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.
Pinned
Paul Graham Raven
@paulgrahamraven.com
· Nov 16
People on this website: "this could be the new Twitter!"
Me: that's pretty much exactly what I'm afraid of.
This node will be POSSE broadcast only. Will maybe check for replies and DMs from time to time, but please donöt count on it. I'm easily contactable by other means with greater bandwidth.
Me: that's pretty much exactly what I'm afraid of.
This node will be POSSE broadcast only. Will maybe check for replies and DMs from time to time, but please donöt count on it. I'm easily contactable by other means with greater bandwidth.
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/
Weeknotes/ week 44 / 2025: hermit walks the dunes
I'm running a three-day course on fiction-for-futures in January! In-person, on-site, and strictly limited to no more than ten participants...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-44-2025-hermit-walks-the-dunes/
I'm running a three-day course on fiction-for-futures in January! In-person, on-site, and strictly limited to no more than ten participants...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-44-2025-hermit-walks-the-dunes/
November 2, 2025 at 11:30 AM
Weeknotes/ week 44 / 2025: hermit walks the dunes
I'm running a three-day course on fiction-for-futures in January! In-person, on-site, and strictly limited to no more than ten participants...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-44-2025-hermit-walks-the-dunes/
I'm running a three-day course on fiction-for-futures in January! In-person, on-site, and strictly limited to no more than ten participants...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-44-2025-hermit-walks-the-dunes/
Weeknotes/ week 43 / 2025: l'esprit de l'ascenseur
Marketing 101 advises that you hone your elevator pitch. I'm increasingly convinced that simplifying problems this way just makes them worse in the long run.
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-43-2025-lesprit-de-lascenseur/
Marketing 101 advises that you hone your elevator pitch. I'm increasingly convinced that simplifying problems this way just makes them worse in the long run.
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-43-2025-lesprit-de-lascenseur/
October 26, 2025 at 11:30 AM
Weeknotes/ week 43 / 2025: l'esprit de l'ascenseur
Marketing 101 advises that you hone your elevator pitch. I'm increasingly convinced that simplifying problems this way just makes them worse in the long run.
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-43-2025-lesprit-de-lascenseur/
Marketing 101 advises that you hone your elevator pitch. I'm increasingly convinced that simplifying problems this way just makes them worse in the long run.
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-43-2025-lesprit-de-lascenseur/
Weeknotes/ week 42 / 2025: reinventing the wheel
What’s the value of worldbuilding around the questions of a green transition, when participants could be spending their time developing products and services instead? I have answers!
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-42-2025-reinventi…
What’s the value of worldbuilding around the questions of a green transition, when participants could be spending their time developing products and services instead? I have answers!
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-42-2025-reinventi…
October 19, 2025 at 10:30 AM
Weeknotes/ week 42 / 2025: reinventing the wheel
What’s the value of worldbuilding around the questions of a green transition, when participants could be spending their time developing products and services instead? I have answers!
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-42-2025-reinventi…
What’s the value of worldbuilding around the questions of a green transition, when participants could be spending their time developing products and services instead? I have answers!
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-42-2025-reinventi…
Weeknotes/ week 41 / 2025: stuck in the middle with you
In which I channel my inner Inigo Montoya in an attempt to explain why talking about "technology" robs us of the sense of our own agency...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-41-2025-stuck-in-the-middle-with-you/
In which I channel my inner Inigo Montoya in an attempt to explain why talking about "technology" robs us of the sense of our own agency...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-41-2025-stuck-in-the-middle-with-you/
October 12, 2025 at 10:30 AM
Weeknotes/ week 41 / 2025: stuck in the middle with you
In which I channel my inner Inigo Montoya in an attempt to explain why talking about "technology" robs us of the sense of our own agency...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-41-2025-stuck-in-the-middle-with-you/
In which I channel my inner Inigo Montoya in an attempt to explain why talking about "technology" robs us of the sense of our own agency...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-41-2025-stuck-in-the-middle-with-you/
Weeknotes/ week 40 / 2025: the same river twice
This week, it seems I'm flagrantly mishandling Heraclitus to make a case for horizon-scanning...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-40-2025-the-same-river-twice/
This week, it seems I'm flagrantly mishandling Heraclitus to make a case for horizon-scanning...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-40-2025-the-same-river-twice/
October 5, 2025 at 10:36 AM
Weeknotes/ week 40 / 2025: the same river twice
This week, it seems I'm flagrantly mishandling Heraclitus to make a case for horizon-scanning...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-40-2025-the-same-river-twice/
This week, it seems I'm flagrantly mishandling Heraclitus to make a case for horizon-scanning...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-40-2025-the-same-river-twice/
that one guy rides again
I can think of few people in the pro-AI academic space whose writing betrays such a desperate yet frustrated desire to be affirmed and approved of by those whose ranks he once aspired to join.
I can think of few people in the pro-AI academic space whose writing betrays such a desperate yet frustrated desire to be affirmed and approved of by those whose ranks he once aspired to join.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
October 2, 2025 at 8:03 AM
that one guy rides again
I can think of few people in the pro-AI academic space whose writing betrays such a desperate yet frustrated desire to be affirmed and approved of by those whose ranks he once aspired to join.
I can think of few people in the pro-AI academic space whose writing betrays such a desperate yet frustrated desire to be affirmed and approved of by those whose ranks he once aspired to join.
Weeknotes/ week 39 / 2025: staying with various troubles
Utopias and dystopias are equally open to interpretation, as are all narratives of futurity. That's why, for me, the name of the game is to portray the messiness of hopes and fears alongside each other...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/we…
Utopias and dystopias are equally open to interpretation, as are all narratives of futurity. That's why, for me, the name of the game is to portray the messiness of hopes and fears alongside each other...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/we…
September 28, 2025 at 10:30 AM
Weeknotes/ week 39 / 2025: staying with various troubles
Utopias and dystopias are equally open to interpretation, as are all narratives of futurity. That's why, for me, the name of the game is to portray the messiness of hopes and fears alongside each other...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/we…
Utopias and dystopias are equally open to interpretation, as are all narratives of futurity. That's why, for me, the name of the game is to portray the messiness of hopes and fears alongside each other...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/we…
generational hangover
There are also moments when a widely-shared world ends not with a neat denouement, but rather with a slurry of lazy tropes and cliches.
There are also moments when a widely-shared world ends not with a neat denouement, but rather with a slurry of lazy tropes and cliches.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
September 23, 2025 at 9:04 AM
generational hangover
There are also moments when a widely-shared world ends not with a neat denouement, but rather with a slurry of lazy tropes and cliches.
There are also moments when a widely-shared world ends not with a neat denouement, but rather with a slurry of lazy tropes and cliches.
and they burn so bright, while you can only wonder why
Like the faerie folk, once you’ve learned to see them, you always will—and also like the faerie folk, they can see that you can see them, and that marks you out for whatever blessings or curses they may choose to bestow upon you.
Like the faerie folk, once you’ve learned to see them, you always will—and also like the faerie folk, they can see that you can see them, and that marks you out for whatever blessings or curses they may choose to bestow upon you.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
September 22, 2025 at 9:10 AM
and they burn so bright, while you can only wonder why
Like the faerie folk, once you’ve learned to see them, you always will—and also like the faerie folk, they can see that you can see them, and that marks you out for whatever blessings or curses they may choose to bestow upon you.
Like the faerie folk, once you’ve learned to see them, you always will—and also like the faerie folk, they can see that you can see them, and that marks you out for whatever blessings or curses they may choose to bestow upon you.
Weeknotes/ week 38 / 2025: player of games
I’m waxing philosophical this week, as I consider the potential utility of the “dark forest” theory of the internet to foresight. So please exercise your (potentially illusory) free will and click on through to follow along...
https://www.worldbuilding.a…
I’m waxing philosophical this week, as I consider the potential utility of the “dark forest” theory of the internet to foresight. So please exercise your (potentially illusory) free will and click on through to follow along...
https://www.worldbuilding.a…
September 21, 2025 at 10:31 AM
Weeknotes/ week 38 / 2025: player of games
I’m waxing philosophical this week, as I consider the potential utility of the “dark forest” theory of the internet to foresight. So please exercise your (potentially illusory) free will and click on through to follow along...
https://www.worldbuilding.a…
I’m waxing philosophical this week, as I consider the potential utility of the “dark forest” theory of the internet to foresight. So please exercise your (potentially illusory) free will and click on through to follow along...
https://www.worldbuilding.a…
i’d buy that for a dollar
Few things hurt quite so much as a confrontation with one’s obsolete exceptionalisms.
Few things hurt quite so much as a confrontation with one’s obsolete exceptionalisms.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
September 16, 2025 at 2:12 PM
i’d buy that for a dollar
Few things hurt quite so much as a confrontation with one’s obsolete exceptionalisms.
Few things hurt quite so much as a confrontation with one’s obsolete exceptionalisms.
Weeknotes/ week 37 / 2025: a room of one’s own
It’s been wall-to-wall logistics around here this week, as I’ve been moving in to a new studio/office space...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-37-2025-a-room-of-ones-own/
It’s been wall-to-wall logistics around here this week, as I’ve been moving in to a new studio/office space...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-37-2025-a-room-of-ones-own/
September 14, 2025 at 10:30 AM
Weeknotes/ week 37 / 2025: a room of one’s own
It’s been wall-to-wall logistics around here this week, as I’ve been moving in to a new studio/office space...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-37-2025-a-room-of-ones-own/
It’s been wall-to-wall logistics around here this week, as I’ve been moving in to a new studio/office space...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-37-2025-a-room-of-ones-own/
meme opera
All things considered, I guess most USians of my acquaintance would probably rather have the penguins.
All things considered, I guess most USians of my acquaintance would probably rather have the penguins.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
September 11, 2025 at 8:44 AM
meme opera
All things considered, I guess most USians of my acquaintance would probably rather have the penguins.
All things considered, I guess most USians of my acquaintance would probably rather have the penguins.
Weeknotes/ week 36 / 2025: at the intersection of three things
I've been going on about this "narrative prototyping" thing for ages now, but how does it differ from science fiction and/or design fiction? Well, since you asked...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-36-2025-at-the-inter…
I've been going on about this "narrative prototyping" thing for ages now, but how does it differ from science fiction and/or design fiction? Well, since you asked...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-36-2025-at-the-inter…
September 7, 2025 at 10:30 AM
Weeknotes/ week 36 / 2025: at the intersection of three things
I've been going on about this "narrative prototyping" thing for ages now, but how does it differ from science fiction and/or design fiction? Well, since you asked...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-36-2025-at-the-inter…
I've been going on about this "narrative prototyping" thing for ages now, but how does it differ from science fiction and/or design fiction? Well, since you asked...
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-36-2025-at-the-inter…
Weeknotes/ week 35 / 2025: radio daze
Client work is keeping me busy this weekend, so perhaps you'd like to go listen to a recent podcast appearance?
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-35-2025-radio-daze/
Client work is keeping me busy this weekend, so perhaps you'd like to go listen to a recent podcast appearance?
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-35-2025-radio-daze/
August 31, 2025 at 10:30 AM
Weeknotes/ week 35 / 2025: radio daze
Client work is keeping me busy this weekend, so perhaps you'd like to go listen to a recent podcast appearance?
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-35-2025-radio-daze/
Client work is keeping me busy this weekend, so perhaps you'd like to go listen to a recent podcast appearance?
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-35-2025-radio-daze/
a configuration that can’t possibly be true, and yet here it is
The shock of the same old new.
The shock of the same old new.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
August 29, 2025 at 9:06 AM
a configuration that can’t possibly be true, and yet here it is
The shock of the same old new.
The shock of the same old new.
Weeknotes/ week 34 / 2025: the machine stops
When life gives you lemons, make a lemonade-flavoured parable in place of the more considered content that you'd have written if you'd not lost the time to dealing with the lemons.
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-34-2025-the-machine-sto…
When life gives you lemons, make a lemonade-flavoured parable in place of the more considered content that you'd have written if you'd not lost the time to dealing with the lemons.
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-34-2025-the-machine-sto…
August 24, 2025 at 10:30 AM
Weeknotes/ week 34 / 2025: the machine stops
When life gives you lemons, make a lemonade-flavoured parable in place of the more considered content that you'd have written if you'd not lost the time to dealing with the lemons.
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-34-2025-the-machine-sto…
When life gives you lemons, make a lemonade-flavoured parable in place of the more considered content that you'd have written if you'd not lost the time to dealing with the lemons.
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-34-2025-the-machine-sto…
Weeknotes/ week 33 / 2025: how much is too much?
Or, phrased differently: what do the IPCC's climate change scenarios have in common with the Star Wars franchise?
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-33-2025-how-much-is-too-much/
Or, phrased differently: what do the IPCC's climate change scenarios have in common with the Star Wars franchise?
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-33-2025-how-much-is-too-much/
August 17, 2025 at 10:30 AM
Weeknotes/ week 33 / 2025: how much is too much?
Or, phrased differently: what do the IPCC's climate change scenarios have in common with the Star Wars franchise?
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-33-2025-how-much-is-too-much/
Or, phrased differently: what do the IPCC's climate change scenarios have in common with the Star Wars franchise?
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-33-2025-how-much-is-too-much/
so immersive that they transcend words on a page or pixels on a screen
Lock up your libraries, the brand-marketing people have discovered worldbuilding.
Lock up your libraries, the brand-marketing people have discovered worldbuilding.
www.velcro-city.co.uk
August 13, 2025 at 10:33 AM
so immersive that they transcend words on a page or pixels on a screen
Lock up your libraries, the brand-marketing people have discovered worldbuilding.
Lock up your libraries, the brand-marketing people have discovered worldbuilding.
Weeknotes/ week 32 / 2005: conspiracy culture
There's nothing like looking at the disposable popular culture of three decades previous for reminding you that there's nothing new under the sun, and that history moves in waves rather than an arc.
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-32-2…
There's nothing like looking at the disposable popular culture of three decades previous for reminding you that there's nothing new under the sun, and that history moves in waves rather than an arc.
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-32-2…
August 10, 2025 at 10:30 AM
Weeknotes/ week 32 / 2005: conspiracy culture
There's nothing like looking at the disposable popular culture of three decades previous for reminding you that there's nothing new under the sun, and that history moves in waves rather than an arc.
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-32-2…
There's nothing like looking at the disposable popular culture of three decades previous for reminding you that there's nothing new under the sun, and that history moves in waves rather than an arc.
https://www.worldbuilding.agency/weeknotes/week-32-2…