Paul Graham Raven
@paulgrahamraven.com
Science fiction writer turned tech critic turned STS/critical futures academic turned consulting critical foresight practitioner and worldbuilder-for-hire.
This account is POSSE broadcast only. Email if you want to reach me.
This account is POSSE broadcast only. Email if you want to reach me.
building up against the left wall
building up against the left wall
Some notes on an interview with hyperproductive sff author Adrian Tchaikovsky on his writing practice, with plenty of good stuff about worldbuilding.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
January 9, 2026 at 10:02 AM
building up against the left wall
keep shuffling those ideas around
keep shuffling those ideas around
Factorial math just makes the tarot look even more magical, to be honest.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
January 8, 2026 at 10:03 AM
keep shuffling those ideas around
on the valence of designed things
on the valence of designed things
The context of a work of design tells the viewer something about the world that the design implies, and signals how seriously it should be taken.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
January 7, 2026 at 10:00 AM
on the valence of designed things
The Good Soldier
The Good Soldier
Some thoughts on the novel by Ford Madox Ford.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
January 6, 2026 at 10:01 AM
The Good Soldier
if the house keeps winning they’ll just burn it down
if the house keeps winning they’ll just burn it down
One of the previous year’s surprisingly difficult lessons has been the need to stop considering reportage from the US as in any way representative of a baseline for circumstances elsewhere.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
January 5, 2026 at 10:00 AM
if the house keeps winning they’ll just burn it down
week 01 / 2026: the medium is the maxxage
week 01 / 2026: the medium is the maxxage
Reading round-up: the (temporary?) end of completion; the four laws of media; the failure of USian political science; and the end-game paths of the risk-maxxing paradigm.
www.worldbuilding.agency
January 4, 2026 at 11:30 AM
week 01 / 2026: the medium is the maxxage
whatever circuits of vanity underlie the original impulse
whatever circuits of vanity underlie the original impulse
I’d been planning to stop doing criticism, but it was essentially a triage decision: drop the writing that seems to be achieving the least, you know.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
January 2, 2026 at 2:08 PM
whatever circuits of vanity underlie the original impulse
week 52 / 2025: minimum viable
week 52 / 2025: minimum viable
Bare bones from the skeleton crew.
www.worldbuilding.agency
December 28, 2025 at 11:30 AM
week 52 / 2025: minimum viable
week 51 / 2025: tearing away the caul
week 51 / 2025: tearing away the caul
Reading round-up: the performative shaming of “performative reading”; the post is the product; the illusion of inevitability; and maximalist manga-monster steampunk-fantasy strangeness.
www.worldbuilding.agency
December 21, 2025 at 11:30 AM
week 51 / 2025: tearing away the caul
this oppressive cardinality
this oppressive cardinality
Another of last weekend’s works. As the title implies, there’s a bit of a theme emerging with some of these. I had ambitious plans for this afternoon, work-wise, but after the obligatory Friday morning encounter with my nemesis and a compensatory calorie overload at Burek House, I’m sorely tempted to just lay myself out in […]
www.velcro-city.co.uk
December 19, 2025 at 1:22 PM
this oppressive cardinality
… for some reason!
… for some reason!
With apologies for raising the shade of Rumsfeld, people mostly don’t know what it is that they don’t know.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
December 18, 2025 at 11:27 AM
… for some reason!
the consequences of failure are everywhere to see
the consequences of failure are everywhere to see
It’s genuinely shocking, the sheer number of apparently well-qualified professional people who are deep in the silicon-god cult right now.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
December 17, 2025 at 1:53 PM
the consequences of failure are everywhere to see
dead media beat: mass-market paperbacks
dead media beat: mass-market paperbacks
Ballard needed the cliches of the genre to push against, but he also needed a medium cheap enough to allow him to take risks in doing so.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
December 16, 2025 at 9:33 AM
dead media beat: mass-market paperbacks
halting states
halting states
Collage relies on an instinct for knowing when to stop.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
December 15, 2025 at 10:32 AM
halting states
week 50 / 2025: ancient of days
week 50 / 2025: ancient of days
Reading round-up: Auger disowns design-as-augury; a return to Turnton Docklands; a potted history of futurology; and an anarchist's analysis of utopian bureaucracy.
www.worldbuilding.agency
December 14, 2025 at 11:30 AM
week 50 / 2025: ancient of days
on discernment
on discernment
The really blunt way to put this would be to say that a bit of cultural elitism might not be a bad thing right now.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
December 8, 2025 at 3:15 PM
on discernment
week 49 / 2025: against the supposedly inevitable
week 49 / 2025: against the supposedly inevitable
Reading round-up: the end of The Line; socially constructed technological inevitability; the crusade against empathy; the Noughties as the Before Times... and the attentional friction of poetry.
www.worldbuilding.agency
December 7, 2025 at 11:31 AM
week 49 / 2025: against the supposedly inevitable
immediate and widespread access
immediate and widespread access
I’m less interested in the budget itself than in the seemingly peripheral dramas
www.velcro-city.co.uk
December 2, 2025 at 9:08 AM
immediate and widespread access
week 48 / 2025: walking in the shadows
week 48 / 2025: walking in the shadows
Reading round-up: dead media theory revisited; the quantified self, Victorian style; two takes on a rising China; and Aleister Crowley’s proto-pomo mental hygiene routines.
www.worldbuilding.agency
November 30, 2025 at 11:30 AM
week 48 / 2025: walking in the shadows
rock and roll is (not) dead
rock and roll is (not) dead
“You can just not go, you know.”
www.velcro-city.co.uk
November 25, 2025 at 10:28 AM
rock and roll is (not) dead
week 47 / 2025
week 47 / 2025
The end of the year is within sight, which means an early shift into reflective thinking...
www.worldbuilding.agency
November 23, 2025 at 11:30 AM
week 47 / 2025
a community of good fortune
a community of good fortune
Having in recent years thought a great deal about luck from the other side of the deal, so to speak, these were a strangely revelatory few lines for me.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
November 21, 2025 at 2:09 PM
a community of good fortune
week 46 / 2025: eyes on the street
week 46 / 2025: eyes on the street
So, you’re writing a short story that’s meant to explore a future. What’s the first and most crucial step in the process of getting your imagined world onto the page? It’s not what you might think...
www.worldbuilding.agency
November 16, 2025 at 11:56 AM
week 46 / 2025: eyes on the street
woke up this way
woke up this way
<p>Having always thought myself a free-thinker, I realise that I was led, by my desire to at long last belong somewhere, to acquiesce and affirm things that I didn’t believe to be true.</p>
www.velcro-city.co.uk
November 14, 2025 at 11:02 AM
woke up this way
Weeknotes/ week 45 / 2025: ten theses on “the future”
The moment to change a mental model is the moment at which it becomes an obstacle to understanding rather than a scaffold for it.
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-45-2025-ten-theses-on-the-future/
The moment to change a mental model is the moment at which it becomes an obstacle to understanding rather than a scaffold for it.
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-45-2025-ten-theses-on-the-future/
November 9, 2025 at 11:32 AM
Weeknotes/ week 45 / 2025: ten theses on “the future”
The moment to change a mental model is the moment at which it becomes an obstacle to understanding rather than a scaffold for it.
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-45-2025-ten-theses-on-the-future/
The moment to change a mental model is the moment at which it becomes an obstacle to understanding rather than a scaffold for it.
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-45-2025-ten-theses-on-the-future/