Robin Sloan

Quotes by Robin Sloan

People want things to be real. If you give them an excuse, they'll believe you.
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So I guess you could say Neel owes me a few favors, except that so many favors have passed between us now that they are no longer distinguishable as individual acts, just a bright haze of loyalty. Our friendship is a nebula.
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The Golden Horn of Griffo is finely wrought, Zenodotus said, tracing his finger along the curve of Telemach's treasure. And the magic is in its making alone. Do you understand? There is no sorcery here..."Magic is not the only power in this world," the old mage said gently, handing the horn back to its royal owner. —Griffo made an instrument so perfect that even the dead must rise to hear its call. He made it with his hands, without spells or dragon-songs. I wish that I could do the same.
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Walking the stacks in a library, dragging your fingers across the spines -- it's hard not to feel the presence of sleeping spirits.
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After that, the book will fade, the way all books fade in your mind. But I hope you will remember this:A man walking fast down a dark lonely street. Quick steps and hard breathing, all wonder and need. A bell above a door and the tinkle it makes. A clerk and a ladder and warm golden light, and then: the right book exactly, at exactly the right time.
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It was a fungal party hellscape.
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America pays defense contractors to build aircraft carriers. Google pays brilliant programmers to do whatever the hell they want.
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Neel cuts in: Where'd you grow up?Palo Alto, she says. From there to Stanford to Google: for a girl obsessed with the outer limits of human potential, Kat has stayed pretty close to home. Neel nods knowingly. The suburban mind cannot comprehend the emergent complexity of a New York sidewalk.I don't know about that, Kat says, narrowing her eyes. I'm pretty good with complexity.See, I know what you're thinking, Neel says, shaking his head.You're thinking it's just an agent-based simulation, and everybody out here follows a pretty simple set of rules-- Kat is nodding--and if you can figure out those rules, you can model it. You can simulate the street, then the neighborhood, then the whole city. Right?Exactly. I mean, sure, I don't know what the rules are yet, but I could experiment and figure them out, and then it would be trivial-- Wrong, Neel says, honking like a game-show buzzer. You can't do it. Even if you know the rules-- and by the way, there are no rules--but even if there were, you can't model it. You know why?My best friend and my girlfriend are sparring over simulations. I can only sit back and listen. Kat frowns. Why?You don't have enough memory.Oh, come on--Nope. You could never hold it all in memory. No computer's big enough. Not even your what's-it-called--The Big Box.That's the one. It's not big enough. This box-- Neel stretches out his hands, encompasses the sidewalk, the park, the streets beyond--is bigger.The snaking crowd surges forward.
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America pays defense contractors to build aircraft carriers. Google pays brilliant programmers to do whatever the hell they want.
Read quote
Walking the stacks in a library, dragging your fingers across the spines -- it's hard not to feel the presence of sleeping spirits.
Read quote
The Golden Horn of Griffo is finely wrought, Zenodotus said, tracing his finger along the curve of Telemach's treasure. And the magic is in its making alone. Do you understand? There is no sorcery here..."Magic is not the only power in this world," the old mage said gently, handing the horn back to its royal owner. —Griffo made an instrument so perfect that even the dead must rise to hear its call. He made it with his hands, without spells or dragon-songs. I wish that I could do the same.
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Neel cuts in: Where'd you grow up?Palo Alto, she says. From there to Stanford to Google: for a girl obsessed with the outer limits of human potential, Kat has stayed pretty close to home. Neel nods knowingly. The suburban mind cannot comprehend the emergent complexity of a New York sidewalk.I don't know about that, Kat says, narrowing her eyes. I'm pretty good with complexity.See, I know what you're thinking, Neel says, shaking his head.You're thinking it's just an agent-based simulation, and everybody out here follows a pretty simple set of rules-- Kat is nodding--and if you can figure out those rules, you can model it. You can simulate the street, then the neighborhood, then the whole city. Right?Exactly. I mean, sure, I don't know what the rules are yet, but I could experiment and figure them out, and then it would be trivial-- Wrong, Neel says, honking like a game-show buzzer. You can't do it. Even if you know the rules-- and by the way, there are no rules--but even if there were, you can't model it. You know why?My best friend and my girlfriend are sparring over simulations. I can only sit back and listen. Kat frowns. Why?You don't have enough memory.Oh, come on--Nope. You could never hold it all in memory. No computer's big enough. Not even your what's-it-called--The Big Box.That's the one. It's not big enough. This box-- Neel stretches out his hands, encompasses the sidewalk, the park, the streets beyond--is bigger.The snaking crowd surges forward.
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So I guess you could say Neel owes me a few favors, except that so many favors have passed between us now that they are no longer distinguishable as individual acts, just a bright haze of loyalty. Our friendship is a nebula.
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After that, the book will fade, the way all books fade in your mind. But I hope you will remember this:A man walking fast down a dark lonely street. Quick steps and hard breathing, all wonder and need. A bell above a door and the tinkle it makes. A clerk and a ladder and warm golden light, and then: the right book exactly, at exactly the right time.
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People want things to be real. If you give them an excuse, they'll believe you.
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It was a fungal party hellscape.
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I love the web, but man, I look at my browser, and there are, like, twenty tabs up there, all jostling for space and time, all framed by a mosaic of other apps, other work, other entertainment... so even when I really am paying attention to something on the web, there's this peripheral haze.
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There's certainly satire written about techies, but it's so snarky and snide and doesn't treat him as a whole person. The people I worked with at Twitter - they're very analytical, but they're also deep and thoughtful - I feel like they deserved a charismatic spokesperson.
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'Gone Home' is a game about exploration, and everything you'll experience is tied intimately to the space of the spooky house around you. Your task is simple: Poke around.
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The stimulation I get from my phone does not feel like the opposite of boredom to me. It actually feels like a different flavor of boredom... a twitchier flavor. And sometimes, it's almost more irritation than stimulation. It's an itch.
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