> I'm gonna shit on scientific and technological progress, because I can't have a career as a sci-fi writer if the -fi parts become real too fast
This is not a fair characterization: cstross wrote several novels about singularities or set in post-singularity universes decades ago - before the current LLM hype. I suspect he has thought more about a/the singularity than those he is criticizing in TFA. He even wrote blog posts about why he doesn't write singularity-related stories anymore (six[1] years before Transformers, and the "Attention is All You Need" paper). Those timelines do not match your interpretation of him being salty about tech moving too fast.
You dismissal sounds a little shallow: there's more to sci-fi than AI, and he doesn't just write sci-fi - his Merchant Princess and Laundry Files books are fantastic.
He's also very specifically said that he would like the world to slow down so he can finish stories before they're obsoleted by reality. This is why Halting State got one sequel rather than two: http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2013/12/psa-why-...
> He's also very specifically said that he would like the world to slow down so he can finish stories before they're obsoleted by reality
My read is that he says it with tongue very much in cheek. So it's not that his stories are obsoleted but overtaken by reality, making the plot appear to be inspired by recent events - no author wants to be seen as unimaginative. Also, it has happened to him multiple times - he had to scuttle another go at a Halting State sequel scheduled for 2022 which pivoted around a (then fictional) global pandemic[1]
This is not a fair characterization: cstross wrote several novels about singularities or set in post-singularity universes decades ago - before the current LLM hype. I suspect he has thought more about a/the singularity than those he is criticizing in TFA. He even wrote blog posts about why he doesn't write singularity-related stories anymore (six[1] years before Transformers, and the "Attention is All You Need" paper). Those timelines do not match your interpretation of him being salty about tech moving too fast.
You dismissal sounds a little shallow: there's more to sci-fi than AI, and he doesn't just write sci-fi - his Merchant Princess and Laundry Files books are fantastic.
1. https://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2011/06/reality...