📚 Books 2026, 19: Persuasion, by Jane Austen: https://devilgate.org/2026/08/23/finished-reading-persuasion-penguin-popular/
📚 Books 2026, 14: A Canticle for Leibowitz, by Walter M. M. Miller: https://devilgate.org/2026/08/15/books-a-canticle-for-leibowitz/
Wow, so many typos in today’s post, including Melville’s surname! I hope no one saw it.
📚 Books 2026, 18: Moby Dick, by Herman Melville
Took me a few months to get through this, and with a couple of interruptions — actually three. Why the interruptions, given I really enjoyed it? It’s a dense work, if not fantastically long at some 530 old-school paperback pages in the Penguin Popular Classics edition I have. Sometimes I felt like reading something a bit easier. Which suggests it’s hard work, for which it does have a bit of a reputation.
devilgate.org
BOOKS 2026, 18: Moby Dick, by Herman Melvile: https://devilgate.org/2026/08/09/books-moby-dick-by-herman/
John Gruber may not be a mainstream journalist, in that he’s an independent writer, not employed by a large publication; but this retraction of a recent article is an object lesson in how to behave when you’ve published something incorrect. Even if, as in this case, you’ve been misled.
Retraction: The App Store Rejection of the Week That Was, in Fact, a Correct Rejection
My disdain for astrology is so utter, and my esteem for Godier’s previous work so high, that it simply never occurred to me that he might have actually made and submitted to the App Store an astrology app, let alone that he’d then feign surprise and frustration that an astrology app was rejected for being an astrology app.
daringfireball.net
Watched: Spider-Man: Brand New Day 🎥 This was great! I think it’s the best of the Tom Holland Spideys. Marvel movies seem to be back.
"Getting rid of teachers because we all have chatbots is like getting rid of doctors because we all have the plague." Cory’s latest is very good on good and bad uses of LLMs, and why discernment is key to using them well.
I need to excise the word ‘though’ from my vocabulary, like I’ve just had to excise several instances of it from this morning’s post. It is clearly my most overused word.
📚 Books 2026, 17: The Three Eyes of Evil, by AE Van Vogt
I read this from the Balloch library several times when I was (much) younger. I really liked it, as proven by the fact of my repeated borrowing. Then the other day Warren Ellis mentioned getting an old book off Ebay, and this one popped into my head: could I get a copy of it, after all these years? I could, and for only a few quid with the postage. It was soon here, and I read it over the weekend.
devilgate.org
📚 Books 2026, 17: The Three Eyes of Evil, by AE Van Vogt: https://devilgate.org/2026/07/28/books-the-three-eyes-of/
Watched: Babylon 5: The Road Home 🎥 This animated sequel-of-sorts to the wonderful Babylon 5 TV series was released a few years ago, and I somehow missed out on the news. Heard about it a few months ago and was reminded again yester... https://devilgate.org/2026/07/25/watched-babylon-the-road-home/
Tales from the Bitface
Watched: Babylon 5: The Road Home 🎥 This animated sequel-of-sorts to the wonderful Babylon 5 TV series was released a few years ago, and I somehow missed out on the news. Heard about it a few months ago and was reminded again yesterday. It’s good enough, but mainly for the chance to spend some more time with beloved characters. It doesn’t add anything to the overall story, nor detract from it.
devilgate.org
Common, Wealthy: https://devilgate.org/2026/07/24/common-wealthy/ In which I watch an opening ceremony and way too many adverts.
Common, Wealthy
In which I watch an opening ceremony and way too many adverts.
devilgate.org
It’s not exactly Danny Boyle’s 2012 masterpiece so far, is it?
Commonwealth Games Opening Ceremony is on Channel 5, but makes heavy use of Doctor Who? Weird.
The most intriguing thing for me about this alternative way of looking at The Great Wave is that I had never before realised there were boats in it! Here's the original (first photo) and flipped (second). The idea is that since Japan... https://devilgate.org/2026/07/20/the-most-intriguing-thing-for/
Watched: Billion Dollar Brain 🎥. The third Harry Palmer film, and considerably more bizarre and confusing than the the first or second. Also a Ken Russell film, so that’s probably why. A mad Texan oil billionaire with a private army tries to trigger a third world war, basically
Billion Dollar Brain
A former British spy stumbles into in a plot to overthrow Communism with the help of a supercomputer. But who is working for whom?
themoviedb.org
That BBC self-ad at half time of the World Cup Final was OK, but Mitch Benn did it better years ago with ‘I’m Proud of the BBC’ (YouTube link).
📚 Books 2026, 16: Use of weapons, by Iain M Banks: https://devilgate.org/2026/07/18/finished-reading-use-of-weapons/ In which I interrupt a major work to reread a favourite (again), this time inspired by a podcast.
I have no idea how Dave Winer comes to this conclusion: "One of the silver linings of AI use is that it makes you a better writer." Especially when one of the main things people (at least non-programmers) tout it for is doing your writing for you!
Scripting News: Tuesday, July 7, 2026
Dave Winer, OG blogger, podcaster, developed first apps in many categories. Old enough to know better. It's even worse than it appears.
scripting.com
Watched: Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason 🎥. I was sure I hadn’t seen it before, but I remembered some scenes as they happened. I have a vague memory of a DVD in a holiday house, perhaps. Partial falling asleep may have been involved. It’s daft but fun in places.
Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason
Bridget Jones is still dating her new love, barrister Mark Darcy, for a perfect six weeks. However, while on assignment in Thailand with her disreputable ex, Daniel Cleaver, claiming to be reformed, Bridget questions if she has everything she's ever dreamed of having.
themoviedb.org
📚 Books 2026, 15: The Illuminatus! Trilogy, by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson: https://devilgate.org/2026/07/06/finished-reading-illuminatus-by-robert/
This from @JohnPhilpin sounds like reviews by John Clute in Interzone back in the day: "👁️ That moment when you open a blog post and you need to look up 4 words just in the first sentence." Source: https://john.philpin.com/2026/06/25/that-moment-when-you-open.html
John PHI⑊PIN
john.philpin.com
Well that was a bloody waste of time! Don’t know why I stayed up for that.
"Minute Cryptic - 24 June, 2026 “Hermit perhaps returning alone, wandering city” (9) 🟣🟣🟣🟣🟣🟣🟣🟣🟣🟣🟣🟣 🏆 0 hints – 3 under the community par (81,255 solvers so far). www.minutecryptic.com" Tough one, this. My first instinct was right, but I made a wrong guess.
This is what we’re faced with as the year hinges into its second half. Astronomically, if not by the calendar.
Just realised I hadn’t added Moby Dick to my Currently reading’ list. I’m only about a third in, totally loving it, and wondering why people think it’s hard. 📚
Moby Dick
micro.blog
Going to see Richard Dawkins at the Barbican tonight. The title of his talk is ‘Genes & the Meaning of Life’. It’ll be interesting to see — among other things — if his beliefs about the aliveness of ‘AI’ have changed.
Tales from the Bitface
We are in strange times when the Pope makes more sense about technology than Richard Dawkins. From Pope Leo’s encyclical, as quoted by Kottke: It is not possible to provide a single, comprehensive definition of AI. What can be stated, however, is that we must avoid the misconception of equating this type of “intelligence” with that of human beings. These systems merely imitate certain functions of human intelligence. While Dawkins seems to have fallen completely into a vat of kool-aid:
devilgate.org