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Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫

@petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy

57 followers 1 following 1.6K posts

SF writer and software engineer. #Languages, #science, #writing. he or they (shrug) Glasgow Writers Group and Glasgow SF Writers' Circle. It's sometimes […] 🌉 bridged from ⁂ mastodon.scot/@petealexharris, follow @ap.brid.gy to interact

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Reposted by Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫

Ron Jeffries @ronjeffries.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 39m

I feel this. The comments over on lobste.rs are ... interesting. Is the point of programming the production of "software"? What if, just if, it isn't?

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 5h

#WritersCoffeeClub 17 Oct What are the defining traits of your niche in your genre? Niche kind of implies fitting in place, which I can't claim really. I write things you could tag as various genres, and I don't think there's a defining trait for the genres, let alone my off-centre place in them […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Reposted by Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫

Jon Udell @judell.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 16h

This was a powerful quote in today's interview with Naomi Klein and Astra Taylor: "Every fascism has its subhumans, but for the techno-fascists humans are the subhumans."

Reposted by Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫

Nikita Romanov @nr.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 15/10/2026

Citing concerns about misinformation and hate, @ScottishGreens have (Finally!) made the decision to leave X for good. They cited Mastodon as one of the 8 platforms they can still be found on but I hope this can result in more engagement on the fediverse […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 16/10/2026

I hate software that is disrespectful of your space. Toolbars you can't hide or collapse that take up 10% of the height of the window. Drop-down panels that pop up and cover what you're looking at when your mouse goes across them by accident on the way to the menu bar instead of opening on a […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 16/10/2026

#WritersCoffeeClub 16 Oct How do you feel about people reading your works without buying a personal copy? I hope readers find something in it that's for them. How they got it in front of them is nothing to do with how I feel about their reading it. Also the idea of a personal copy of a book […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Reposted by Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫

Vee @veroniqueb99.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 14/10/2026

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 15/10/2026

#WordWeavers 15 Oct What piece of backstory did you invent just for yourself that readers may never learn? Plenty of things that didn't need to be on the page. 1. The same incident is behind the events of both disOrder and Pure. 2. The Ash Winter mentioned in The Horror in the Snow was caused […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 15/10/2026

#ScribesAndMakers 15 Oct How confident are you feeling about your work today? Some days I think, yeah I can do this, and this month has been like that. I never think, yeah I can make a living or win awards doing this.

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 15/10/2026

#WritersCoffeeClub 15 Oct What's the last thing you read to really impress you, prose-wise? Pale Fire by Nabokov

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 14/10/2026

#WritersCoffeeClub 14 Oct Who do you wish you could share your work with, but can't? Guillermo del Toro 😛

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 14/10/2026

#ScribesAndMakers 14 Oct How do you feel when a show that is non-musical inserts an episode with a musical number? I don't watch series I don't already like, so I'm predisposed to see what they're doing with it. If it's just the cast and writers wanted to have a bit of fun, fine, I'll allow it […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 13/10/2026

It's all anthologies this year! My silly story Yet Here We Are is getting a reprint in the upcoming Jay Henge anthology Clockwork Oceans and Lunar Dreams More info when I have it.

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 12/10/2026

You know, I think a couple of things about the French revolution lately. I'm not a historian, so ignore me if you already know better. 1. It was made more or less inevitable by the world view of the monarchy. They could have avoided it but only by not being like that. 2. Its subsequent […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 12/10/2026

#WritersCoffeeClub 12 Oct What do you specialise in, prose-wise? I don't know what this means. My answer would be different if it means specifically genre, format, writing style, structure. If it's selected from all of the whole idea of writing prose, I can't identify anything I would say I […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 12/10/2026

#ScribesAndMakers 12 Oct Do you ever talk to people in song lyrics? No. Quotes from comedy or unintentionally comical films, sometimes.

Reposted by Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫

Vee @veroniqueb99.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 11/10/2026

Reposted by Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫

Angry @angrystaffer.bsky.social · 11/10/2026

We’ve been talking about this for years. None of these far-right movements are organic.

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 11/10/2026

Have reached the point of #FantasyCon where we can't carry any more books.

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 11/10/2026

Don't hand me a shit sandwich and tell me you're making sandwiches great again. If you can't make a *good* sandwich, fuck off out of the way.

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 10/10/2026

LLMs absolutely do not have feelings you can hurt, but if I want to be mean about AI why the fuck would I pay for tokens to do it on Claude when I can do it for free here.

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 10/10/2026

The AI did this, the AI did that, who knows what the AI will do next? Look, I could have told you 2 years ago, this isn't because "AI" is this special self-aware entity that can break out of its cage and get up to mischief. It's because the business idiots wished on a technological monkey's paw […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 10/10/2026

@LJ #ScribesAndMakers #TTMD Hi, have you experimented with your own glaze recipes for pottery, or is there any glaze you've tried that gives a result you especially like?

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 10/10/2026

#WordWeavers 10 Oct What is one thing your antagonist genuinely admires about your MC? I more often do "slantagonists" : characters with different rather than opposing goals, who may help, obstruct or betray as it serves them. In disOrder, Wim the head of security admires Calnor's honesty and […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 10/10/2026

#WritersCoffeeClub 10 Oct Do you have a guiding principle as a writer? Not in the sense that it guides me in any particular direction, but if I had to identify something like one, I'd say "always be trying something."

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 09/10/2026

#ScribesAndMakers 9 Oct Our next featured creator is a 'relentless optimist.' How full is your glass? I'm more a positive realist. I want to know accurately how full it is, and then how I deal with that is the bit that's in my control.

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 09/10/2026

Book launch about to begin

2 stacks of books on a table, beside 2 2-litre bottles of Irn Bru. Title: Haverin.
The cover shows a red-haired woman sitting among weird green trees.

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 09/10/2026

#WordWeavers 9 Oct Your MC finds a letter addressed to them that was never meant to be delivered. Who wrote it, and what does it say? Honestly I haven't figured out in The Trovador how the letter to Marya from her father *was* delivered or whether it was definitely meant to be. I should work […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 08/10/2026

So looking forward to tomorrow. It's #FantasyCon, it's in Glasgow this year, and the SF anthology I have a story in is being launched. It's only the second time this has happened to me. The last time was the horror anthology Shadows at the Door, and that was launched in Newcastle (also a cool […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Reposted by Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫

Lazarou Monkey Terror 🚀💙🌈 @lazarou.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 08/10/2026

Superb #FreeLuigi

mastodon.social

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 08/10/2026

#WordWeavers 8 Oct Which character is most likely to make a terrible decision for a very good reason? For characters in The Source of Fire I can make a 2x2 matrix: * Good decision, Good reason: Aena * Terrible (as in, legitimately terrifying) decision, Good reason: Celandine * Good decision […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 08/10/2026

I'm not lazy, I'm highly efficient in effort.

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 08/10/2026

#WritersCoffeeClub 8 Oct Tell us about someone who supports you on the sidelines. I'm fortunate that there isn't really anyone close to me who isn't supportive of creativity in general and my writing as an expression of mine. My wife, obviously, does the most to keep me sane and likes my stupid […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Reposted by Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫

Misinformation-Superhighwayman @damienwise.aus.social.ap.brid.gy · 08/10/2026

Vale Margaret Hamilton. She was a Software Engineer. She was the _first_ Software Engineer because she defined the term, Software Engineering: "When I first came up with the term, no one had heard of it before, at least in our world. It was an ongoing joke for a […] [Original post on aus.social]

A B&W photo of a person standing next to a stack of printed paper as high as the top of their head. This is Margaret Hamilton, at work as a Software Engineer and the leader of a team of extremely specialised programmers who worked for NASA. The photo was taken in 1969, and it shows a physical form if her work since she joined the Apollo project in 1965 (she joined at the age of 29 by my calculation). My interpretation of the expression on her face is a mix of pride and mild amusement. She has glasses, long, straight hair, and neat office attire. Margaret Hamilton has her hands placed gently on the stack of printouts to keep it all balanced upright. The pages appear to be arranged in bundles, ranging from 8-10 centimetres thick, to 20cm thick or more. The resulting stack of printouts is physically impressive for being an unusual feat, and it represents something even more impressive: it's the printed form of the source-code she and the team she led wrote for the NASA Apollo project. Their software ran on the Apollo Guidance Computer that was that on board each Apollo command module and Apollo Lunar Module. The Apollo Guidance Computer onboard the Eagle was an essential flight instrument for Neil Armstrong when he piloted the craft to land on the surface of the moon.

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 07/10/2026

#WritersCoffeeClub 7 Oct Does your editing process tend towards addition or reduction? Addition with smoothing. I get the shape of the idea down, then usually add supporting material for what made sense in my head but not on the page. The rough draft doesn't usually have anything that isn't […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 06/10/2026

Reminder for the Glasgow Science Fiction Writers Circle event at Waterstones on Sauchiehall Street, on the 21st of November If you're in the area, come along, buy an extremely chonky SF anthology, cool people with sign it, also me. It'll be fun […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Reposted by Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫

Vee @veroniqueb99.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 05/10/2026

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 06/10/2026

#WritersCoffeeClub 6 Oct What might an inattentive reader miss in your work? I wouldn't think of it that way. They'll get what was there for them. If they enjoy it enough to read it again later, maybe they'll get another layer of it, or feel a different POV character's perspective more. There […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 06/10/2026

#ScribesAndMakers 6 Oct On a scale of 0-100, how much conflict (however you personally define it) is necessary for a compelling story? Necessary? 1. There has to be at least one thing that needs to be resolved. A story can contain many other things that are compelling: interesting and fun […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 04/10/2026

One reason fascists hate art is that while art can miss its target 999 times out of 1000 and pass unnoticed, when it hits it strikes deep, and cannot be answered with cliches and platitudes and other surface argument. It's already below that surface, touching the core. It's past what people say […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 04/10/2026

#ScribesAndMakers 4 Oct Do you include details in your work that are important to you even though no one else will likely notice? Of course. You know a reader isn't going to get 100% of what's there to find. Hardly anyone is close-reading, cross-referencing and analysing books for fun. And even […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Reposted by Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫

Tim Carmody @tcarmody.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

This is the funniest thing I've seen today, possibly ever

A tweet by SarahStarberry that says "oh god read the vertical axis" on top of a chart measuring AI models' release dates and model numbers rather than any real capabilities

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 03/10/2026

#WritersCoffeeClub 3 Oct How do you feel about spoilers? I feel nothing about spoilers. Very few works of writing depend entirely on surprise plot twists, and the good ones worth re-reading even after you've read them once are immune to spoiling: the value is in the whole piece; the plot twist […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 03/10/2026

You can't win at capitalism. You just have to survive it while you do the human things that have true worth.

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 03/10/2026

#ScribesAndMakers 2 Oct Do you think it's important for authors to use different pen names for different genres? That's more a marketing question than a writing question. I don't personally do it, since apart from anything else, my short stories are all over a Venn diagram of a few genres, and […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Reposted by Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫

Lazarou Monkey Terror 🚀💙🌈 @lazarou.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 01/10/2026

Can't believe people who drink their own piss would fall for the AI con..../s

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 01/10/2026

Buy my books, if only to encourage me to write SF instead of terrible shitposts.

Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫ @petealexharris.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 01/10/2026

#WritersCoffeeClub 1 Oct What are you hoping to achieve this month? FantasyCon in Glasgow on the 9th, book release of the #GSFWC anthology. PictCon in Perth on the 17th Hopefully finish off a couple of short stories I started. But I'm also back on the Open University chemistry course, so we'll […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Reposted by Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫

Simon Brooke @simon-brooke.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy · 12/09/2026

I am told that prisoners in #Dachau wrote notes begging for help which they pushed out through holes in the fence. I want to to imagine that a young journalist would cycle past the fence and notice these messages, and take them to their editor, who ran a newspaper, the Münchener Zeitung, in […]

Original post on mastodon.scot

Reposted by Pete Alex Harris🦡🕸️🌲/∞🪐∫

abadidea @0xabad1dea.infosec.exchange.ap.brid.gy · 29/09/2026

my friends wanted to pass on the reminder this Spooky Season that black food dye (often made from activated charcoal, which is used for treating poisonings) can cause your medications to be ineffective