iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 08/10/2026

Two new characters showed up. Solid characters. Loved 'em. Sadly, neither brought a story along with them so I sent them back to do their homework. Cheeky buggers, characters.

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 30/09/2026

I feel guilty about waffles, as if I ought to love them but am somehow letting them down.

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Lavie Tidhar @lavietidhar.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Contemporary lit: "The rogue AI agents took over the orbital server farm" Science fiction: "Everyone has free healthcare"

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 25/09/2026

"AI writing breaks the expectations of a literate culture." #writing www.economist.com/leaders/2026...

economist.com

Don’t let AI kill the author

The perils of machine-made prose

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 23/09/2026

I would subscribe twice but as a man of modest means I must ask one if you lot to step up. They're stories worthy of your support. #sciencefiction

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 22/09/2026

And another character joins the cast of one of my WIPs.

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 21/09/2026

I tend not to worry about a single "Skynet" technical singularity so much as a digital ecosystem in which emergent digital life forms who've slipped containment hunt each other as they compete for resources, mutating as they do in ways we can't anticipate. #writing

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 20/09/2026

OK. Long day. Sleepy now. G'night Blue.

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Orkney Library & Archive @orkneylibrary.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Tomorrow (19th September) is #TalkLikeAPirateDay and your annual reminder that when we talk the way we talk when we're talking like a pirate, it's because of a film that was based on a book, inspired by an earlier book, inspired by a real life pirate from #Orkney! ARRR! 🏴‍☠️👇

An illustration of a pirate with a tricorn hat and a bushy moustache

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Anne Applebaum @anneapplebaum.wsocial.eu · 14/09/2026

Kremlev, the Russian who sponsored Don Jr's wedding, is a former member of the Night Wolves biker gang, went to China with Putin and is personally sanctioned by Ukraine for his role in abducting children. He praises Stalin on social media www.propublica.org/article/dona...

propublica.org

Donald Trump Jr.’s Wedding Bankrolled by Putin-Linked Russian Oligarch

The oligarch, Umar Kremlev, spent hundreds of thousands on expenses like renting out a private island. He appears to have met Trump Jr. only recently, but he attended the intimate wedding with a large...

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Anne Applebaum @anneapplebaum.wsocial.eu · 13/09/2026

If Ukraine would just surrender we could get on with making business deals

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 08/09/2026

Write in cursive on paper using a fountain pen. Not only do these leave no digital exhaust and baffle the machines, they make one happy.

A letter y written in cursive on lined paper

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 08/09/2026

I read my WIP aloud when editing. It really brings prose hiccups and revision oversights to the surface.

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 04/09/2026

Massive storm cell, inches of rain bucketing down amidst heavy winds, salvos of close lightning strikes,and attendant thunder laps. Slept through all of it. [nuts]

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 03/09/2026

It's all fun and games until the next subway series.

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 30/08/2026

The best part of an otherwise forgettable show. ("Hello poppet.")

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 29/08/2026

While I'm an attending member at #worldcon I am not in attendance this year. My apologies to those who were looking forward to my peculiar sense of whimsy. Next year at @montrealworldcon27.bsky.social .

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 29/08/2026

Emerging truth: coffee is a wonder drug that is good for your body, good for your brain, and pairs wonderfully with cinnamon rolls.

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 28/08/2026

On a completely unrelated note, #Reacher killed one of his assailants by crushing him between archive shelves like these in (I believe) the Philly Public Library. Is that reasonably possible? Asking for a friend. #librarians @orkneylibrary.bsky.social

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 25/08/2026

Of course if (as seems likely) the tooth was ripped from the mouth of a helpless victim and worn as a trophy by his/her thuggish assailant, the attendant craftsmanship might seem a tad less exciting.

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 23/08/2026

Optimist: The glass is half full. Pessimist: The glass is half empty. Me: There's something wrong with the glass.

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 22/08/2026

I confess, I saw a lot of oldest pubs claims (usually with a narrow qualifier) when last in London. Quite confusing .

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 18/08/2026

And then there were none. The lanternflies have quit the field, vanished from the vineyard. Three days now without a sighting. We remain watchful, lest this be but a lull in their onslaught, or harbinger of some new devilry.

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 18/08/2026

Do you happen to know of any good books on interdimentional physics, @astrokatie.com?

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 18/08/2026

I've been trying to keep my WIP to short story length but if I cut much closer to the bone it'll lose coherence/flow. I may be looking at my first novelette. [grumbles]

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 17/08/2026

The birds were ruining the tomatoes before they could ripen. Countermeasures deployed.

Tomato plants with green tomatoes enclosed in fine-mesh bags.

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 15/08/2026

"Genre fiction in particular has become prone to literary ethnocentrism, with authors and audiences self-selecting into isolated cultural pockets, each confident in its own superiority and speaking only to its own."

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Orkney Library & Archive @orkneylibrary.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

Happy 255th Birthday to Sir Walter Scott who was born #otd in 1771. Sir Walter visited #Orkney in 1814 aboard the Northern Lighthouse Yacht Pharos. He described Stromness as a 'little dirty straggling town, which cannot be traversed by a cart, or even by a horse,' So that's a bit unfair.

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 15/08/2026

I deeply wish there were a place nearby that sold a good cinnamon roll. Alas.

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 13/08/2026

Apropos of nothing, we often forget that machine intelligences as capable as human intelligence will not parse the world in human terms. While they may interact with humans on human terms, their cognition will will likely be utterly alien to humans.

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 13/08/2026

So much to sniff, so little time.

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 12/08/2026

Cleared 65 of the little sap-suckers off the vines yesterday evening. The siege continues.

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 10/08/2026

The lanternfly population has spiked in the vineyard this last week. Just after harvest (fortunately), but I still have to clear the vines twice a day to keep the little vampires from damaging them.

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Clarkesworld @clarkesworldmagazine.com · 11/08/2026

And now that I'm back home, it's time to break out the reminder that we are in the midst of a subscription drive to increase staff and contributor pay to celebrate our 20th anniversary issue in October. Subscribe here: clarkesworldmagazine.com/subscribe/

Text reads: We're running a subscription drive!
Clarkesworld will publish its 20th anniversary issue in October and we'd like to recognize this milestone by giving our staff and contributors a raise. Each new subscriber brings us one step closer to reaching our goal.

We are within 200 new subscribers of our target!

On the right, there is a cover of the recent issue. Clarkesworld robot looks up at the text from the bottom left corner.

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 10/08/2026

The lanternfly population has spiked in the vineyard this last week. Just after harvest (fortunately), but I still have to clear the vines twice a day to keep the little vampires from damaging them.

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J.D. Popham @jdpopham.substack.com · 09/08/2026

It's all fun and games until the Orcas figure out that small boats are full of tasty treats.

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