Remote

Katherine Alejandra Cross

@Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop

Sociologist | Mistress of Information Systems | Techie TransLatina Ph.D Candidate at the University of Washington iSchool | Researching: online harassment, shame, content moderation, and anti-social behaviour.

Essays and articles everywhere, but most especially WIRED Ideas these days. I yearn for the robot uprising. (She/Her)

0 Followers

0 Following

18 Posts

Joined December 10, 2022

Fedified::

https://fedified.com/@Quinnae_Moon

Patreon::

https://www.patreon.com/KatherineCross

Bluesky::

@quinnaemoon.bsky.social

Posts

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · Mar 16, 2024

@alis@orphaned.monster There is! You just have to preorder from regional retailers. We're working on Australian/NZ distribution, but Aussies have successfully preordered from British retailers like Blackwell's.

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · Mar 16, 2024

Hello, Wandering Shoppers! Preorders are live for my forthcoming book, "Log Off: Why Posting and Politics (Almost) Never Mix," my critical look at why a lot of online activism tends to fail, and how most social media tends to cause us to dissolve into drama-mongering--which we, in turn, pretend is activism.

Is this all the praxis that posting was supposed to be? No, and the failures of the last decade make that clear. But, hope remains in logging off more often!

https://www.littlepuss.net/logoff

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · Dec 05, 2023

I think I've truly arrived as a Wandering Shopper now that I've got some actual spec fic to share (and to hawk, as well).

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · Dec 05, 2023

Also, my fellow Mastodonians, my good friend (who, mysteriously, has never been seen in the same room as me) Serena Thorne, has put forth a sci-fi erotica series called Cosmic Odyssey that's a loving send up of Star Trek with a sexy twist. I would... I mean, *she* would appreciate a look-in at her Patreon.

https://www.patreon.com/CosmicOdyssey

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · Dec 03, 2023

In other news, I'm also doing game reviews for Australia's Only Good Newspaper, The Saturday Paper.

This week, I take a look at I Was a Teenage Excolonist, which might just be the best visual novel I've ever played--with all the loveliest refinements of that genre, but the scope of something far larger and grander, to tell a sci-fi story that's somewhere between a LeGuin philosophical novel and Edge of Tomorrow.

https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/culture/games/2023/12/02/i-was-teenage-exocolonist#mtr

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · Dec 03, 2023

@attacus@aus.social Oh hey! Thank you so much. <3 Yes, I'm reviewing games for TSP now.

Really enjoying it so far! It's my favourite newspaper in the country and I'm so chuffed to be able to write for them.

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · Dec 03, 2023

Whew, it's been a minute! A hell of a busy quarter at UW, and more than a little futzing around with Bluesky.

But also... I've been writing [SECRET PROJECT] and also writing a massive sci-fi project. The latter truly makes me feel like I, at last, truly belong on Wandering Shop!

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · Aug 18, 2023

Sorry I've not been around much; I've been absorbed in writing, BG3, more writing, and a dash of Star Trek Online.

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · Jul 22, 2023

Hello, fellow Mastholes! It's my latest Wired piece, fresh forged between the hammers of controversy and praise.

Herein I critique both Reddit and Bluesky for undermining good moderation practise. Reddit corporate forced a minor correction on something that wasn't worth fighting over--but it is clear that their vision of volunteer moderation is, for now, diverging sharply from that of the moderators who have built the site.

Bluesky, meanwhile, well... read on.

https://www.wired.com/story/reddit-bluesky-moderation/

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · Jul 19, 2023

Got an article about content moderation failures on Reddit and Bluesky coming out tomorrow.

By the way, if you're *on* Bluesky and want to find me, I'm @quinnaemoon.bsky.social

I'm trying to participate in the life of all sites I'm on, but I'm finding that I have less time/inclination? And that feels like a good thing.

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · Jul 13, 2023

I see Bluesky has entered its "Welcome to Hell, motherfuckers! *cackles wildly*" stage.

The 'ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny' theory of social media remains undefeated.

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · Jul 13, 2023

My latest on Wired is up!

This one is a little riskier in terms of its premise, but I'd been planning this one for a while. Analogising all the Twitter clone sites to the many, often failed attempts to clone World of Warcraft.

I ask how these situations are alike, how they're different, and what we can learn.

The gist is that rather than getting a true Twitter *replacement*, the age of microblogging may be well and truly over.

https://www.wired.com/story/twitter-threads-platforms-games/

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · Jun 06, 2023

@stavvers@masto.ai (I'm something else)

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · May 19, 2023

Are you ready for the phrase "serving cunt" to become totally meaningless as it's pile-driven into the ground?

Because it's about to join the ranks of words like "triggered," "gaslight," and about 36% of AAVE in having its meaning utterly appropriated and destroyed by runaway meme culture.

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · Apr 28, 2023

Replying to @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop

But in any population there's always going to be someone with wacky, outre, hyper-extreme views completely untethered from reality. When you see them shouting on a streetcorner at passersby who are all studiously ignoring them or, at best, pitying them, you have appropriate context for their significance. Social media doesn't give that to you. It, instead, sends a lot of confusing signals. And when one of them is a huge account saying "this is a growing problem!" it skews your perceptions.

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · Apr 28, 2023

Replying to @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop

So when you take something like, say, for instance an open threat of genocide from a tiny account and amplify it, you're implicitly misleading people about the prevalence and popularity of such ideas. After all, if something pops up on your feed or your timeline or whatever, that immediately gives it pride of place. And you may subconsciously overestimate its significance or popularity because of that.

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · Apr 28, 2023

Replying to @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop

This plays into the dynamics I spoke about in my Wired piece and on the CMD podcast. There's a way in which most social media platforms can distort one's perception of the popularity of extreme points of view. Something going viral on a platform is not the same as a scientific poll showing widespread agreement with whatever idea or policy was espoused, point-blank. Write it on the blackboard a thousand times: virality is not a scientific poll.

Katherine Alejandra Cross @Quinnae_Moon@wandering.shop · Apr 28, 2023

I feel like I'm going to have to get this carved on my tombstone, I swear to the Goddess:

Look, if you have a huge platform on whatever social media site you're on (including this one) you do not, under any circumstances, have to show your followers something fucked up that a troll with *checks* 29 followers said.

Indeed, you are likely doing that person a huge favour by giving them access to your vastly larger audience. Maybe consider that, and consider how you may be needlessly terrorising.

Remote instance

wandering.shop

Open on original server

Katherine Alejandra Cross

Posts

Remote instance

Media