Just a reminder to check for your name in this list of books that OpenAI trained from. If your name is there, they probably owe you several thousand dollars. OpenAI cried that if everyone eligible author files, the company will go bankrupt, so I'm alerting every author I have ever spoken to.

Dear all trans women: Whatever you talk about or how you behave is how women talk and behave, because you are a woman who talks and exhibits behavior. You do not need to copy or mimic some kind of headcanon cis woman. Literally *anything* you do is definitionally something a woman does.

READ. THIS. ARTICLE!

Most people don't know how to pronounce my name ("SOAR'lyeh" is close enough) but I've never had anyone giggle at it. Let alone a supposed professional. I know Anglophone SF culture has always been parochial, but you would think. You would bloody well think.

Good to see one paper taking a stand.

I don't know how you can say that blatantly discriminating against trans people is not discrimination, but that's the UK now. Don't think for a second it will stop with trans people. We've been telling you this for a decade.

6/ Analysis - @jamiewareham.co.uk "This is a rare positive ruling for the Trans+ community - but it only received a handful of mainstream media stories. I'm confident if the ruling had been negative, it would have been blasted across headlines as a propaganda tool against gender affirming care."

A UK judge has ruled that a private gender clinic was right to get an "outstanding" review from the UK medical regulator the Clinical Quality Commission 🏳️‍⚧️ It's a rare positive ruling for the Trans+ community - let's take a look at it 🧵

UK organisations with trans members/service users: this is the time to:- a) refuse to comply with transphobia b) make it clear to your trans members/service users that you are going to refuse, so they know they are safe. Don't be intimidated into appeasing fascists, please.

YES. More trans girls everywhere please.

I think a lot of people need to realize that they’re not too much to love, that they’ve been loved by the wrong people, and that’s not your fault; it’s their fault for trying to diminish you.

Dear UK govt, You seem a bit confused about this, so I hope that I can make it clearer:- - LLMs are not people. Corporations are also not people. - trans people, Palestinians, refugees, disabled people, and indeed all other human beings *are* all people. Please act accordingly. FFS. Merry

OpenAI doesn't realise that PhD-level expertise has very little to do with the stuff you know and more to do with how you can think. I forget facts from mine all the time! The value in my PhD is knowing how to reliably generate, evaluate, and defend or dismiss information that's new to the world.

Doomscroll break

Among so much I don't understand about "gender criticals" (such a misnomer) who still think they're protecting women: if hating on trans women was good for cis women, *Donald Trump wouldn't do it*. They need to look at which men agree with them, and *why they do so*.

Well they should stop pursuing aims that kill lots of people then, shouldn't they.

If enough cis people and enough organisations refuse to comply with the UK gvt's transphobic bullshit it *will* become undoable. Protect trans women using women's spaces/trans men using men's. Be inclusive. Be kind. Put the safety of trans ppl over the comfort of a tiny minority of bigots.

Happy International Cat Day! Put your paws together please for the felines who work hard to keep the places you love running. Fliss makes sure young plants have plenty of heat for growing in the glasshouses at Stourhead in Wiltshire...

NHS announces public consultation into youth gender services – here's how you can get involved

The UK for the past 80 years, accurately: Chamberlain was wrong and appeasing fascists is bad. We are an awesome country and we won't do *that* again. The UK gvt at the moment: I know we're Labour but we can have a little fascism (and a lot of appeasing Trump) as a treat.

I would like everything everywhere to stop getting worse all the time

Sending huge solidarity to trans actors and other trans performing arts industry professionals today. It's got to be *horrible* knowing that there are colleagues (actors and directors and writers and crew) still willing to work with Rowling. :(

It's such a fricking far-right playbook thing. They put the comfort of the only women they deem acceptable (cis, but let's face it also het, white, abled, femme, thin, and apparently under 5'11" too...) ahead of the *safety* of all other women. It's enraging anyone is falling for it.

#GoodNews on #biodiversity, because we all need some www.bbc.com/news/article...

Trans rights *are* good. If you oppose them, you need to fix your heart, especially before you run for an office that controls other people's lives.

Autistic humans don’t burn out from being autistic. We burn out from performing something we’re not. Smiling when it hurts. Shrinking so others feel big. Pretending we’re fine. Masking is survival. Unmasking is living with your needs met, truly.

I'm one of those no longer entitled to a booster, and I'm livid. And worried. :( If you're not at the bare minimum wearing a mask on public transport and in crowded indoor spaces at the moment... please start doing so again. Bringing the infection rate down is even more crucial now.

I'm one of those no longer entitled to the COVID booster and... yeah. Not good. :( (Also, do the gvt want to reduce the number of ppl too disabled to work or not?! Long Covid is a growing problem, and utterly horrible for those who get it...)

It’s a queer joy to be in Iceland this week and talk about my new book at the Reykjavik Pride conference. It was energising to be in an atmosphere of sunshine and (painted) rainbows while talking through some of the feelings that shape our struggles for legal and social justice. 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍🌈🇮🇸

Oh, I've just fallen in love with tenor Nicky Spence's voice! Aaaaah so beautiful. (New album of art songs (by Kaprálová, Dvořák, Bartók, and Křička) he's released with the awesome pianist (and Spence's husband :) ) Dylan Perez. It's called "Sparks and Ashes". V recommended. :) ) #TinyJoys

The most powerful argument for me was when a blind colleague said that when he found that due to the strong alt text etiquette on mastodon he was finally able to browse through hours of cat pics and viz content, he almost cried. You think blind people don’t look at your stuff but they do. Let them.

Visually impairment is a wide spectrum. Sometimes it's just nice to know the colours, sometimes something needs to be pointed out because there isn't enough contrast, sometimes people just want to know what's in the picture. ALT-text isn't easy, but it helps.

Hate groups are planning to gather outside the Links Road Hotel again this Saturday at noon. A counter-protest is being organised to stand in solidarity with the city’s asylum seekers. Share and help spread the word.

📢 ABERDEEN AND PETERHEAD: ALL OUT FOR HUMAN RIGHTS Get organised THIS weekend to stand up against the anti-migrant hate that's rearing its ugly head once again. Spread the word. Migrants are not the enemy.

When Nabil's house was destroyed in an Israeli assault, he managed to save his kindergarten graduation certificate. Now he and his brothers long to go back to school. Please help them to survive this war and recover their dream. www.gofundme.com/f/emergency-... @mommunism.bsky.social #MutualAid 🍉

The Marks & Spencers thing. So far as I can make out, this is the full story: "A female shop assistant asked a customer if they would like help with anything. She was quite tall." EVERYTHING else is noise and fury about nothing, but with real consequences.

Designed a new sign for my convention table. Might be too subtle, idk, what do you reckon?! No Oxford comma we die like men!

Sadly, Only 4 people responded today. It’s not even enough for 3kg of flour and water for my family of 7. We’re surviving day by day — but it’s getting harder. Please consider donating 🙏🏽 i beg you

If you want to stop a large proportion of major crimes, actually doing something about domestic abuse would have a massive impact.

Good news in @newscientist.com! We're a step closer to understanding myalgic encephalomyelitis, aka chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS): A big genetic study has linked eight regions of the genome to the condition. https://loom.ly/EYuHytA

Devil's-Bit Scabious blowing in the early morning breeze. #sunrise #wildflowerhour #nature

Magnificent rock samphire photographed yesterday #wildflowerhour #coastalplants

Autistic liberation isn’t just about ending ableism. It’s about unlearning the shame we were taught. Stopping the scripts we still perform. Seeing ourselves through our own gaze, not theirs. That’s where everything starts. That’s where we begin to live.

This is *delightful*. :D

🚨🏛️ Pompeii news! People returned to live in Pompeii's ruins, archaeologists say www.bbc.com/news/article...

Not a new complaint from me but so very tired of reactionary updates of migration measures on BBC news. Drop fed moral panic by the same media which will then - again- report migration is one of top public electoral concerns.