We need Solidarity

Author: Iris Meredith

Published: 2025-03-28

Both me and a lot of people around me have written extensively about the issues that we face in the tech industry, both inward and outward facing. Some of us have attempted to essay potential solutions, but on the whole, I don't believe we've had a coherent strategy for fighting back against this shit as an industry. So, let me propose one: we, as an industry, need to unionise quickly, effectively and on a massive scale.

My Immortal is a better story than Altman's AI slop

Author: Iris Meredith

Published: 2025-03-20

In this light, AI-generated "fiction" is already broken from the get-go. What makes fiction interesting and compelling is, in large part, the spark of recognition: of seeing your experience reflected by someone else, of seeing how someone else sees and experiences the world, of recognising something in a story that you can take from it and put into your own life. This - all of this - is deeply dependent on the aforementioned relationality of fiction: fiction without an author feels wrong, and almost fraudulent, as though the person who generated the story is lying to you by pretending to have had experiences, thoughts and feelings that he actually hasn't. The reaction this generates is a subconscious level of disgust and violation, as we're expected to pretend that (in this case) Sam Altman has feelings that he's never shown any evidence of being capable of.

Pride Month

Author: Iris Meredith

Published: 2025-03-19

A story set in Liam Kofi Bright's Sanguinary Utnapishtim setting

Putting trans people in the Omelas hole

Author: Iris Meredith

Published: 2025-03-16

It seems, therefore, that a lot of broadly socially liberal centrist people believe that having a bunch of trans people in the Omelas hole is necessary for society to work. They'd never direct explicit hostility at trans people or even believe that they're hateful, and yet, they believe, unconsciously and on some tacit level, that trans people have to suffer. They will let that belief subconsciously control a large part of their behaviour, whether that is tacitly supporting transphobic legislation, employment discrimination or even just being quietly but consistently *weird* about interacting with trans people.

Into the (leadership) void - A review of The Five Dysfunctions of a Team and Seven Strategic Questions

Author: Iris Meredith

Published: 2025-03-08

As with an awful lot of literature meant to be consumed by a primarily elite audience (in this case, the executive class), both Simon and Lencioni write as though the work done by their audience is the important work that clearly needs to be focused on the most. In the context of executive leadership, this means that executives are the main figures written about in both these books, and to some extent that's broadly expected.