Because Internet is for anyone who's ever puzzled over how to punctuate a text message …
Fun, open-minded, mind-opening
4 stars
A great, breezy read on internet language history and culture, from stopping people SHOUTING ON USENET to the lolcat bible. With an important message: Language isn't static; it's not passed down from elders to children, but grown collectively, with each generation taking it in a new direction. This is not corruption. It's evolution.
[This review originally was published on another instance and was lost during migration.]
It was too much for me to hope to grasp quantum computing from one book, and perhaps I got as much as I could have reasonably hoped for: I know what I don't know and I will recognize these terms when dropped at the quantum water cooler.
Coming from a science and computing background at university, I knew the basics of electronics and cryptography. I fear someone without this background might not make it far in this book. The quantum bits (er, qubits) I get the basics of, but several core concepts left me with 'how' and 'why' questions that were necessarily hand-waved, to use the author's term.
How does entanglement happen and how does one choose the kind of entanglement? Why is entanglement over large distance assumed axiomatically when it's a great feat to have it happen from one side of the table to the other? How do I …
It was too much for me to hope to grasp quantum computing from one book, and perhaps I got as much as I could have reasonably hoped for: I know what I don't know and I will recognize these terms when dropped at the quantum water cooler.
Coming from a science and computing background at university, I knew the basics of electronics and cryptography. I fear someone without this background might not make it far in this book. The quantum bits (er, qubits) I get the basics of, but several core concepts left me with 'how' and 'why' questions that were necessarily hand-waved, to use the author's term.
How does entanglement happen and how does one choose the kind of entanglement? Why is entanglement over large distance assumed axiomatically when it's a great feat to have it happen from one side of the table to the other? How do I get atoms in 'superposition' to give me a meaningful answer rather than a completely random number?
I come away from this book more skeptical than before about quantum computing, which surely isn't the author's desire, but it does lay the groundwork for me eventually understanding something.
[This review was originally published on another instance and was lost during migration.]
The word "bitch" conjures many images for many people but is most often meant to …
Ace slut-shaming shaming
5 stars
Read this for a history of The Man holding women down with a dictionary; an explanation of vocal fry and upspeak, the roles they fill in female communication, and how vilifying them is part of a hate as old as time; the many grammatical roles that an f-bomb can play; why gay guys often sound gay but lesbians don't sound 'lesbian'; and the word 'slut'. A lot. Just read it.
Edit: I originally rated Wordslut at four stars, but on reflection, its combination of outrage and history, delivered with disarming humor, sets a bar that should be considered the gold standard, not the silver standard.
EditEdit: I wrote this review soon after the book was released in paperback, but my review was lost in an instance change. :( It's not really new.
"Anti-binary" is the best way I can explain the author's thesis: You've been taught that you must live within these behavioral guardrails, you must endure back-breaking work, and then you either Win or you Lose. And you've been taught wrong.
The cover and the title may prime you for a lot of card- and chart-reading, and while there are chapters on that, the "magic" is spread lightly throughout. Magic is one of the things that The Man says has no value or dismisses as fakery or superstition—but far from being worthless, these may be the way you find meaning.
Unlike the author, I do not identify as a witch, or queer, or even particularly anti-capitalist. But I am sold on her use of these themes to orient us toward our own truths and away from The System. There's plenty to learn for all of us who'd be leading fulfilling lives …
"Anti-binary" is the best way I can explain the author's thesis: You've been taught that you must live within these behavioral guardrails, you must endure back-breaking work, and then you either Win or you Lose. And you've been taught wrong.
The cover and the title may prime you for a lot of card- and chart-reading, and while there are chapters on that, the "magic" is spread lightly throughout. Magic is one of the things that The Man says has no value or dismisses as fakery or superstition—but far from being worthless, these may be the way you find meaning.
Unlike the author, I do not identify as a witch, or queer, or even particularly anti-capitalist. But I am sold on her use of these themes to orient us toward our own truths and away from The System. There's plenty to learn for all of us who'd be leading fulfilling lives if we weren't listening so much to our detractors. Who, by the way, hold 99% of the wealth and power in our all-men-created-equal liberal democracies. Nobody said it was going to be easy. But one lovely day, we'll see our collective power and feed the grasshoppers to the bird. Tweet tweet.
@Tellington@millefeuilles.cloud did i read that she had no children when she wrote this? i swore i had seen some interview where she said her thinking changed after kids
(a question not a value judgment; i haven't any either)
