Reminder To New Users: Bookish Instructions for Bluesky
The jury is still out on social media as a whole, but every now and then it brings us something delightful. (See: Bigolas Dickolas.) This morning, Bluesky — which has been growing quickly, as invites become more available — brought us the glorious hilarity of “Reminder to new users.” I’m sure it started out practically enough; the users in my feed have been very vocal about what kind of community they want it to be. But, like all things on the internet, it quickly became meme-worthy, and now there is a veritable cornucopia of pop culture, book, and media references, all advice to the noobs, all under 250 characters.
The very first one I saw was bookish (thank you, CL Polk) and while there are no hashtags on Bluesky, a search for that phrase will bring you the goods. I’ve collected some of the bookish ones that I’ve seen, added some that I think are perfect (rather than just bombarding my own timeline with them, you’re welcome), and present them to you for your own guessing enjoyment. How many can you place? Answers and shout-outs to Bluesky users at the bottom!
1. Reminder to new users:
The Wheel of Time turns, and ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legends fade to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again.
2. Reminder to new users:
Hwæt! wē Gār-Dena in gēar-dagum
þēod-cyninga þrym gefrūnon,
hū ðā æþelingas ellen fremedon.
Oft Scyld Scēfing sceaþena þrēatum,
monegum mǣgþum meodo-setla oftēah.
3. Reminder to new users:
No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream.
4. Reminder to new users:
All that you touch, You Change. All that you Change, Changes you. The only lasting truth Is Change.
5. Reminder to new users:
Much that once was is lost, for none now live who remember it
It began with the forging of the Great Rings
Three were given to the Elves, immortal, wisest and fairest of all beings
Seven to the Dwarf-Lords, great miners and craftsmen of the mountain halls
6. Reminder to new users:
The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.
7. Reminder to new users:
Hold out your hands and let me lay upon them a sheaf of freshly picked sweetgrass, loose and flowing, like newly washed hair. Golden green and glossy above, the stems are banded with purple and white
8. Reminder to new users:
A beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the balances are correct. This every sister of the Bene Gesserit knows. To begin your study of the life of Muad’Dib, then, take care that you first place him in his time
9. Reminder to new users:
When the Dark comes rising, six shall turn it back. Three from the circle, three from the track. Wood, bronze, iron, water, fire, stone. Five shall return and one go alone.
10. Reminder to new users:
Let’s start with the end of the world, why don’t we? Get it over with and move on to more interesting things.
11. Reminder to new users:
Know, oh prince, that between the years when the oceans drank Atlantis and the gleaming cities, and the years of the rise of the Sons of Aryas, there was an Age undreamed of, when shining kingdoms lay spread across the world like blue mantles beneath the stars…
12. Reminder to new users:
In the myriadic year of our Lord – the ten thousandth year of the King Undying, the kindly Prince of Death! – Gideon Nav packed her sword, her shoes, and her dirty magazines, and she escaped from the House of the Ninth.
13. Reminder to new users:
In the beginning the Universe was created.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.
14. Reminder to new users:
Ayoola summons me with these words – Korede, I killed him.
I had hoped I would never hear those words again.
15. Reminder to new users:
The island of Gont, a single mountain that lifts its peak a mile above the storm-racked Northeast Sea, is a land famous for wizards.
16. Reminder to new users:
You warned me that knowing your secret would destroy us. At first, it sat in our marriage like a blue-lipped ghost, hardly noticeable until a trick of the light drew it into focus. But you could always tell
Answers:
1. The Wheel of Time, Robert Jordan (obvi)
2. Beowulf (in the original!)
3. The Haunting of Hill House, Shirley Jackson
4. Parable of the Sower, Octavia Butler
5. The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien
6. The Dark Tower, Stephen King
7. Braiding Sweetgrass, Robin Wall Kimmerer
8. Dune, Frank Herbert
9. The Dark Is Rising, Susan Cooper
10. The Fifth Season, NK Jemisin
11. Conan the Barbarian, Robert E. Howard
12. Gideon the Ninth, Tamsyn Muir
13. Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
14. My Sister, the Serial Killer, Oyinkan Braithwaite
15. The Wizard of Earthsea, Ursula K. LeGuin
16. Last Tale of the Flower Bride, Roshani Chokshi
Shout-outs* for, in no particular order and including but not limited to, the following Bluesky users: Preeti Chhibber, Hannah Kolbeck, Max Gladstone, Jared Pechaček, and DongWon Song.
*I kept it to those who are using their full names and/or are public figures, on the assumption that they actually want you to find their accounts. All users with non-name screen names are findable in the Search, but I’ll refrain from pointing you at them directly.
Looking for more bookish quizzes? Try Can You Match The Sci-Fi Opening Line To Its Novel? and Can You Pass the Hardest Lord of the Rings Quiz?
