Charlie StrossScottish resident SF/F author (he/him/they/them). Three times Hugo Award winner, 30+ novels in print. Does not play well with Nazis. Abolish the monarchy!
Born in a world with 320ppm atmospheric CO2, 3.3 billion people.
@cstross.bsky.social on Bluesky
blog at: https://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/
FOLLOW REQUESTS: don't expect a reciprocal follow. And I will reject requests from folks with no profile and/or no tooting history.
Charlie StrossOUCH! "It’s one of those rare, unicorn films that doesn’t have a single redeeming quality. I’m not even sure it qualifies as a documentary, exactly, so much as an elaborate piece of designer taxidermy, horribly overpriced and ice-cold to the touch"
https://www.theguardian.com/film/2026/jan/30/melania-review-trump-film-is-a-gilded-trash-remake-of-the-zone-of-interest
Charlie StrossFound elsenet: seems reasonable to me.
Charlie StrossThis is racism. (And also, the World Cross-Country Championships this year are clearly being rigged.)
"According to a report from LetsRun.com, only four of the 18 Ethiopian U20 athletes had their U.S. visa applications accepted"
(That's the national team with the 44-year winning streak. Other countries, including Eritrea, are also excluded due to Trump's racist travel bans.)
https://runningmagazine.ca/the-scene/u-s-denies-entry-to-14-ethiopian-athletes-ahead-of-world-xc-championships/
Charlie Stross@pluralistic@mamot.fr
Microsoft's CEO doesn't want us to talk about AI slop any more, does he?
He's quite right: we need to start calling unwanted LLM-generated garbage "Nadella", in honour of Microsoft renaming "Office" to "CoPilot".
Or I guess we could call it Nadella Bukkake.
What do you think?
Charlie StrossChina to hike tax on condoms in attempt to boost falling birth rate
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/dec/18/china-to-raise-tax-condoms-boost-birth-rate
That's not going to work. Instead, it'll boost the abortion rate and cause a spike in the prevalence of sexually transmitted diseases.
(Attempts to force women into pregnancy by withholding contraception tend to fail horrifically—see also Romania in the 1970s and 1980s following Decree 770.)
Charlie StrossCurrent listening: "I Love the Eighties" by Men Without Hats—undiluted nostalgia for my late teens/early 20s, inject straight into the vein
Charlie StrossHAHAHAHA—
‘Reverse Midas touch’: Starmer plan prompts collapse in support for digital IDs
Net public backing for scheme has fallen to -14% after prime minister’s announcement, according to polling
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/oct/01/keir-starmer-labour-collapse-public-support-digital-id-cards
Charlie StrossWHAT THE WHATTING FUCK—
(See text in alt.)
The chef's kiss moment is the "... and a baby alligator."
Charlie Stross#WritersCoffeeClub 13Aug—What regrets do you have regarding your work?
I regret making "Iron Sunrise" a direct sequel to "Singularity Sky"—the worldbuilding in SS was subtly broken and although IS was a fundamentally better novel I couldn't continue working in that universe thereafter.
I regret being unable to write the novel-length expansion of "Palimpsest" or the third Scottish near-future novel on schedule in 2010, but these are minor.
But regrets are pointless as long as you're breathing.
Charlie StrossOTHER THINGS YOU CAN DO TO SAVE WATER AT HOME
- Save your piss in empty soft drinks bottles. No, really: piss is water, not radioactive waste, honest
- Wrap yourself in cling-film at night so you sweat less
- Kidnap passing school children, slice them finely, and dry them in a food dessicator
- Eat the rich (raw), that way you're not wasting valuable water on crop irrigation: suggestion, start with water company PR firm executives
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/national-drought-group-meets-to-address-nationally-significant-water-shortfall