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vgr's profile
Venkatesh Rao
Venkatesh Rao
Venkatesh Rao
@vgr

Tweets

Venkatesh Rao

@vgr

Conversational account. For work follow @ribbonfarm, @breaking_smart, @artofgig. Tweets are 90% vacuous views, apathetically held. Mediocritopian. IKEA builder.

Los Angeles, CA
venkateshrao.com
Joined August 2007

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    1. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr 17 Dec 2020
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      Finished Iain M. Banks’ Matter last night. Probably my favorite display of writing virtuosity so far. The sheer amount of world-building crammed into a single story... and literally into a single world. Wow. The shellworld idea is a sci-fi narrative engineering masterpiece.

      14 replies 10 retweets 262 likes
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    2. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr 17 Dec 2020
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      So that’s 4/9 Culture novels finished ✅ Use of Weapons ✅ Hydrogen Sonata ✅ Look to Windward ✅ Matter Next up: Player of Games which I started but abandoned previously. Probably the most inventive and richly imagined (in a baroque way) SF world-building I’ve read ever.

      14 replies 0 retweets 63 likes
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    3. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr 17 Dec 2020
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      Vernon Vinge (Deepness in the Sky) is the only thing I’ve read that seems to be imagined on a similarly lavish scale, and evoke operatic space of similar narrative proportions. Both are galaxy-sized stories for galaxy-sized canvasses. They don’t feel like stretched planet-scale.

      4 replies 1 retweet 44 likes
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    4. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr 17 Dec 2020
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      By contrast, Asimov’s foundation, despite being otherwise pioneering in the genre, feels like planet-scale narrative stretched to fit galaxy-scale canvas, and the pixelation shows. It is self-admittedly just the decline-and-fall-of-Roman-empire transposed to a space-operatic key.

      2 replies 1 retweet 51 likes
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    5. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr 17 Dec 2020
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      Hyperion (I only read one volume) had the potential despite starting with Canterbury tales sub-planet scale inspiration, but I felt lost its way. Didn’t feel inspired to finish.

      10 replies 0 retweets 17 likes
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    6. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr 22 Dec 2020
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      Venkatesh Rao Retweeted Venkatesh Rao

      https://twitter.com/vgr/status/1341285050537504771 …

      Venkatesh Rao added,

      Venkatesh Rao @vgr
      Finished Player of Games. That was surprisingly short. I enjoyed it, but definitely not my favorite Culture novel. Good and clever but not great. Interesting to contrast with other game-themed books like Glass-Bead Game and Ender’s Game.
      1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes
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    7. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr 22 Dec 2020
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      Now on to Consider Phlebas. Nice to be reading it at #6. It will feel like a prequel and I’m a big fan of prequel narratives.

      6 replies 0 retweets 8 likes
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    8. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr 31 Dec 2020
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      Finished Consider Phlebas last night. Easily the worst so far, but still worth it for getting the backstory of the world. It is both technically weaker than later novels and less inventive. Has a color-by-numbers feel. Player of Games too. The rest feel organic by contrast.

      6 replies 0 retweets 8 likes
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      Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr 31 Dec 2020
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      Status: ✅ Use of Weapons: A- ✅ Hydrogen Sonata: A ✅ Look to Windward: A ✅ Matter: A+ ✅ Player of Games: B ✅ Consider Phlebas: B- To go: State of the Art Excession Inversions Surface Detail

      8:34 AM - 31 Dec 2020
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      • micah.fyi Lorah Ddy. Gabriel Michael Buckley sam atman 🌓 controlled by the beloved spider James Giammona Andrew M. Webb (((. . . n)))
      10 replies 1 retweet 29 likes
        1. New conversation
        1. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Jan 7
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          Next up: Surface Detail

          7 replies 0 retweets 11 likes
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        2. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Jan 11
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          LOU/eccentric Me, I’m Counting is one one of my favorite ship names. Nice godly name.

          2 replies 0 retweets 7 likes
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        3. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Jan 16
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          Venkatesh Rao Retweeted Venkatesh Rao

          Surface Detail has the most direct philosophical exposition and plot-extraneous world building among the books I’ve read so far. Mildly tedious. Also not particularly enjoying the detailed description of hells. Reminds me of Dante’s Inferno (which I also found tedious).https://twitter.com/vgr/status/1350335875373154305 …

          Venkatesh Rao added,

          Venkatesh Rao @vgr
          “[Simulationism creates] a kind of lassitude through acceptance that could be exploited. There were few better ways of knocking the fight out of people than by convincing them that life was a joke” —Iain M. Banks in Surface Detail
          1 reply 0 retweets 8 likes
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        4. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Jan 16
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          Kinda fun to learn about non-SC divisions of Contact. Quietitude is a nice concept for an afterlife intelligence agency.

          1 reply 0 retweets 7 likes
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        5. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Jan 20
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          Ok SC still steals the show in the end. Surface Detail is a B-. Some really ambitious world-building compromised by long stretches of rather tedious scene descriptions.

          2 replies 0 retweets 5 likes
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        6. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Jan 20
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          This is the most overtly socialist-polemic of the novels so far, and somewhat weakens it. Falling Outside the Normal Moral Constraints is probably one of the most anthropomorphic ships ever. Almost too human to be fun, though it acts properly ship-like towards the end.

          1 reply 0 retweets 5 likes
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        7. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Jan 20
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          Status: ✅ Use of Weapons: A- ✅ Hydrogen Sonata: A ✅ Look to Windward: A ✅ Matter: A+ ✅ Player of Games: B ✅ Consider Phlebas: B- ✅ Surface Detail: B- To go: State of the Art Excession Inversions

          4 replies 0 retweets 12 likes
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          8. End of conversation
        1. Shulgin's Daemon‏ @ShulginsDaemon 31 Dec 2020
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          Replying to @vgr

          Agreed. Matter was the best of the bunch.

          0 replies 0 retweets 0 likes
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        1. Michael Taft (simulated)‏ @OortCloudAtlas 31 Dec 2020
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          Replying to @vgr

          Skip to Surface Detail if you require an A+

          0 replies 0 retweets 1 like
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        1. Richard Bown‏ @bownie29 31 Dec 2020
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          Replying to @vgr

          ENJOY! I seem to have lost/given away my copy of Excession and I'm GUTTED

          0 replies 0 retweets 0 likes
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