Lore SjöbergAug 31, 2024

I’m writing a novel. I’m not going to say much for fear of jinxing myself, but I have a couple thoughts.

1. It’s set in the present, so the characters text each other, chat on Discord, look at videos on YouTube, and so forth. It’s all perfectly reasonable; it would be weird if they didn’t text, and I do so myself all the time. But it still feels very “hello fellow kids.” #genxproblems

1/

Show threadLore SjöbergAug 31, 2024

2. On the other side of the coin, I sometimes have to rewrite because I forgot about modern technology. For instance, one character was hiding from another in a dark parking lot, and I suddenly remembered that everyone now carries a flashlight with them at all times.

3. Also, I now have to go to a parking lot at night to see how effective phone flashlights are.

2/

Show threadLore SjöbergAug 31, 2024

4. Other things I remembered mid-writing: You can reply to mysterious messages if they’re delivered via email. You can call 911 and be driven to a hospital at the same time. People around the age of 30 don’t all know what Usenet was, even if they’re tech-literate. Or what Usenet is; I guess it’s still technically around.

5. If I reference music or TV, I should probably do some research instead of making the characters fans of Pizzicato Five and Space Ghost Coast to Coast.

3/3

Show threadLore Sjöberg

Just to throw another log on, I don’t forget that phone flashlights and e-mail replies exist in real life, just when writing. So I don’t think it’s that I’m out of touch with tech, I think it’s that growing up without the Internet, I saw tropes like “mysterious note from a stranger” and “manhunt in the dark” so many times in earlier incarnations that I use them without considering that I’m going to have to update them.

Come to think of it, have I ever seen someone use a phone flashlight on TV?

Aug 31, 2024 at 9:24pmMastodon for iOS
Show threadPhogna BolognaAug 31, 2024
@loresjoberg I've become so used to seeing phones as flashlights on TV that I'm annoyed when characters forget to use them, and I'm 48. Flip side, I had a TV writer tell me he got a correction on a script where a teen checked her wristwatch instead of her phone--and that was 15 years ago! 😄
Show threadCarl MuckenhouptSep 1, 2024
@loresjoberg I always think of the film Cellular (2004) as an exercise in consciously thinking about the effect that cell phones have on thrillers and trying to come up with story beats they enable to replace the ones they disable
Show threadJohn HarrisSep 1, 2024
@loresjoberg
Phone flashlights are the kind of useful feature that I imagine Apple and Google designers lie awake at night trying to justify reasons to remove it.
Show threadWestern InfidelsSep 1, 2024
@rodneylives @loresjoberg "We've upgraded your flashlight to an infrared night-vision flashlight that requires expensive rechargeable Apple-branded accessory goggles to be useful. Don't worry, you can always use a visible light flashlight through an extra-cost dongle."
Show threadjharishSep 1, 2024

@loresjoberg Funny that you are trying to write a novel in the 'Modern World' since most written fiction tends not to be modern because if you include a website, even one that is major and currently popular, you might end up with something like 'They all met on MySpace' and people won't even know what you're talking about.

Why not world build a fantasy world that is very similar to the modern world just with a few differences that come around when you write them?

Show threadLore SjöbergSep 1, 2024
@jharish For reasons.