Sydnee

@sydmt.bsky.social

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Freelance developmental/copy editor, occasional SFF short story writer, has strong opinions about journalism ethics

(Website: shadesofsydnee.com)

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honestly hate that every time there's an industry bad actor, lists of "works by marginalized authors to support instead" start circulating like it's a moral obligation to be done out of guilt, & it's crickets every other day of the year. my art is not to be taken in as a reactionary measure

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Most common writing advice (kill your darlings, no adverbs, show don't tell, etc) is intended to push back on the failures of freshmen in Creative Writing 101, not be applicable in all situations.

if u see this, quote-post with your tips for writers that no one gives anymore because they seem obvious (even though they're not)

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When journalists ask us to save journalism remind them they refused to save it for the Black female colleagues www.refinery29.com/en-gb/black-...

Black Women Are Leaving Journalism & It’s A Huge Losswww.refinery29.com The golden era of journalism has long gone and many are choosing to make an escape plan—especially Black women, including myself.

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you simply do not have to have this argument aftermath.site/assassins-cr...

Stop Trying To Defeat Racism With Logic - Aftermathaftermath.site The new Assassin’s Creed game stars what appears to be a black samurai, which is cool. Anyone who tries to argue is just not worth your time.

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"Every story you read is defiance against a structure that did not envision that story." So much truth in this essay by @edebell.com apex-magazine.com/nonfiction/e...

Escapism is a Lie - Apex Magazineapex-magazine.com What the fuck is escapism?

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IMO, asking questions is one of the best things an editor can do. I can't help the story be the best version of itself unless I fully understand the author's goals for the story.

Posting here too because I know too many who’ve experienced this—myself included. Yes, editing is a technical job, but it’s an art, too, and we need to keep that in mind and not just operate on right-wrong autopilot.

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"Editorial intelligence is akin to emotional intelligence. It incorporates intellectual, creative and emotional capital – all gained from lived experience, complemented by technical skills and industry expertise, applied through the prism of human understanding." theconversation.com/can-chatgpt-...

Can ChatGPT edit fiction? 4 professional editors asked AI to do their job – and it ruined their short storytheconversation.com Technically, ChatGPT can do (some of) the work of a human editor. But an experiment comparing three separate human edits of a literary short story to edits by ChatGPT exposes AI’s serious limitations.

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I think the actual thing people should be told when they encounter a story about someone falling for a scam that seems obvious isn’t “you’d fall for it too” because that’s not true—most scams have a low hit rate—but “somewhere out there is a scam you’d fall for that would also be obvious to others”

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U.S. journalism is steadily being replaced by automated gibberish, engagement bait, brand influencers, and extremely well funded right wing propaganda, but surely that won't wind up being a problem

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If you're thinking about science fiction awards nomination season, please keep in mind @malonlouis.bsky.social. IF WISHES WERE OBFUSCATION CODES AND OTHER STORIES qualifies for short story collections awards, and "Code Switching" from the book is a novella: firesidefiction.com/book/if-wish...

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Happy "freelancers working through the holidays to meet the early January deadlines set by publishing professionals who are out of office for the entire month of December" to those who celebrate

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We all had fun blasting James Somerton to ash, & he thoroughly deserved it. Nothing of value was lost, etc. But if any of this leaves any kind of lesson in its wake, I hope it makes more of us a little more fastidious about citing our sources, and requiring evidence before we believe random claims.

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I have far too many friends who are autodidactic and I have seen far too many groups of humans use language as a method of excluding other humans for me to ever support making fun of someone who mispronounces something they’ve never heard said out loud.

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It really sucks ass that people who steal all their shit make a fortune, while the people who actually put in the work are having to claw their way through life, man. Really exhausting.

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Microsoft Word is not a good piece of software, but everyone uses it, and it's amazing to think about how little effort it would have taken Microsoft over the last few years to actually make it a better piece of software, but, everyone uses it, so fuck it

I understand why every publication has to have a paywall now, but could you at least include an option to read a summary of the article before I click the headline Tired of getting three free articles/month only to realize I don't care about the subject

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I really wish this site had a mute words/phrases function because it’s not even 2024 yet and I’m already seeing entirely too much election bullshit, almost all of which is neither enlightening nor entertaining.

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"Emissions from the motor sector could have fallen by more than 30% between 2010 and 2022 if vehicles had stayed the same size, a report has found."

Motor emissions could have fallen by over 30% without SUV trend, report sayswww.theguardian.com Global fall averaged 4.2% between 2010 and 2022 but would have been far more if vehicle sizes stayed same

For the last month, anytime I go to Slate.com, I get redirected to a malware website "scanning" my computer for viruses. As long as I avoid Slate, the problem goes away. Good luck, everybody!

Like truly have you tried reading something from a news site on your phone recently? It is nearly impossible. I keep trying to scroll (because ads take up half the screen) and accidentally clicking on some pop up that consumes the entire screen but also doesn’t actually work so I can’t x out of it.

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The “pivot to video” like narrative that mobile is the future of news consumption + social media sites being increasingly impossible to use outside a mobile app + the horrible experience trying to READ a single web article on your phone through a kaleidoscope of pops and ads = a truly bad situation.

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Purposeful, intentional "anachronisms" in secondary worlds don't really bother me as much. I do think you can tell the difference between it being intentionally weird and just laziness though. As with most things, probably the mileage varies based on the reader.

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Journalists talk a lot about what’s wrong with our industry, but we need to also talk about how the structural problems with our business model go way beyond just bad ownership

New: multiple sources, including executives, explain why sites like Jezebel are being shut down despite being very popular. The "brand safety" industry has created a paranoid environment where companies are not prepared to run ads next to important issues. www.404media.co/advertisers-...

Advertisers Don’t Want Sites Like Jezebel to Existwww.404media.co The 'Brand Safety' and 'Suitability' industries have financially crushed the news business by keeping ads away from articles that its 'sentiment analysis' algorithms think will make people sad or upse...

Yesterday I wrote in a manuscript (paraphasing), "This feels a little too on the nose, but sometimes I feel like readers prefer subtle evil in fiction because we actually wish there was some plausible deniability for these assholes in real life." 🙃

Ahahhahahah AWS Amazon has literally set up offices in the former Haarlem prison that was literally built as a panopticon This is so too many layers of meta for me vm.tiktok.com/ZGJoofCe5/

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i would rather have the opinion of two, three if i'm lucky, people who absolutely get what i'm doing and who want to talk to me about it than ten crits from people who are just ... opinioning.

The big thing is “tons of feedback” is the trap that so many folks fall into. You don’t want a dozen opinions. You want two or three GOOD opinions.

Lift as you climb.

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Stop telling people to "google" things like works especially if you work in journalism/ civic life etc They are factually making it harder to find results

Google killing image search is so funny its a fundamental misunderstanding of why one searches for images. looking for references historic moments, anatomy, places, artists works?? No, people just want to see "duck with human legs" and other nonsense prompts. goodbye reality.

End of feed.