Axios writer: I melted my brain with AI. Not only can I no longer read, but I don't even understand the purpose of reading anymore. Here's how you can also do this. www.axios.com/2026/08/11/r...
Philip Purser-Hallard
@purserhallard.com
I write stuff -- most recently Sherlock Holmes: The Monster of the Mere. Posting about writing, TV, SF, Doctor Who, politics, language, crosswords, things I like, things I'm interested in, things. He/him.
Jesus, the sheer lumpen lack of imagination it must require for someone to look at Doctor Who in 20fucking26 and think, "Do you know who I reckon would make a good Doctor? That bloke David Tennant."
GeekTyrant@geektyrant.com · 7h agoNew Report Claims DOCTOR WHO Veteran David Tennant Has Had Preliminary Talks About Returning to the Role
Always annoys me in TV space opera (Doctor Who and Star Trek both guilty of this) when spaceships are shown "near" stars and the CGI star looks like it might possibly, if you're charitable and squint, be maybe as big as the Isle of Wight.
Paul Byrne@theplanetaryguy.com · 6d agoThis is the highest-resolution view of the surface of the Sun. Ever. Taken by the NSF's Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope, features as small as 19 km across can be resolved. The wispy things are magnetic field boundaries formed by Kelvin-Helmholtz instabilities. The island of Ireland for scale.
God, the miserabilist arseholes on this app who get furious because others are still capable of enjoyment rather than doomposting about genocide every moment God sends.
I don't think there should be a defibrilator on Snowdon. And that's a hill I'm prepared to die on
Everything I do *click, click* I do it for you *click, click* Everything I do, I do it for you, I do it for you *click, click* - The Bryan Addams Family
Why is the Guardian publishing an entire series of ragebait articles designed solely to provoke? Do they think there isn't enough hate in the world or something?
The hill I will die on: Remove those earphones – you’re blocking out the music of humanity | Stefan Stern
Beyond the white noise lies a vibrant world of possibility, so take your headphones off and listen to your surroundings. It may even save your life, says author Stefan Stern
theguardian.com
Reminder for all watching the Labour party go "well, we have to enforce segregation of trans people, the law's the law" The UK is not the USA. Parliament is sovereign and Labour have a thumping big majority; they could, trivially, amend the equality act to end this. They are choosing not to.
This would be funny, but the fact the Trojans are dressed as Roman legionaries is terribly distracting.
Private Eye Magazine@privateeyenews.bsky.social · 4d ago‘A delivery was attempted today.’ From the new Private Eye, out now.
Life's Lottery by Kim Newman. I like Anno Dracula, but this is Newman's master work: a study of one man's life, character and potential told as a choose-your-own-adventure book. It makes clever use of the format, but is mostly interested in exploring the nature of choice and free will.
Life's Lottery
An adult role-playing novel where the reader can choose…
goodreads.com
Cowboy Angels by Paul McAuley. Another reread, but a slightly ill-advised one this time as I'd forgotten I found it quite dull the first time round. It's a many-worlds thriller, but all its alternative Americas are of 20th-century vintage so there's not as much variety as that suggests.
Cowboy Angels
America, 1984 - not our version of America, but an Amer…
goodreads.com
The Lonely Londoners by Sam Selvon. Reread of a novel I read years ago, about West Indian immigrants navigating 1950s London. There are some serious reflections, but it's mostly a comic novel in an idiosyncratic idiom, which reminds me more of Damon Runyan than anything else.
The Lonely Londoners
Alternate cover edition for ISBN 9780141188416. Newer c…
goodreads.com
Where We Stand, Where We Fall by Lizbeth Myles. Highly readable introduction to the politics of Doctor Who by one of our earliest Black Archive authors. Always interesting and perceptive, not always right in my view (which is obviously how it should be).
Where We Stand, Where We Fall
Discover and share books you love on Goodreads.
goodreads.com
Immediately recognised the Penguin Classics edition of the 1818 text of Frankenstein. That paperback postdates smartphones.
Stephanie Porras@periodeye.bsky.social · 5d agoThis is a triggering image of a museum display in the natural history museum in DC about life before smartphones. Me and a fellow 40+ person were laughing at how we are now LITERAL MUSEUM PIECES. MY teen was like did you have a clear phone? An address book? A book of maps. Yes, yes I did. 🫠🫠🫠
This trilogy is going to have as many volumes as the Hitchhiker one.
Jeff VanderMeer@jeffvandermeer.bsky.social · 4d agoPleased to finally announce... Abdication, the last Southern Reach novel! "There will come the days of the watcher, the drowned woman and the shadow of a man who keeps falling apart with each step, but first comes the moment the birds appear at night from the gaps between the stars, far from home."
Some Questions for Channel 4, about their documentary ‘The Great ADHD Myth?’ theneuroscienceofeve... Channel 4 have many questions to answer about their upcoming 'documentary'. Here are some of the most pressing (and snarky, because when dealing with brutal cynicism, why not join in?) #ADHD #C4
Disappointed this obituary fails to explain the sixth Doctor cosplay in the photo.
William Orbit, pop producer for Madonna, All Saints and more, dies aged 69
Musician’s projects included Madonna’s Ray of Light, Blur’s 13 and All Saints’ chart-topping singles Pure Shores and Black Coffee
theguardian.com
Just checked the shelves, and my copy of Dune has completely vanished.
Adrian 'buy HAIR SHIRT' Sobol@yoadrianididit.bsky.social · 4d agoEXCUSE ME?
It's odd that Lower Decks consistently managed to blend silly, funny, sweet and full-on geeky in a way that totally worked, whereas despite repeatedly trying Strange New Worlds has to my mind only ever managed that once, in the crossover episode with Lower Decks.
I always did get confused between A for Andromeda and The Andromeda Strain.
Safety fears as scientists make first viruses designed by AI
Researchers say breakthrough offers hope for new medicines but also raises urgent biosecurity questions
theguardian.com
Waris Hussein directed River Phoenix? Gosh. [Squirrels information away with other pub quiz trivia.]
‘James Dean has got nothing on that kid’: River Phoenix films – ranked!
As Stand By Me is re-released for its 40th anniversary, we look at the late actor’s most intense, enduring roles – from a goofball boffin to a narcoleptic hustler
theguardian.com
Pretty much the opposite of this actually, but I remember going to a doctor in my 20s and complaining that I felt tired all the time. He said, in effect, "Well yes, you're an adult now." I was annoyed at the time, but he was right.
Heather Hill@rollin-academic.bsky.social · 6d agoA question from Reddit that I'll answer here: "What's the most unhinged thing a doctor has said to you with a straight face?"
OK, reading this first thing in the morning without due coffee and attention I thought the teen in question was just some goth who collected skulls.
jordan@jordantyranny.bsky.social · 6d ago"For years, this 2,200-year-old nailed skull was thought to be a brutal war trophy. A recent isotope study revealed a wilder truth: it belonged to a local teenager, decapitated after death and nailed inside a home as a sacred guardian."
As long as they can convincingly play him at the age of 105, I'm not bothered.
The Independent@the-independent.com · 6d agoJames Bond producer shares update on 007 casting: ‘It’s got to be really different’
This is accepted practice. It's using it in a sentence where you should use "but" that's bollocks.
Merriam-Webster@merriam-webster.com · 6d agoJane Austen used 'however' at the beginning of a sentence, and so can you.
