Gaming is our cultural bogeyman - we blame it for everything from child obesity to violence to short attention spans. But any explanation that fits every situation ultimately explains nothing.
Gaming is our cultural bogeyman - we blame it for everything from child obesity to violence to short attention spans. But any explanation that fits every situation ultimately explains nothing.
The species will continue, whatever apocalypse we manage to unleash. It just won't be much fun to live through.
No one should ever feel obliged to speak or to put themselves out publicly online, but I do think it's a good thing to do. The more of us who are women, making our work and just going 'Here I am, here's my work,' the easier it gets for everybody. It's a good thing to do.
We all know that the desire for perfection can get in the way of authenticity and enjoyment; it's the same with games. There's a completist part to many of us that can't rest until we reach the perfect 100% finish point.
Games don't cause racism. But the real-time chat makes nasty comments hard to moderate and easy to spread.
I hope that there are many more women out there writing bits of feminist sci-fi. And men, also - men are allowed to write feminist things.
The worst things that ever happened to me were before I was 20. It has been slow, hard-won improvement since then.
There's some really good stuff in the way I was brought up. There's some really rubbish stuff as well.
I feel powerful when I'm onstage talking to an audience. I like communicating; it feels like my calling in the world. Knowing what you're meant to be doing with your life is pretty bloody powerful.
Attending a book group is always a salutary experience for a writer. There's no guarantee that the people there will have enjoyed your book, and, as anyone who has taken part in a book group will know, half the fun is in ripping a book you haven't liked to shreds.
As someone who went to school in the '70s and '80s, I can't say that I noticed much of a 'medals for all' culture myself.
The hilarity or brilliance of a forwarded link is inversely proportional to the number of people it's sent to.
It's hard to describe why one room and not another feels right for writing. Of course you have to train yourself to be able to write anywhere, but it's nice to feel that each book has a place that belongs to it, where it's home.
Twitter's strength - and its weakness - is that it makes it extremely easy to share every passing thought with everyone on your friends list.