Probably ’cause the government’s back off holiday and has started doing things again.
Educational Technologist, in HE. Father/husband. Writer. Brightonian/ex-Tokyoite. DJ/podcaster. European. Transitionist. (Occasional) Musician. Not necessarily in that order?
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Probably ’cause the government’s back off holiday and has started doing things again.
Wikipedia editors trying to fend off the onslaught of AI crap have crowdsourced some telltale signs of LLM-generated writing; it might be handy for editors and proofreaders generally. Thanks to @ellenrykers.com for pointing me to it. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikiped...
Ah, good to know - will check it out…
Yeah, that’s absolutely a thing too.
The last one (us) did Suez on the way down and then eventually sought sanctuary in the European Community…
Would park this in the same category as China’s recent exponential adoption of renewable energies. A geopolitical strategy in the face of opposing constraints that happens to also be good for the environment (rather than being specifically driven by that goal).
No worries. Am ultimately looking to build an educational offer that is both interdisciplinary and inter-institutional, but the first part of that is complex enough! Interesting to hear about your involvement in HE. UoE = Edinburgh?
No problem - very welcome to!
If you’re ever looking for guests to talk about education for sustainability, particularly in the university sector and with an interdisciplinary focus, I have stories 😊
Most recent guest episode (Pedagodzilla): open.spotify.com/episode/2ct8... Series I cohosted (Teaching Here And There): open.spotify.com/show/0XJC8Zq... (2/2)
I’ve taken part in a few over the years, but don’t currently have a regular one to call my own (though have a forthcoming episode of Talking Higher Ed where I’ll be intersecting with sustainability and podcasting for the first time). (1/2)
Just had the same thought…
Takes me back to an academic paper I read over a decade ago suggesting that advertising would not happen on mobile devices as the screens were too small.
That was fascinating. We have major, major changes ahead. Even 2019 feels like decades ago now!
Kinda feels like whatever fossil-aligned fascists might prefer to be the case, the coming energy revolution will be far more epochal than the other revolutionary narrative being pushed by Silicon Valley.
Migrants didn't cut council funding. Migrants didn't cut NHS funding. Migrants didn't close youth centres. Migrants didn't sell off council houses. Migrants aren't filling our rivers with sewage. Farage and co. will tell you to point the finger at migrants. Don't fall for it.
I think it’s not so much a case that it’s actually running out - no doubt there would be many more years of extraction ahead if we wanted to. It’s more a case of the cost of extraction is beginning to exceed the return on it. Energy Return On Investment (EROI) and all that.
Thanks for the recommendation. It’s been in my feed a while - will make time for it.
The folks in the picture thinking ‘Oh yeah, last year we weren’t a fascist autocracy’…
as @70sbachchan.bsky.social emphasizes, this is **the** major geopolitical shift of this century.
What’s the collective noun for ‘Sputnik moments’? And, what if, in China protecting its own economic interests by going green instead of staying hooked on Western fossil fuels, inadvertently kick starts global decentralisation of economic power (with the Americans having abandoned global trade)?
Britain I guess at least had the excuse of being immersed in a major war while all the European imperial powers fell in on each other. America doesn’t have that - it’s doing this by choice.
Remembering now who immediately followed Boris Johnson…
As the summer draws to a close, here’s a collection of photos I took on my first solitary ramble around West Sussex’s #Knepp Wildland project, just as spring was breaking out. #rewilding #NatureBasedSolutions #conservancy #sustainability #nature www.flickr.com/photos/globa...
Have long said that he’s going to go out like Elvis. A very American death.
I know we’re only halfway through the decade, but gotta ask - is the lesson of the 2020s going to be ’there was a massive pandemic at the start of it that they found a solution to but then everyone went mad because no-one could face up to what the real implications of that pandemic were’?
The enticing prospect of Peak Oil hitting DURING Trump 2.0 is a delight to entertain…
Can I just give a 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼 for naming it the ‘Missing Lynx Project’?
Being old enough to remember the web as a non-commercial space, I avoid the top of a Google search anyway due to the clustering of ads at the top. But this is way more annoying as I’m making an active choice whether to view the ads whereas this just starts generating whether I use it or not.
Assuming Middlemarch still doesn’t have any pictures though…
In other words, either the US is over and ends with Trump, or he goes down in the same annals that include native genocide, slavery, Jim Crow, prohibition, McCarthyism and the War on Terror, and then the experiment continues on the other side.
You kinda have to seek out crumbs of comfort at times like this. And mine is that the passing of Trump, when it comes, will have an impact felt in people’s heads that could even be positive. The idea of America has so many dark points along its 250-year story, but also a history of lighter ones.
The consolation - perhaps - being that while Vance would be worse, he also wouldn’t have the same cult-like grip on such a large part of the population, thus making his admin even more brittle. Right?
(scrolls frantically for evidence it might be true)
Jack White *absolutely* on fire here!
Very much like it. This NEEDS to be the solar century, and with a little imagination, it can be. Might also be a pretty good antidote to fascism too.
‘Garden: Yes’
Had the same question
Earlier this year, I gave my first talk at the annual #HCID conference I’d often attended (& learned so much from). Put a lot into preparing the talk, on the theme of ‘paradigm shift’ & about the climate module I’m involved in. Finally got round to publishing it. dompates.medium.com/battling-mon...
All the more reason for doing it, I’d say.
Anti-fascist should be an MVP (minimum viable position) for ANY candidate in the US that stands for election from this point on…
‘If democracy were easy, everyone would do it.’
Illinois Gov. Pritzker vows to pursue Trump officials who participate in an illegal National Guard deployment to Chicago: "If you hurt my people, nothing will stop me - not time or political circumstance - from making sure that you face justice under our constitutional rule of law."
Utterly glorious!
Took the #drone out today and got 20m of flight time, capturing the sun setting over the South Downs. Beginning to develop more confidence in my abilities to navigate and fly the thing by now, its 5th proper flight. It’s interesting how much our countryside becomes ‘managed farmland’ from up there.
Paris has removed the paving from its city hall square and transformed it into an urban forest. Stunning! 🤩
I just don’t know how you get through life with that much bile inside of you…
Demagafication, when it comes, is going to have to run so so deep.
Hell of a way to rehabilitate Nixon’s reputation, by having someone far, far worse (and atm seemingly untouchable) in the White House.
Laws of gravity and all that…
Goodness me, that was marvellous…
Collapse of the Oil Age’s tough on a lotta folks…
Never got as far as adopting Tumblr, but abandoning Twitter felt pretty familiar after having already done so with Facebook and MySpace. Rarely even use Google for search any more either, when there’s Ecosia and DuckDuckGo on offer…
Ever more vital given the political turn that things have taken since the book came out (sorry to mention). Helps with the ‘hope amidst the darkness’ thing and *my goodness* do we have so many solutions in place already!
"By ensuring that European markets would be dependent on US oil, the Marshall Plan prevented the Soviet Union from wielding its own energy influence over the continent." @markblyth.bsky.social @danieldrisc.com put Trump's anti-decarb politics in context. www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/t...
UK online safety law in practice.
Even a non-organic ‘intelligence’ wouldn’t be *that* stupid…
Are his hats getting stupider with each one he puts on?
Can’t see those midterms being free and fair…
Usually one category error is enough to make the general premise questionable of a piece of writing. Four, though..?
‘Learn as much as possible while we still can’ is quite the statement for the moment…
The tail end of the (mainly Californian) intersection between the optimism of the hippy era and that of the early digital age, where even some of the people were the same. And then some people realised they could make more money from the Internet than ever in history (plus the fascists got it).
Taking a look at what China’s doing in that space is pretty remarkable. No interest in ‘culture warring’ any of the climate tech stuff - they just realise that it’s all simply better and more efficient than fossil-run societies.
Indeed - good point (though I’m sure there was billions of VC $s washing around in the late 90s too that kept these things afloat then). Re: your indie AIs, I suspect that the launch of DeepSeek will end up looking like a major milestone when this story gets told, after the wave has crested.
This is the thing I hold onto at the moment, which is that this particular iteration of fascism has forgotten ‘the other side of the US’ that is profoundly against this sort of sh*t. I know that the fascists have nukes this time. They’re also highly incompetent and the cult leader’s really old.
As a ‘veteran’ (observer) of the Dot Com bubble bursting, I can confidently confirm that people still made websites after the bubble burst. In fact, people probably made more websites since than they did during the boom. For what this comment is worth…
Exactly. I’m sure Freud would have a field day with the people making (and inspiring) this sort of junk.
Exception being the guy in the dark suit.
Passing resemblances to Macron and von de Leyen, but doesn’t *really* even look like any of them either. God, this stuff is all so lame.
Perhaps they rather like them. Which would be…bad. Or maybe they’re afraid of them. Which would be…worse? (not sure I’ve got these the right way round)
‘Vibe thinking’?
Dylan said ‘money doesn’t talk, it swears’. Same applies to history too. These foul people are raiding America’s back catalogue of darkest moments for the ‘greatest hits’ they can find.
Which will make it a very odd autumn
Yeah, I spotted that too. Was in London last week in a very leafy area and it looked like mid-autumn! But given how summer seemed to start in the springtime, shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise.
Absolutely delighted to be making my debut on the award-winning #Pedagodzilla podcast! Brought a twisted take on the classics, with a look at #VR through Homer’s Odyssey. Meant too that @markchilds.bsky.social and @r3beccaf.bsky.social helped me get started properly on my pending book chapter.
Solid view right there
It’s hard as hell to shine a light on the path ahead, but doesn’t half make it easier for others to see the way(s) ahead…
‘Exhuming McCarthy’, as REM once said…
Just watched ‘Everything, Everywhere, All At Once’, for the first time. In VR. Well, that was intense!
For optimal usability, especially on mobile, key actions should be positioned in the bottom center or middle half to two-thirds of the screen to be accessible to both left and right hands. www.smashingmagazine.com/2025/07/desi...
…just a straightforward switch because, on so many levels, renewable energies are just better. And can I just also say that ‘electrostate’ is a *great* band name!
This is pretty fascinating to read, particularly when the US has gone so doggedly in the opposite direction. China have been very strategic and purposeful in switching how the country is powered, from fossil to renewable, in just a decade. There doesn’t even seem to be a making of the moral case…
Have just started my very first audiobook, and it’s ’What If We Get It Right?’ by @ayanaeliza.bsky.social. Ayana, I am *so* glad that you wrote this vital book! #ClimateSolutions
Global warming is a deliberate policy of death for the poor, sick and vulnerable. A global necropolitics. jksteinberger.medium.com/climate-necr...
Seems big. And plausible, as a strategy. At least it’s sign of a fight back…
Friends (esp if you live in CA) we REALLY need signatures on this petition supporting Bill AB412 - the AI Copyright Transparency Act. TLDR = this will require AI corps to be transparent about what is in their datasets! Signing takes 1 min. Once you sign, PLEASE SHARE!! tinyurl.com/4uxbp963
Ah, the infamous three-legged chipmunk…
A little history tonight on The Thursday Night Show, as I take a look at Aug 14th in music. Join me on ttns.uk in the chatroom from 23:00 (UK time) for a highly eclectic music of tunes from several continents and decades.
Made him feel bad about American history? Welcome to American history, kid! (British history in similar ballpark)
I kind of wish that microphones would automatically and reflexively develop an allergic reaction whenever he came anywhere near them. All microphones. If we end up as ancestors to anyone at all when this is all over, they’ll look back and ask how we put up with so much stupid for so long.
These people are so dense that I’m surprised they don’t fall over from heads that are too heavy to hold up.
The British government is clearly not up to the moment we find ourselves in. Could be worse, obviously, but still not good.
Symptom, not cause, and all that.
Always please the king. That’s the rule.
City Hall has triggered a high air pollution alert for Tuesday 12 August as hot weather is expected to increase pollutant levels. We're urging Londoners to look after themselves, stop their engines idling, and refrain from burning wood or garden waste.
It doesn’t make it much consolation to remember that this is what Labour PMs always do when in power (try to ‘look tough’ on immigration). What I struggle with is how to get to this when being a leading human rights lawyer is a major part of your career story.
And that you couldn’t make a phone call at the same time as you were online, because they both used the same line.
Fascinating essay that suggests societal collapse is not always as catastrophic as we make it out to be (though whether that would be the case in the collapse of a globalised society also remains to be seen)…
Progress made on pending chapter ‘A Virtual Odyssey’: - debut recording for podcast #Pedagodzilla about the chapter (due next month) - dug into concepts of #PostDigital and #autoethnography Now unpacking the notion of a #LearningJourney. Seems to be used more as a metaphor than a theory, right?
'1984. Part 1, Chapter 4. The process of changing history and the past, it was Winston’s job to falsify the records.' Modern politicians seem to use 1984 as an operating manual (see also Ofwat, Ofgem etc. etc.) ++ungood, to coin a phrase.