I like playing a Ravi Shankar playlist on a Monday. His joie de vivre and invention charge things up.

Mission of the Lunar Sparrow is an audio drama about a mission to the moon. I produced it a few years ago and it keeps getting discovered. Have a listen at this link. Each episode is about nine minutes.

Welcome to 500 Words. This week, the newsletter is late because I’ve been revising my second novel. I just sent off the book yesterday to my editor for a last look before proofreading starts. So let’s get right to this. TOP OF MIND Kate Middleton is an amateur, by her own admission, when it comes to … read more

What if we simply stopped trying to predict the future, based on various passive indicators, and simply seized the future as ours, and shaped it into what we need it to be?

“Well, we all broke the world together,” Kat said with a sigh.

–dialogue

Testing microposting out of Obsidian, and also taking a moment to note that I’m trying to drink ~60 oz of water a day, and it’s a lot harder than drinking a glass of wine at dinner.

From Mastodon:

If you have to do a Google search, use “before:2023" at the beginning of your search string. You get a completely different (and IMO much more usable) set of results.

The web has died.

[From Diane Patterson] (https://wandering.shop/@Dianepatterson/112039030285970934)

This is why I’m using kagi for search now.

I’m writing the Glossary of Terms that goes at the back of the novel. Slaze Slang for the field of confusion created by cloakcraft (See Cloakcraft). Slaze is most often generated by technical means, such as a Blanky, (See Blanky) used to erase the recordings of public cameras, the use of a … read more

Hello all, Welcome to 500 Words. TOP OF MIND I was invited to publish articles on Medium.com when it started in 2012. I sent them articles on a regular basis — until last week. I had a “wait, wut” moment. Was Medium allowing chatbots like ChatGBT to ingest my work? Was my writing being used for … read more

I’m glad I don’t write about politics in California for this blog, because everything is upside down here as usual, with a Democratic senatorial candidate helping to fund a Republican candidate’s campaign. As I understand it, the Democrat did this to help the Republican in the primary, because, … read more

The 500 Words newsletter this week will cover how Medium.com’s management is saying no to AI crawlers on the site. Also why KISS will never stop touring for all eternity. Subscribe: https://opennotes.blog/subscribe

Writing today with a Musgrave Pencil Co. NEWS 600, made in Tennessee. #pencils

There are a lot of fun community plugins to play around with in Obisdian. (bad)

There are a lot of fun community plugins to play around with in Obisdian. (good)

Putin still seems to command support among the millions of rural, less-educated Russians who believe in his propaganda about a hostile world out there that only he can hold at bay. But the mile-long line of people, [at Nalvany’s funeral] most of them young and many with a clutch of roses, inching across the colorless, slush-covered streets of the southeastern Maryino district, were the people Putin continues to fear.

• Serge Schmemann

Writing my next book backwards, starting from the end. 📚

Finished reading: Surrender by Lee Schneider 📚A good read. Have read it before and couple of times. Ends big with a lot of drama. #books #bookstadon

I sent out a newsletter this morning. (If you haven’t yet, subscribe to it.) The provider, Buttondown, is great, with personal service and a sense of real caring about us, the customers. I wrote to ask them if they were thinking about doing anything about OpenAI from crawling our newsletter … read more

Hello all, A newsletter post today! Kind of. I’ll offer a few quick ideas, because today these thoughts are pecking at me like woodpeckers working on a big tree. Subscribe now TOP OF MIND I’m closing in on the final draft of my second novel, the sequel to Surrender. It’s called … read more

Station identification! I’m Lee Schneider, a writer-producer. I am finishing my second novel, which will be published this year. I produce podcasts and coach podcast hosts. I teach a course in media in the School of Architecture at USC. Married to a goddess. Co-founder of three children. My goals this week include reading more books and drinking more water. My youngest son has track and field tryouts today. Wish him luck and speed.

At last, I feel seen by LinkedIn. They have selected me to contribute to one of their AI-generated articles. They want me to weigh in on what it’s like to be a rowing instructor! Well, here goes: Being a rowing instructor is like when you sit in the back of the boat with one of those megaphone thingies, right? And you go, like, “row, row, row!” Or do you go, like, “paddle”–? Something like that. [Narrator’s voice:] He isn’t a rowing instructor. LinkedIn must be desperate to populate their AI-driven articles with human content if they’re asking anyone with the word “instructor” in their profile.