Accelerando

[coalescent]

At some point, Asimov's decided to put all the stories to date in Charlie Stross' Accelerando sequence online. Since they're all excellent stories, this is a Good Thing and I recommend everyone check them out. Try at least 'Lobsters' and 'Router':

• 'Lobsters'


• 'Troubador'


• 'Tourist'


• 'Halo'


• 'Router' (one of the best sensawunda kicks I've had for a while)


• 'Nightfall' (or at least half of it)

Comments

hi

[nirikina.livejournal.com]

i noticed you added me as a friend
if you want to be added back please introduce yourself

Re: hi

[coalescent.livejournal.com]

Hi there. This is me.

But...

[rant]
Livejournal 'friending' protocols bug me. I'm not your friend; you're not my friend. I don't know you. I found your journal entirely at random, surfing through various of my interests. I noticed we had a bunch of interests in common. I decided to add you as a 'friend' for a while to see if I liked your journal.

Nowhere in this process was there an expectation of being friended back. I just figure that if someone likes what I'm writing, they'll friend me; if they don't, they won't. It doesn't - or at least, in my view shouldn't - have anything to do with whether I've added them or not. So if someone I've friended doesn't reciprocate then I'm not bothered. If someone friends me then unfriends me, I'm not bothered - they've given my journal a trial, and it wasn't for them.

(If someone I actually know well unfriended me, then I'd be a little worried, I admit)

Really, a much more useful terminology would be 'journals I am watching' and 'watched by'.
[/rant]

So...sorry about that. You just hit one of my hot buttons. If you want to read what I'm writing, that's cool. If not, that's cool too. :)

Re: LJ protocols

[applez.livejournal.com]

Actually, this is the first I've seen of protocols.

(interesting)

Re: LJ protocols

[coalescent.livejournal.com]

Really? I seem to come across them all the time: People expecting you to friend them because they've friended you, people who think it's rude to friend somebody without asking first, people who get upset if they're unfriended...

There are arguments to be made in some cases, but for the most part it all bugs me. :)

Re: LJ protocols

[applez.livejournal.com]

Yup, pretty much the first time, and I don't quite understand it, though I know where they're coming from. I guess folks feel they need to bring their reality social rules into this virtuality - just doesn't work all the time because of the nature of the medium.

All in all, common sense should be the main guide.

I dunno, I just think there are bigger issues at stake in LJ/online communications: like identifying who one is, or being conscience of how many kb one is piling on in commments in someone else's LJ (whistling, looking towards the ceiling). :-)

----

Terminology

[tinyjo.livejournal.com]

Yeah. This is a hang over of LiveJournals origins as something Brad wrote for him and his college friends to use to keep up with each other. The major reason that people tend to end up with some sort of "friends protocol" IMHO is that LJ conflates 2 functions into the friends list. Firstly it's a list of journals you want to watch* but secondly it's the means of controlling who can read your entries.

I believe that there's a project afoot which will allow you have trust relationships with users without having to add them to your reading list, leaving them free to rename the friends list if necessary. I don't think it's started development yet, but it's definitely on the to do list.

* Although with the use of Friends Groups, you don't even have to read the journals of everyone on your friends list!

Technique for delimiting lists

[applez.livejournal.com]

Yes, the 'Custom' function can do this nicely, iirc.

I'm not sure I have it working right yet, though.

V. fun!

[applez.livejournal.com]

Did a quick read of 'Lobsters' ... I quite like this swipe: "Communist Russia is the only government still running on Microsoft, the central planning apparat being convinced that if you have to pay for software it must be worth money." :-)

Anywho, is certainly fun, neat to see in web-form, but I can also see its limits. Namely the classic problem of balancing the first-person with meta-changes of the globe; also that the story will age, oddly. :-)

----

Re: V. fun!

[coalescent.livejournal.com]

Read 'em all. But read 'Router' most of all. The singularity actually happens! :-D

Observation

[applez.livejournal.com]

You know, it's times like this when I feel we should force Mike to LJ, even if requires Clockwork Orange style reprogramming. :-p

Why am I the one left carrying the humanities banner in virtualspace again?

(thinking) Damn, if we were to apply the Mike in this manner, it'd be very Vinge-style 'Emergents' wouldn't it? (or am I getting my novels mixed up again?).

hehehehe...

(/diabolical thinking)

Re: Observation

[greengolux.livejournal.com]

Why am I the one left carrying the humanities banner in virtualspace again?

Excuse me! What am I then? ;)

Re: Observation

[coalescent.livejournal.com]

Why am I the one left carrying the humanities banner in virtualspace again?

Hey, I'm as much in the dark as you are: This is very much an exemplar of Doctorow's 'overclocked'. It's hard SF, but the Science is the science of computers, about which I know very little. :-)

Niall pic

[applez.livejournal.com]

BTW Niall, why haven't you updated your pic? You look kind of looming in that pile-o-Magdalene-people pic. ;-)

Did I snap any of you when you visited? Let me check when I get home tonight, mail you any I may have.

Re: Niall pic

[coalescent.livejournal.com]

I haven't updated because, having no digital camera and no scanner, there aren't that many photos of me online. Pretty much that simple. :)

[elleblue.livejournal.com]

Didn't you used to link to this picture? It's gone the way of most of my older online pictures, and been moved to the slower wingar.demon webspace rather than my university space, but it's still online. If you want to be immune to me reshuffling my scrapbook, you're welcome to save your own copy!

[coalescent.livejournal.com]

Thanks. I really did mean to get round to that at some point and stop stealing your bandwidth, but never did...

(Also, CDs turned up today. Thanks!)

[pikelet.livejournal.com]

I'm so bored now that your flamewar has died down.

Can you please annoy someone else? Pretty please?

[coalescent.livejournal.com]

Dammit, I'm doing my best. Whaddya want, blood?

[coalescent.livejournal.com]

OK, how much will you pay me to troll these people?

[scribeoflight.livejournal.com]

I'm really tempted to say TROLL AWAY!

But I probably wouldn't put the money where my mouth is ;o)

[pikelet.livejournal.com]

Do it. Write about Light or something, presenting it as 'SF' - that is, 'speculative fiction' as Atwood writes it.

They'll never guess.

[coalescent.livejournal.com]

I swear to god, I came up with that idea entirely independently last night.

GET OUT OF MY HEAD, PHIPPS!

Sorry

[autopope.livejournal.com]

... but I've had to ask Asimov's SF to remove these files.

This used to be an anonymous-ish account for me (until Warren Ellis blew my cover): but in case you didn't know, autopope is Charlie Stross (http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blosxom.cgi).

I don't mind you reading my stories, but my agent is currently pitching "Accelerando" (the novel) at a publisher. These stories weren't supposed to be left on the Asimov's SF website after the awards they were nominated for were announced. I found this LJ entry via Google. If I could find it, then so can publishing folks -- and that could torpedo the book deal. Working on the assumption that you might want to read the other 70,000 words of the story, I'm asking Asimov's SF to remove the files -- at least until their status is clearer -- as the lesser of two evils.

(Again: apologies. I hope you can understand why I'm taking this action, and will forgive me.)

Re: Sorry

[coalescent.livejournal.com]

in case you didn't know, autopope is Charlie Stross.

It's kind've an open secret...

I hope you can understand why I'm taking this action, and will forgive me.

Oh, absolutely. Don't worry, I've got a sub to Asimov's, and I'm sure I'll be bugging everyone I know to buy the novelization when it (eventually) comes out... :-)

(I also now feel a little guilty: I saw you post something on rec.arts.sf.* in the last week or so which made me think that maybe you didn't know they were all online, and maybe it might be a problem, and I meant to email you about it but I forgot. Sorry.)

Re: Sorry

[coalescent.livejournal.com]

kind've

This actually makes no sense. I never realised that before. Gah.