TRYMSTENE
The Dancing Banana

The honest page

AI, and what it does here

It helps me write the code. It does not draw the banana, and it does not run the place.

First, the money

I don’t make money on this. Running Banana World costs me about 300 dollars a month: the AI subscription, the shop platform, the domain and Cloudflare, a few ads here and there, test products for the shop, and small tools. The tip jar brings in five or ten dollars a month, and it all goes back into the place. There is no salary in it. I have a normal nine-to-five job; this is what I do with the evenings.

What it costs about $300 a month
What it pays me $5–10 a month, the tip jar
Roughly, averaged over a year. It goes up in a month with a new test product or an ad.

Where AI is

In the code. Most of the code on trymstene.com and in Banana World is written with AI (Claude), working with me. That is true of most software you use today, from Discord and Twitch to Roblox, the studios behind your games, and almost any website; here I want to say it out loud. I decide what gets built, I test it, and I ship it. Nothing goes live because a machine said so.

Where AI is not

In the pictures. The dancing banana is mine, since 1999. The world’s places and rooms are built from art I bought and licensed from the people who drew it, and I take pride in that: paying for human work, and making my own on top of it.

No image generators are used. A few small pixel pieces are drawn in code with AI’s help, and every one of them goes past me before it ships.

What I think about it

AI has real problems. It costs energy and water. It fills the internet with slop. It is trained on, and used to replace, the work of artists and writers who never agreed to it. I use it for code with that in mind, and I try to keep it out of the parts that should stay human. As far as I can, within what one person with no funding can do, I would rather pay independent artists and creatives than let a model imitate them. This place and its community stay alive on that budget, and stay a place for everyone.

You

AI is not used to watch you, judge you or talk to you. The characters’ lines are written by hand. Reports are read by a person: me.

The whole list

Where AI shows up here: writing code, and reading the site’s own numbers so I can see what works. That is the list, and this page changes if it does.

Questions? Write to me.