange ideas, feel free to find me via email, comments, or other methods. I’d be very happy to study and communicate together~!
This year, I hope my family stays healthy! :)
Also, wishing everyone a prosperous Year of the Dragon and all the best!
So, Happy New Year, and may everything go smoothly!
