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Unintended Misinformation: Dynamics and Dangers

March 4, 2020

internet, manipulation, misinformation, society

A mythological king was once asked what was his most precious asset: his health, his army, his wealth, or his offspring. “Information!” he said. “Give me information, and I can easily get back the rest”. Of course, information also comes with misinformation. And unintended misinformation, in particular, can be a very insidious, dangerous concept.

Unlike fake news or intentional propaganda, unintended misinformation neither involves malice nor has ulterior motives. Those spreading misinformation aren’t aware they’re doing so. Instead, they believe they’re helping (either a cause or the general dissemination of knowledge).

But, as I mentioned above, unintended misinformation can be an insidious process, causing significant damage and having far-reaching repercussions. The problem, as we’ll see in more detail below, lies precisely in its lack of intention or malice. Put simply, its dynamics are such that preclude detection of the misinformation until it has effectively displaced the truth.

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Writing Criticality: Identify and Control Points of Divergence in Your Fiction

February 26, 2020

Fiction Writing Tips, Writing

fiction, plot, writing

In physics, criticality refers to a nuclear reaction that is able to continue by itself. But for our purposes, I use it as a metaphor to indicate “points of no return”. In other words, points of divergence in a novel, where the plot can take two (critically) different directions.

The concept of points of divergence might be familiar to authors writing alternative-history science fiction. For an example, you can see my review of Elleander Morning. However, when I refer to writing criticality, I’m not limiting myself to speculative fiction.

The concept of points of divergence is ubiquitous. It pervades all fictional narratives, regardless of genre. Or at least… it ought to! In this post I’ll show you how to work with points of divergence – identifying, controlling, and deploying them successfully.

A note on terminology: I use the terms “Writing Criticality” and “point of divergence” interchangeably in the post.

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Book Worming Party: When Literature Meets Drawing

February 20, 2020

Home For Fiction, Programming

art, home for fiction, javascript, literature, programming

For the past couple of months I’ve been working on a rather ambitious project. Ambition is often misunderstood, but the way I choose to approach it, it’s about doing something “just because”. It was in this “fuck it” framework that Book Worming Party, my latest programming project came to being.

Book Worming Party – even the name should tell you how mad this project is – combines three of my interests: literature, visuality, and programming. What can I say, I’m a talented man (and above all, modest).

Book Worming Party is a program (written mostly in JavaScript) that takes a work of fiction and, based on calculations and interpretations it makes about its nature, turns it into semi-random visual art. It translates words into color, plot into shapes, genre into affect. There are no separate “kinds of art”; art is art.

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