Tim Rayborn

@timrayborn.bsky.social

Writer of books (history, arts, trivia, the unexplained, fantasy and sci-fi), ghost writer, PhD historian (medieval and more), musician (early music and more), aesthete, and sometime-curmudgeon. Literary Rep: Maryann Karinch, Rudy Agency www.timrayborn.com

If NFL owners want to censor who performs in stadiums, they shouldn't ask taxpayers to help build them. You can't take public subsidies for stadiums then use them as your personal editorial board. Pay for it all out of your own pocket and hold as many Kid Rock concerts as you want to.

Today's reminder that the current genAI boom is powered by GPUs manufactured with a mineral called coltan (and other rare earths, and cobalt) mined through the labor of enslaved children in Congo, and the US and UAE fund the paramilitaries which protect those mines and keep those children enslaved.

My biggest frustration with writing is that quite often, the SWOOP that takes a book from midlist to BIG DEAL is pure luck, and I personally can't do anything to make it happen. Publishing is not a meritocracy. It's skill + time + luck, and all you can do is be in position for possible liftoff.

RELEASE THE EPSTEIN FILES! “My private island is simply an exclusive, quiet sanctuary.” ~Epstein “It wasn’t a sanctuary. It was a heavily guarded, highly funded slaughterhouse for children. You bought the absolute silence of presidents & princes while you traded our bleeding bodies.” ~Guiffre 💔😡🎅🏻

Color close-up photos of Jeffrey Epstein and Virginia Giuffre.
Epstein:
"I merely cultivate relationships with the world’s most briliant, powerful minds. My private island is simply an exclusive, quiet sanctuary for elite philanthropy and high-level intellectual discourse.”
Giuffre:
“It wasn’t a sanctuary. It was a heavily guarded, highly funded slaughterhouse for children. You bought the absolute silence of presidents and princes while you traded our bleeding bodies.”
@think_and-extst

Looking for fun weekend plans? Craft a cloak of moss gathered from the tombs of forgotten forest gods. Wear a crown of goblin bones to discourage faerie mischief. Travel on twisting paths, disappear into the green, and become part of the great unknown.

I’ve been standing stock still in this wood for about 10 minutes while I mess about with a photo on my phone. I look up, notice the shape, and slowly crouch down to film This has made me so happy I feel I could cry. It’s as close to magic as I hope to get.

just heard a foundation declare its mission as reducing "polarization" as though there's some sweet spot halfway between white supremacy/radical inequality/climate denial and the opposite we should all aim for. There isn't. Been railing against it forever.

Stop glorifying ‘centrism’. It is an insidious bias favoring an unjust status quo | Rebecca Solnit

The notion of a neutral and moderate middle is a prejudice of people for whom the system is working, against those for whom it’s not

theguardian.com

Really crazy to learn that JK Rowling once worked at Amnesty International as a bilingual researcher but she was fired because she was too busy writing books during work hours instead of documenting war crimes in French speaking Africa.

A screenshot of an article snippet featuring a photograph of J.K. Rowling credited to Twocoms / Shutterstock.com. Below the photo, a heading reads "J.K. Rowling" followed by "Net worth: $1 billion." Two paragraphs of text follow: "Before she was a best-selling author, 'Harry Potter' creator J.K. Rowling lost her job as a secretary for the London office of Amnesty International because she was caught writing creative stories on her computer while on the clock. She used her severance to begin Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. Today, Rowling is a billionaire, thanks to the book series that has sold over 500 million copies and a blockbuster film franchise."