networked worlds

I love this mix of drama where life is lost, erosion is sad, mass extinction is terrifying; there's a creative beauty in this process of death and rebirth where the present becomes the compost of the future.

Stories by Stephenson – which tend, predictably, towards singular heroes who win at technocracy – form the inspiration behind Amazon’s Blue Origin and Facebook’s Metaverse.

closed net cultures such as One Direction fandom do produce a lot of creative work, but it’s basically like the inside jokes you come up with at summer camp rather than innovations that will diffuse into the mainstream.

The debate over “is it real or fake” is somewhat ironic, because so much of what we experience as reality even within our own bodies is actually simulation.

The rest of us have the misfortune of living in a superfan’s world.

As awful as all this is, the workarounds themselves are often delightful and clever, testaments to the wit and grace of marginalized communities. For example, sex-workers call themselves "accountants." Homophobia is called "cornucopia" and "LGBTQ" becomes "Leg Booty."

This creativity isn't limited to people I admire or agree with: anti-vaxers have a... See more