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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: July 2nd, 2023

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  • It’s not simply a reading comprehension thing with bullet points. If your questions require research on my end having them already structured in bullets does a few things to help with that process.

    The asker’s bullet structure gives something to mimic. You can even put your answers directly below the question, so the asker can be reminded of their own questions.

    The bullets also help skimming, if I need to see which item id is needed next it’s easier to do so without losing my place.

    Bullet grammar structure also allows for much terser sentences. If I need to reread your question it’s easier if I don’t have to ignore a bunch of words that don’t substantively alter the meaning.

    Do I need any of these? No. Could I put the questions into bullets myself for the reply? Sure. But it’s easier to spend more time and effort on answering your questions if you save me a few steps.







  • Of what others have suggested and that I’ve read: the ones most similar to what you’ve finished are:

    • The First Law series by Joe Abercrombie
    • The Expanse series by James SA Corey
    • Hyperion (at least the first two books, w/ optional two more) by Dan Simmons

    New recommendations:

    • Dhalgren by Samuel R Delany (content warning)
    • The Baroque Cycle series by Neal Stephenson (Snow Crash and the Diamond Age may both be better starting points for the author, but may fit your other criteria less)
    • The Book of the New Sun series by Gene Wolfe

    Other works that stretch your genre boundary but may evoke the right emotion:

    • Collected Fictions by Jorge Luis Borges
    • If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino
    • The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco
    • Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
    • The Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie
    • Lovecraft Country by Matt Ruff
    • Plain Bad Heroines by Emily M Danforth
    • John Dies at the End by David Wong




  • At the same time it’s the map’s job to describe the world. Even for something like nation states where there’s an official name, the map uses the common name. Our maps say France, not French Republic.

    Changing the displayed name for a body of water shared by several nations doesn’t make much sense, especially when the common name has yet to follow.

    At least that’s from the perspective of one of the goals the map ostensibly wants to serve.