I had set myself a goal of 35 books for the year, but lack of travel meant I could squeeze in a fair bit more. I’ve tried to read more fiction, but not very successfully (most of the books here are non-fiction). Nonetheless, here is my reading list for 2020. (1/9)

I'm gonna do my other star wars thread tomorrow, which will primarily be me yelling at a @RowanKaiser-shaped strawman for calling the First Order and The Resistance "cosplayers who the rest of the galaxy has to deal with"

the deal w/the New Republic, the First Order, and the Resistance is very weird and complex and I actually take issue with how Story Group frames the actual conflict.

pre-TFA stuff is presented as a "cold war" between the New Republic and the remnants of the Empire that form the First Order, which 100% makes sense.

But they frame the First Order's attack on the Hosnian system and the subsequent battle that takes place across TFA and TLJ as a full on war when it's very clearly a coup. A war implies at least equal standing, but the First Order completely wrecks shop and takes over the galaxy.

ok never mind I'm fucking doing this now.

The First Order fleet we see in TLJ is *not* the entire fleet of the First Order (I don't even think Starkiller Base was their main base of operations honestly, it couldn't have been considering they were operating out of Wild Space)

I am reading through reams of late-1920s communist poetry and easily my favourite title so far is: "To a Lady who Rejected a Poem about Spring as a Petit-Bourgeois Deviation"

The last lines:
"So here's my hat into the air,
Three cheers for your amazing hair,
For coal mines, and for turbines, too,
For steel, the Comintern and you!"

A not exactly graceful (though possibly satirical) title: "Lines Disassociating Myself from Yessenin and Supporting the Otherwise Unfounded Legend that I am a Foremost Proletarian Writer"

An excerpt:
"Goodbye verses of Yessenin
Goodbye literary slop-
You are not the line of Lenin
You are not the line of WAPP

Never shall I moan a
simple lyric from the heart
I'll devote my new corona
to the proletarian art"

The poet was Joseph Freeman, who published much of his revolutionary verse in the New Masses, a stylish journal of the interwar American literary Left.

A thread of business related TV series..... Which is your favorite?

1. Billions vs Suits

2. Better call saul vs Ozark

3. Madmen vs The profit

4. Start up vs shark tank

5. Ballers vs Dirty Money

Time to lift the lid? Can you ‘live tweet’ reading a 6 year old playbook you co-wrote and it not be the be the most boring thing ever? How could something written about social media 6 years ago possibly even be relevant eh?! #StorytellingAtScale

From a creative perspective we could almost stop right here... the biggest challenge in churning out content is that you don’t give yourself the time to make exceptional content that you’d actually want millions of people to see... like your TV ads. #StorytellingAtScale

This doesn’t seem... controversial? But we gave it a whole page because frankly all too often it still is 🤷‍♂️ #StorytellingAtScale

An integrated campaign that brings the same campaign idea (and distinctive assets ideally) to life but in a way that makes sense on social...? Sounds pretty obvious. This was the output of the first ever UK ‘Publishing Garage’ workshop with Facebook & Elvis. #StorytellingAtScale

Ahh yes, perhaps not award winning creativity but let’s acknowledge FB isn’t always the biggest/broadest brand building canvas... practical occasion based (category entry point even?) content and simple reminders or prompts play a big role. #StorytellingAtScale

I have decided to take a dive into the d20 System era, so today’s game is its starting point, Dungeons & Dragons Third Edition (2000) from Wizards of the Coast. I worked at WotC from 1998 to 2002 so I was there for the development, launch, and follow-up to 3E. #CuratedQuarantine

I did no design work on the core game, but I was in roleplaying R&D, so I was involved in the internal playtesting, meetings, and discussions. Everyone involved in 3E got a Player’s Handbook with their name embossed on the front cover. The pictures show mine. #CuratedQuarantine

Now AD&D Second Edition had been published in 1989 and WotC bought the ailing TSR in 1997, so it made sense to do a new edition. The goal was to retain the core of D&D but to rationalize the rules to make them more consistent & ideally easier to learn and play. #CuratedQuarantine

In previous editions, sometimes you wanted to roll high and sometimes you wanted to roll low. Sometimes you rolled a d20 and sometimes percentile dice. A lower armor class was better than a higher one, with the result that +3 armor actually reduced your AC. #CuratedQuarantine

This is the sort of stuff that 3E addressed successfully. There was a core mechanic for everything. Roll a d20, add modifiers, and try to hit a target number (hence the d20 System). #CuratedQuarantine