Marc-André asked Charles Stross:

Hi Charlie. I just finish A Fire Upon the Deep by Venor Vinge. I enjoyed it a lot and see you gave it 5 stars on Goodreads. How influencial was Vinge's novel when you wrote the short stories that composed Accelerando? Thanks.

Charles Stross AFUtD wasn't a direct influence on "Accelerando" at all—but it was a strong influence on "Singularity Sky"/"Iron Sunrise"; meanwhile, Vernor's essay on The Technological Singularity from 1993 bears reading if you're interested in "Accelerando". He asserted, among other things, that you can't actually tell stories about the singularity, only about the prior conditions and what it's like afterwards: in "Accelerando" I deliberately tried to prove him wrong. (In "Accelerando" the singularity happens off-stage midway through "Router", at the point when the passengers are arguing about whether it's possible/when it happened ... in an upload realm aboard a coke-can sized starship, which is the real tell.)

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