Tag: science fiction

Pluralistic: 13 Apr 2020

Today's links

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Pluralistic: 29 Mar 2020

Today's links

  1. Announcing Story Club: A short story reading group, kicking off with me and Masque of the Red Death.
  2. Alex Jones's one-two punch: Conspiracy is a credulity-detection system.
  3. Andrew Cuomo is not your woke bae: Teen Vogue has a timely reminder.
  4. Cozy Catastrophes: Time to revisit Jo Walton's 2009 essay.
  5. California's missing medical stockpile: Balanced budgets vs 50m N95 respirators, 2400 portable ventilators, and 21,000 patient beds
  6. A better way to visualize exponential growth: What matters is the rate of new infections.
  7. Don't worry about groceries: They're safe, mostly.
  8. This day in history: 2005, 2010, 2015, 2019
  9. Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming appearances, current writing projects, current reading

Continue reading "Pluralistic: 29 Mar 2020"

Pluralistic: 28 Mar 2020

Today's links

  1. Charter techs get $25 gift cards instead of hazard pay: No hand-san or PPE, either.
  2. The Pandemic Playbook: Trump won't rtfm.
  3. Boardgame Remix Kit: Make 26 new games out of Monopoly, Clue, Trivial Pursuit and Scrabble sets.
  4. McMansion Hell visits 1972: "Architecture store? I'd like one of everything."
  5. Free Cheapass Games print-and-plays: KILL DOCTOR LUCKY, GIVE ME THE BRAIN, LORD OF THE FRIES, UNEXPLODED COW and so many more!
  6. Trump officials killed Walmart opioid prosecutions: With help from Jones Day.
  7. United gets $25B stimulus and announces layoffs: The biggest corporate giveaway in history.
  8. FLICC vs denialism: A taxonomy of scientific denial, just in time.
  9. This Waifu Does Not Exist: Autogenned anime characters, with backstories.
  10. Fever cameras are garbage: It's the pivot-to-covid for grifty police enablers.
  11. Employers scramble to buy remote-worker spyware: Even if you're paying for the product, you're the product.
  12. Canada Reads Q&A on Apr 23: Unfortunately, it's on Facebook.
  13. Cowboy Economist on covid stimulus: Congress doesn't spend taxes, it spends and then taxes.
  14. 88 Names podcast: Talking VR, AR and gold farming with Matt Ruff.
  15. This day in history: 2005, 2010, 2015, 2019
  16. Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming appearances, current writing projects, current reading

Continue reading "Pluralistic: 28 Mar 2020"

Pluralistic: 26 Mar 2020

Today's links

  1. EFF's videoconferencing backgrounds: With a deep cut from the NSA's secret listening post.
  2. The ideology of economics: Economics doesn't have "laws" it has "policies."
  3. LoC plugs Little Brother: Open access FTW.
  4. Canada nationalizes covid patents: An Act respecting certain measures in response to COVID-19.
  5. Exponential Threat: Trump threatened to sue media outlets that aired this spot.
  6. Sanders on GOP stimulus cruelty: "Millions for plutes, but not one cent for workers."
  7. Record wind-power growth: Covid stimulus could start a Green New Deal.
  8. Social distancing and other diseases: Do we trust IoT thermometer companies, though?
  9. Badger Masks: UW Madison's open facemask design.
  10. This day in history: 2005, 2010, 2015, 2019
  11. Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming appearances, current writing projects, current reading

Continue reading "Pluralistic: 26 Mar 2020"

Pluralistic: 24 Mar 2020

Today's links

  1. This year's Nebula Awards will be held online: It's $150, and raising funds to bail out corona-shattered writers.
  2. Make America Well Again stamps: from the artist who brought you the Trump Zero Cents stamp.
  3. Data is the new toxic waste: It never was the "new oil" (my latest podcast).
  4. Stock Jump: A ski-game that lets you play the stock charts of cratered businesses.
  5. Murdering 20% of elderly Americans is bad strategy for the GOP: Terrified old people are the turkeys who vote for plutes' Christmas every four years.
  6. Join me on the Quarantine Book Club: April 1, 3PM Pacific.
  7. The Party of Death: It's a good time to buy exterminism futures.
  8. Financial stability vs economic stability: Debts that can't be paid, won't be paid.
  9. Quarantine reveals the falsity of the automation crisis: Augmentation isn't replacement.
  10. Bailouts and moral hazard: If we never teach big business, it won't ever learn.
  11. MIT's ingenious manual/automatic open source ventilator: Now in FDA testing.
  12. This day in history: 2005, 2010, 2015, 2019
  13. Colophon: Recent publications, current writing projects, upcoming appearances, current reading

Continue reading "Pluralistic: 24 Mar 2020"

Pluralistic: 19 Mar 2020

Today's links

  1. The worst Democrat in Congress just lost his job: Dan Lipinski primaried by the amazing Marie Newman.
  2. Canada Reads documentary on Radicalized: The Great Canadian Book debate is indefinitely postponed, but here's an hour on my book!
  3. Africa's Facebook modders are world leaders: Technological self-determination through adversarial interoperability.
  4. Imagineering in a Box: Interdisciplinary theme park design lessons from Khan Academy and Disney.
  5. Data is the New Toxic Waste: It was never "the new oil."
  6. How to structure a fair covid bailout: Stimulus, not private jets.
  7. Fox News is a suicide cult: Telling your elderly viewers to perform tribal loyalty by engaging in high-risk behaviors is a career-limiting move.
  8. Grocery supply chains are resilient: One less thing to worry about.
  9. Magic in the time of coronavirus: Never let a good crisis go to waste, card-trick edition.
  10. This day in history: 2010, 2019
  11. Colophon: Recent publications, current writing projects, upcoming appearances, current reading

Continue reading "Pluralistic: 19 Mar 2020"

Pluralistic: 18 Mar 2020

Today's links

  1. Ethiopian factory sports Jack Ma quotes: Global trade currents are shifting fast.
  2. Charter orders all workers to keep showing up: Even the 15% of its workforce who could work from home.
  3. MAGA firefighters dismiss coronavirus as Democrat hoax: And/or a Chinese bioweapon.
  4. Flatter Me, a compliments card game: Kickstarting now.
  5. American Airlines blew billions, now it wants a bailout: Socializing losses, privatizing gains.
  6. John Green's mutual aid manifesto: The only way through is together.
  7. How to split a single ventilator for four patients: Peer-reviewed simulations.
  8. Bigoted Republican Congressjerk votes against coronavirus relief because it might cover same-sex partnerships: Rep Andy Biggs wants to send us all to meet Jesus.
  9. Epidemiology and public health in 14 minutes: An epidemiologist and an sf writer make an outstanding science communications team.
  10. 3D printed ventilator hero got a patent threat: Human rights vs property rights.
  11. If nothing is for sale, how will covid stimulus work? Can you fix a supply shock with stimulus?
  12. How to make your own toilet paper: A craft for your isolated kiddos.
  13. Plague precautions from 1665: No feasting, but you can tipple in a bar until 9PM.
  14. This day in history: 2005, 2010, 2015, 2019
  15. Colophon: Recent publications, current writing projects, upcoming appearances, current reading

Continue reading "Pluralistic: 18 Mar 2020"

Pluralistic: 17 Mar 2020

Today's links

  1. The Masque of the Red Death and Punch Brothers Punch: My latest podcast is Poe/Twain bathos crossover.
  2. Fill in your census online: Otherwise you and people you care about literally won't count.
  3. Naomi Klein: this disaster has no room for disaster capitalism: It's our moment to seize.
  4. Scalzi's canceled bookstore: Support your local indie bookseller, especially now.
  5. My Twitter account was suspended: I got in trouble for putting trolls on a list called "Colossal Assholes."
  6. Talking digital writing careers with the Writing Excuses podcast: Covering a lot of ground in 15 minutes.
  7. A new anxiety podcast from Nightvale's Joseph Fink: Proud to be in the debut episode.
  8. Patent trolls try to shut down covid testing: Monkey-selfies, Theranos, Softbank – it's a garbage matrioshke!
  9. How to live with your kids: "Working and Learning from Home with Young Children."
  10. Brave files GDPR complaint against Google: Sharing data between Google services is a no-no.
  11. This day in history: 2005, 2015, 2019
  12. Colophon: Recent publications, current writing projects, upcoming appearances, current reading

Continue reading "Pluralistic: 17 Mar 2020"

Pluralistic: 14 Mar 2020

Today's links

  1. Masque of the Red Death: Macmillan Audio gave me permission to share the audiobook of my end-of-the-world novella.
  2. When Sysadmins Ruled the Earth: A new podcast audiobook of my 2005 end-of-the-world story.
  3. Ada Palmer on historical and modern censorship: Part of EFF's Speaking Freely project.
  4. Glitch workers unionize: First-ever tech union formed without management opposition.
  5. Women of Imagineering: A 384-page illustrated chronicle of the role women play in Disney theme-park design.
  6. Tachyon celebrates 30 years of sff publishing with a Humble Bundle: DRM-free and benefits EFF.
  7. Honest Government Ads, Covid-19 edition: Political satire is really hard, but The Juice makes it look easy.
  8. TSA lifts liquid bans, telcos lift data caps: Almost as though there was no reason for them in the first place.
  9. CBC postpones Canada Reads debates: But you can read a ton of the nominated books online for free.
  10. Star Wars firepits: 750lbs of flaming backyard steel.
  11. This day in history: 2005, 2015, 2019
  12. Colophon: Recent publications, current writing projects, upcoming appearances, current reading

Continue reading "Pluralistic: 14 Mar 2020"

Pluralistic: 13 Mar 2020

Today's links

  1. Announcing the third Little Brother book, Attack Surface: And a new Little Brother/Homeland reissue, with an intro by Ed Snowden!
  2. Where I Write: A column for the CBC that's really about how I write.
  3. Stream 200+ global news channels: Each hand-picked, no registration required.
  4. AT&T's CEO fired 23,000 workers and gave himself a 10% raise: Life on the easiest setting.
  5. Chelsea Manning is free: But she's been fined $256K for refusing to testify to the Grand Jury.
  6. Rep Katie Porter forces CDC boss to commit to free testing: Literally the most effective questioner in Congress.
  7. Trump's unfitness in a plague: It's not because he's an ignoramus, it's because he's a nihilist.
  8. Malware that hides behind a realtime Covid-19 map: Peter Watts' prophecy comes true.
  9. Locked-down Siennese sing their city's hymn: A cause for hope in the dark.
  10. This day in history: 2015, 2019
  11. Colophon: Recent publications, current writing projects, upcoming appearances, current reading

Continue reading "Pluralistic: 13 Mar 2020"