January 21, 2021
John thinks that arguments should be more nuanced, Alison disagrees in every conceivable way, and Liz summarises.
Please email your letters of comment to octothorpecast@gmail.com and use #OctothorpeCast or tag @OctothorpeCast when you post about the show on social media.
A graph of Hugo finalists with more than four names:

January 7, 2021
John edited a podcast, Alison ran all the parties, and Liz programmed a convention.
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December 24, 2020
John was on time because he’s stuck at home, Alison was on time because she’s stuck at home, and Liz was late because she was having her toes done.
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December 10, 2020
John went to bed before Alison, Alison is not at all sleepy or hungover, and Liz had a better offer.
Please email your letters of comment to octothorpecast@gmail.com and use #OctothorpeCast or tag @OctothorpeCast when you post about the show on social media.
- Buy our merchandise!
- Letters of comment:
- Gather
- Virtual Reality
- DisCon III polled members on a potential date change to December 2021
- Hugo for video games? We like video games
- Poetry corner!
- You might have just run an online Punctuation
- But Octothorpe still had a clear obligation:
- What must you do in the con’s aftermath?
- Ducking a challenge would seem quite pathetic;
- So would a lie – but here’s proof, quite magnetic:
- Covered in Weetabix, John in the bath…
- Our theme music is Fanfare for Space by Kevin MacLeod, used under a CC BY 3.0 license.
November 26, 2020
John is bathing with Weetabix, Alison is eating a croissant, and Liz has good hearing.
November 12, 2020
John, Alison, and Liz are QUITE BUSY
Please email your letters of comment to octothorpecast@gmail.com and use #OctothorpeCast when you post about the show on social media.
October 29, 2020
John has finished his TAFF report, Alison wants you to upgrade to Zoom 5.3, and Liz ate a cake.
Please email your letters of comment to octothorpecast@gmail.com and use #OctothorpeCast when you post about the show on social media.
- You can now join Punctuation.
- Letters of comment:
- “Crazy” Dave Mansfield
- I have a longer form of this in draft, but just wanted to say that I’ve listened to 11 to 14 this morning. And it was really amusing hearing the shift from reviewing online conventions, to worrying that the wrong format was getting to be a tradition, to it being clear (with hindsight) that you were going to run one. Then episode 15 running with that as an accidental gag of failing to announce it was perfect. Hopefully I’ll finish the actual LOC today.
- If Zoom is methadone for con social spaces, and Discord paracetamol, is Octothorpe one of those double blind trials, where it turns out placebo is better than the current version?
- Claire Brialey of Croydon
- ”…the Discord chat has already made me feel quite fannish - i.e. interested and engaged and amused and occasionally irritated.”
- “…please continue with your attempts to baffle Neil Gaiman by sending him a corner of a completed jigsaw puzzle.”
- “If that all becomes too difficult, you could probably achieve the same immediate effect by sending him some Weetabix.”
- FIYAH Literary Magazine
- Essence of Wonder’s weekendly panels
- Ineffable Con 2
- Using Game Design to Make Virtual Events More Social
- Punctuation has a venue to tell us what you miss about conventions and socialising in the pandemic.
- Staying sane in the apocalypse
- Our theme music is Fanfare for Space by Kevin MacLeod, used under a CC BY 3.0 license.
October 15, 2020
John is an internet historian, Alison is an investigative journalist, and Liz is a time-traveller.
Please email your letters of comment to octothorpecast@gmail.com and use #OctothorpeCast when you post about the show on social media.
October 1, 2020
John, Alison and Liz are running a convention.
Please email your letters of comment to octothorpecast@gmail.com and use #OctothorpeCast when you post about the show on social media.
Poetry corner!
Claire Brialey’s poem:
This isn’t prose; perhaps it makes it better.
At least it’s all in email, not a letter.
Discussing podcasts makes you rather meta,
And less is more, so let’s not get courgetter.
Mark Plummer’s clerihew:
Alison Scott’s erudition
Does not enslave her to tradition
But John’s misuse of the word “plethora”
Will be the death of her
September 17, 2020
John is making a podcast, Alison is gone again, and Liz is chairing GlobeCon™.
Please email your letters of comment to octothorpecast@gmail.com and use #OctothorpeCast when you post about the show on social media!