James McConnachie

If you think the BBC should be impartial then this is the place to let them know.

If you don’t want to pay for the BBC or have to watch adverts then this is the place to let them know.

You can‘t complain about the BBC unless you get involved

I feel your pain brother

the same argument used to be made by literary festivals

good to hear and good to know! best of luck.

also a good point!

good point

All these non-fiction authors appearing on podcasts that cannibalise the market for their books... And all for publicity and 'profile-building'. Heard that one before? Who else thinks podcasts should #paytheguest?

strew sugar over the zephyrs

When a reading of text has proceeded by laborious stages within the test-rig of detailed study, pause to allow the overall effect to integrate back into a coherent human reading, and ponder whether your life may even have been changed, just a little, or your beliefs about large questions; whether your habits of feeling have been flattered or boastfully challenged, or whether your relation to the text builds up a kind of trust. This aspect is what you will take away with you when all the study is finished, and it should last you through a lifetime.

J. H. Prynne, on reading

Proportion to me has felt like about 999 to 1 so it hasn't really been a problem.

yes, interesting! Nausea in the US means sick-stomach-feeling. Nausea in the UK is more of a moral/existential thing (which somehow fits the relatively Greek pronunciation) because we already have the parallel term 'feeling sick' to mean sick-stomach-feeling.

I wonder if all the bogends who reply 'Paywall' to any post from a paying site pick up a tin of soup in Tesco and shout 'NOT Free!' at the self checkout.

The House of Lords Digital & Communications Committee just published their report on AI, copyright & the creative industries, and their conclusions could not be clearer.

🧵 1/5

Is 'nawsha' American? Albeit spreading. Makes me wonder how Americans say 'nauseating', but I hear it as a distinctively British upper-middle-class idiom anyway. 'What a nauseating performance', etc.

I would imagine that the figures for women authors are higher even than those for women in general.

Truly shocking. I'm sorry it has happened to you.

One for World Book Day....

For World Book Day I might dress as an author on a deadline and spend all day on Bluesky

I found this offered useful background to the government's BBC consultation: britishbroadcastingchallenge.com/our-mission/

Hopeful things are happening elsewhere

cold truth

Grammarly are making AI impostors of living authors now as well as dead ones.

creepy thrilling historically informed 1970s folk-fantasy - one of my childhood favourites.

And fiction! Shout out to the wonderful The Singing Stones by Winifred Finlay

Sounds epic. I wonder if we're distantly related.

Unless the index was wildly faulty, or perhaps hilarious, I don't think I would.

I'm pro-indexing and anti-AI-indexing. But most non-fiction (beyond cookbooks and self-help etc) has a pretty small market, and too many publishers offload the burden onto the author.

But so many contracts insist that the author pays. Given the tiny size of non-fiction advances, this is a major barrier.

But plenty of contracts stipulate that the author does the indexing, or pays for it if they don't. (I know, I know.)

"Iin 2025, Denmark introduced a law giving people copyright-style ownership of their face, voice and likeness. It’s aimed squarely at AI and deepfakes, with 50 years of protection after death, but with exceptions for satire and parody." brodies.com/insights/ip-...