J.D. Moyer

science fiction author, beatmaker, against fascism

Category: Oakland Page 1 of 3

Recovering from World Fantasy Convention in Oakland

By

On October 25, 2026

In Creative Work/Career, Oakland, Writing

I’m resting up after three days at World Fantasy in Oakland. Overall, I’m glad I went, but I also had a few low points…

I’ll start with the bad/uncomfortable:

  • Some of the smaller conference rooms were poorly ventilated (though no fault of the organizers)
  • Some cringey social awkwardness among adults who are enthusiastic about make believe, myself included (but that’s par for the course when going to sci-fi and fantasy cons)
  • There was no way to purchase a ticket if you didn’t pre-register, which excluded a friend who was happy to pay
  • Getting hard-pitched by an author in the expo hall trying very hard to sell me his epic fantasy series

But many highlights!

  • Listening to Ted Chiang talk about the ideas and philosophies behind his stories, as well as how the movie Arrival got made
  • Listening to an interview with Robert Silverberg (Lord Valentine’s Castle was one of the novels that inspired me to write SFF)
  • Attending a reading where my friend Beth Dawkins read two excellent stories
  • Another reading where I heard some intriguing work in progress from Paolo Bacigalupi
  • Learning about the career and artistic process of artist Stephanie Law
  • Meeting some new writers and getting to know others a bit better, despite the fact that I wasn’t feeling particularly social or extroverted

I rarely write fantasy, and this was my first fantasy-only con. But attending was a no-brainer since it was so ridiculously convenient, and both friends and favorite authors attending.

Next up, maybe ’27 Nebulas in Seattle (again, pretty convenient).

What Gig Needs to Do to Succeed

By

On December 16, 2017

In Alternative Economics, Oakland

Almost two years ago our family embarked on a “One Month No Car Experiment” that has extended nearly two years. Since our daughter switched schools to one that is not within easy walking distance, we’ve once again been considering buying or leasing a car. But carpooling with our friends and the existence of the East Bay car-sharing service Gig has allowed us to postpone that decision, perhaps indefinitely.

Read More

I Have Seen the Future of Local Transportation

By

On July 17, 2017

In Alternative Economics, Lifestyle Experiments, Oakland


As regular readers know, my family gave up our car about a year-and-a-half ago. Our lease ended, we turned in the car, and we didn’t get another one. The idea was to go one month without a car and see if we could get around with biking, walking, public transportation, Lyft, and the occasional rental.

Overall the experiment has been a success. I’ve written about the experience at length in the followings posts:

Read More

How To Be Less Racist

By

On December 18, 2016

In Culture Rants/Shares, Metaprogramming, Oakland, Politics


In the United States and Europe, racists are coming out of the woodwork, freely expressing views that were considered taboo only a year ago. Concerns about terrorism and economic security (some valid, some exaggerated) are amplified and directed broadly at people of color, most of whom have nothing to do with terrorism or the availability of jobs. This racism was always there, but it’s more dangerous now that it’s moving into the mainstream (including aspects of our federal government). Some of the dangers, specifically, are harassment and violence against non-whites (including police violence), voter disenfranchisement, and deportation of immigrants (some legal, some undocumented, many if not most vital to our national economy).

Other problems with open racism include social discord and a divisive sense of “us vs. them” pervading our national consciousness. More severe, dystopian outcomes of open racism might include internment camps for Muslims, reversals of civil rights protections, harassment or murder of civil rights activists (including journalists), use of lethal force against peaceful protestors, or even “ethnic cleansing” scenarios (genocide). Big problems, in other words.

I guess one potential benefit of racist attitudes being openly expressed is that it opens the door to conversation, debate, and the potential for attitudes to shift. That’s the purpose of this post: to influence those who might feel racist but are open to non-racist perspectives.

I’ve been reading some Alt-Right blogs and trying to better understand where this racism comes from (I won’t say which ones, because attention and web traffic fuels these hate blogs). From what I’ve read so far, the Alt-Right openly-racist/white-supremacist perspective looks something like this:

Read More

How I’m Voting

By

On October 23, 2016

In Oakland, Politics

An AC Transit bus that helped deliver seniors to the polls in the 1990's,

An AC Transit bus that helped deliver seniors to the polls in the 1990’s,

This year I’ve decided to share how I’m voting, as an experiment. Sometimes I just ask my wife how she’s voting, and copy her (since we agree on most political issues, and she always does the research), but this year I actually did the research myself. I’ve tried to make notes that get to the crux of the issue, at least from my own perspective. My bias is generally liberal, leaning libertarian on personal freedoms, leaning social democrat on economic policy. I’m more of a pragmatist than an idealist, and for political decision making I favor an empirical approach (what has worked before in similar situations/environments).

I don’t expect anyone to agree with all of my choices, but maybe some readers will find the information to be helpful in making their own choices (somewhere out there is my perfect “mirror-image” voter: one who makes the opposite choice in every category). I hope you find my notes to be useful, even if you end up voting a different way. Let me know in the comments.

Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.… – Winston Churchill

Read More

Page 1 of 3

Next

Powered by WordPress & Theme by Anders Norén