Pictures from a friend of mine who works on a crab-fishing boat off the coast of Newfoundland. I love the nightmare crab door.

obviously Adobe should never have turned that "feature" on by default but "whoops, we don't make our pdfs accessible so we never noticed" isn't... great...

y'know, I do hafta say that Adobe's generative AI "captions" that has been annoying the piss out of Evil Hat and now Chaosium would have been caught before release if they had anyone entering real alt text into their PDFs at all. I know this because that's when WE caught it. *Before* release.

Programme aired on 20 December 2025, but the initial legal letter was sent first to ITV, then inexplicably rerouted via Channel 4 before finally being dumped in the Costa outside BBC Broadcasting House.

this is so funny 😭

Starting at 10:30 AM EST today, July 2nd, I'll be running Psi*Run: The Pursuit, my on-line version of the game, in this thread, #PsiRunPursuitJuly2 There will be a companion Q&A thread as well, #PsiRunPursuitQ&A Are you ready to run? #PsiRun2e #ttrpg #pbta

Octothorpe 163 has arrived, and we discuss Eurocons in some detail, covering all the news from 2026 to 2030. Alison is currently at Metropol Con and she’s promised to report back. We also discuss queer awards and swim headphones. Listen here! octothorpe.podbean.com/e/163-board-...

We’re offering a free night’s stay to the first guest who can figure out where the endless shrimp keep coming from. Please make it stop.

Good of England to say goodbye to Stokes by celebrating his strategy of *checks notes* throwing wickets away with stupid batting for no reason #cricket #ENGvNZ

We're throwing our hat in the ring to host Eurocon 2030 in the fantastical city of Copenhagen! Accessible transport, stunning sights, and a commitment to sustainability, Copenhagen promises an unforgettable experience for all attendees. Support our bid, and be part of an incredible adventure!

Hey, Reddit, so this is what happened. Now, it WAS my idea, but everyone went along with the magical ritual and now I we‘ve been transformed into a giant merged flesh construct, like meaty Devestator. Everyone is ANGRY & blaming me, but i got it worst as I’m the poop-sphincter! So: am I the asshole?

If you're still using Sticker Mule btw, you should not do that

THIS. THIS. THIS. There’s reasons why folks might focus on D&D depending on their scope/ research question. BUT I do not accept arguments for focusing on D&D like: - the extant research focuses on D&D - D&D is inevitable touchstone - D&D was first _________ - D&D can represent all of TTRPG

Starmer is refusing to allow debate time for the Early Day Motion about the EHRC ‘guidance’, despite it being signed by over 140 MPs. If we get 100,000 signatures on this petition we can force a debate.

Oh no, my "how to host your first itchio charity bundle" post is out of date...guess I'll have to make a new one charittrpgs.substack.com/p/tips-to-ho... Jokes aside, this is a great update to make hosting charity bundles so much easier!

I need information on any tabletop games events happening in the Bay Area in the next few weeks, please internet friends thank you.

When I was a youngster I was terminally online, I treated every argument as if it were the end of the world and I posted with the white hot fury of a thousand burning suns, sure of my holy mission to correct the wrongs of the internet.

You can catch an even better glimpse of it here, snapped as we walked back from the Nando's to the Eastercon hotel.

If I sold 1/1,000,000,000,000th of my company to someone for $1 and kept the remaining shares would that make me a paper trillionaire

I saw that Babette de Leede was playing and wondered if she was a relation of Durham and Netherlands men's cricketer BAs de Leede; they're cousins, apparently! #Cricket #T20WorldCup

This paper is hilarious, and also excellent science. I won't spoil it for you too much, but it's about how to pivot when your participant recruiting plans fail because the people you're reaching only want to have sex with you and you're only in the field for a week :) scispace.com/pdf/taking-t...

Episode 284 of Eating the Fantastic is now LIVE with guests @bohemiancoast.bsky.social and @johncoxon.bsky.social. Discover how the coming of COVID-19 kickstarted the creation of Octothorpe, how to comment responsibly on fandom while being part of fandom & more. www.scottedelman.com/wordpress/20...

If only there was a team of archivists

@andy.baio.net If someone raises the alarm that something is about to go away – e.g., bsky.app/profile/fina... – is there a way to raise the alarm with some sort of archival squad?

@shannonappelcline.bsky.social Hello! I want to buy the next edition of DESIGNERS & DRAGONS: is there a mailing list I could sign up to for when I can back it on Kickstarter/buy it from a shop/acquire a copy at a crossroads in exchange for my immortal soul?

@eerko.bsky.social In the BGG app, would it be possible to make it so that typing in the forums through the app uses typographer’s quotes (smart quotes) rather than simple quotes? I would love this to be a feature.

Who is your favourite sci-fi game artist? Asking because of reasons...

Join us as we read the Clarke Award shortlist! Alison and Liz judge John’s own judging, and then they ask him questions about his judging and judge his answers. We hope you judge that this is a good episode. The word “judge” looks weird now. Listen here! octothorpe.podbean.com/e/161-you-pa...

✨The Shortlist 2026!✨ DUNGEON CRAWLER CARL, Matt Dinniman  THE DREAM HOTEL, Laila Lalami LUMINOUS, Silva Park THERE IS NO ANTIMEMETICS DIVISION, qntm WHEN THERE ARE WOLVES AGAIN, E.J. Swift THE SALT ORACLE, Lorraine Wilson This year’s winner will be announced on Weds 12 August.

COMING NEXT MONTH on Eating the Fantastic — my Eastercon lunch at Nando's with @octothorpecast.bsky.social's @johncoxon.bsky.social and @bohemiancoast.bsky.social — followed by Balticon BBQ with Mark L. Van Name. Subscribe to eavesdrop on these fascinating conversations! pod.link/1083737796

Octothorpe 160 comes with an exclusive free gift*! We talk a little bit more about the Hugo Awards including the packet, but mostly we dive into our bulging mailbag and read out your letters and comments. Listen here! octothorpe.podbean.com/e/160-global... *free gift is theoretical/made up

Hey hivemind, a question for y’all… Does anyone have any recommendations for ongoing Glaswegian fanzines or fanwriting? I’m going to be on a panel at Satellite 9 and I want to know whether I’m missing anything or whether there isn’t much out there at the moment. @satellitecons.bsky.social

For those who don’t believe it was my actual laptop.

@renay.bsky.social I wish it to be known that I already read Intergalactic Mixtape, I was just moving from RSS subscriber to email subscriber! (Doing this for a number of newsletters after a couple I read through RSS moved provider and I didn’t notice…)

I ain’t a map guy, but this is incredible and, now, so obvious. Hats off to the parent of this idea.

Captured a chat with 2/3 of the @octothorpecast.bsky.social hosts — @bohemiancoast.bsky.social and @johncoxon.bsky.social — as a postscript to our upcoming episode of Eating the Fantastic recorded at Eastercon, during which each of us knew we were Hugo nominees but couldn't yet tell the other.

Gosh. Hello to new followers! 👋

Something about Eating the Fantastic's Hugo nomination which tickles me is that when I recorded an upcoming episode with @octothorpecast.bsky.social's @bohemiancoast.bsky.social and @johncoxon.bsky.social at Eastercon, we each knew a secret we couldn't speak aloud. Though at the time, I did wonder.

Same with writing. Same with game design. The boring, hard work is how you learn.

I keep seeing "all authors use AI, the real issue is they're being forced to be sneaky about it" headlines. Full stop No. This is a lie peddled for normalization. It's schoolyard-level pressure tactics "C'mon, all the cool kids are already doing it. We won't tell. It's fine. We're on your side."

Reminds me that I’ve been toying with the idea for a Mothership module where you play as a salvage/cleanup crew who have to go in to clean up AFTER other Mothership modules have finished.

My advice to biologists tempted to use AI/LLMs to code their analyses: don't. (I'm continuing with reviewing the analyses for our article, and it's taken me all morning to figure out what the code is trying to do.)

Octothorpe 156 is here! We discuss Locus, we discuss the Nebulas, we discuss Eastercon, and then we talk about Liz’s totally SFnal and very genre pick. Listen here! octothorpe.podbean.com/e/156-surpri... @locusmag.bsky.social @sfwa.org @easterconuk.bsky.social

I have heard exciting news that someone is scheduled to run OTHERSHIP at a convention shortly, like as an actually arranged thing? They're using the rules from something called 'Mothership' for it, which is very funny.

These prices are horrific. By comparison: -A Magic card (hell, even in 1993), $1,000 -A Delta Green interior full page colour illustration, $500 -A colour cover, $1,000 Way back when a bullpen artist told me; "Trying to break into comics is like tying to break in Auschwitz, kid. Save yourself."

Alright yall, my inbox is full from folks privately reaching out (please always feel free to publicly post if your contract allows) about CURRENT COVER RATES in 2026 Strap in

@thestorygraph.com Please may we have a tabletop game genre? I just moved to your service from Goodreads, and I’m adding some books that aren’t in your database that I own, but there’s no genre for them that makes sense!

I‘ve heard people say the show fell off when she was introduced, but I think they’re all being insincere. It’s just a bad faith argument.

Well done! You’ve found the contents of Octothorpe 155, perfectly preserved in a jar. The jar was in your basement. The jar was always there. You always had a basement. Don’t run—come back! We talk about Eastercon! octothorpe.podbean.com/e/155-ed-ed-... P.S. Vote in GUFF, today is the last day.

@deepcrypt.games is there any chance of your games coming to Switch or PS5?