Andrew Cherry

I'm always trying to work out which of the things Glasman has said recently is the most obstreperously idiotic. I think "abolish the treasury" was less nakedly absurd, but, on consideration, even more fuckwitted. It's like making the classic boorish drunk uncle a peer.

divergentcoachkelly on Threads * 2h ADHD is knowing exactly what you need to do then watching yourself not do it like you're a scientist observing a very dumb experiment

10/10 take. No notes.

That's definitely the question, along with "Is this real cultural change you've observed or hypothetical/potentially fictitious cultural change you've been told about?"

One of my favourite series, layer upon layer of ideas to explore and a glimpse of cultures that are nearly tangible. The best parts of a whole slew of genres twisted together around thousands of miles of railway track...

Haha, yes, that's a valid point! It irks me slightly that they keep dressing things up in nationalised-sounding clothes, but I do get it. (Although, do we need a Great British Prefix for bloody everything?!)

I have no expertise but it seems like "sounds like some nationalisation, but really isn't, instead an additional body which is supposed to coordinate and make things work better". Which in turn seems to imply profits still flowing out to private orgs/not in (more than superficial) public interest...

Yeah, it's just such a ridiculously detached and intellectually lazy understanding of "the working class", combined with my other searing pet hatred, the idea that you have to mirror people, not lead/persuade/debate them, the total abdication of the fight for progress.

I've never been able even to understand why they want to be Labour. The initial founding statement of "...a deeply conservative socialism..." should have seen them booted from the room before they'd finished the sentence, for intellectual incoherence as much as appalling policy and bigotry.

Absolutely this, and the fact that it isn't immediately and painfully obvious to them how to sell the Good Things That Need Doing is, as much as anything, what makes people suspicious of whether they actually believe in left things at all.

Let’s take a look at the whole “there are too many black people on TV” thing, shall we?

After Pochin claimed Black people in TV adverts “made her mad”, all her supporters tried to use 👇🏼 as their excuse for why she was somehow justified in her overt racism.

Spoiler - she isn’t! 🤨

🧵
1/22

Is the difference in criminal ranking not at least partially influenced by how caught you got? Sticking the Mona Lisa under one arm and hoofing it would be bold, but non-masterful - huge, yet petty. Caught = bad, much like famous = bad for spies, surely? Ah, Mr Bond... Bugger.

About the only current option would be a Morgan Super 3, which doesn't seem practical, or in the (bigoted, moronic) spirit of what he said, but I'd be all for offering disabled people a little sports car if they could use it...

It's astonishingly daft, despite being so appalling.

It's also weird how he seems to subconsciously try to Tolkien-ise his prose: "they shall surely all die" - does he really speak like that? Although Tolkien wouldn't have suffered such ridiculous hyperbole. All of them? Every single one? Idiot.

Bizarrely, I've never really touched Python, and have no meaningful connection to it, but nevertheless - hats off to them for showing how to stand up and put principles first. Always good (if all too rare) to see a tech community with a decent moral core.

Yup, I suspect you're probably right - it would definitely require a different model of provision, and the end-state would likely be more beneficial, provided you kept motive for innovation in some form. Classic "how do you get there from here?" problem though, buried under a century of economics...

That's not to be mean, just to recognise the practical problems that kind of approach entails - right now, a company is better at moving quickly and consistently, but that's not (IMO) inherent, just a side-effect of current culture/markets/env.

Yeah that's a really interesting thought, and a good theoretical answer, potentially - except that now you've got to get all countries to agree to and implement complex interop standards, each with their own learning curve, non-shared costs, etc. We've not managed to standardise plugs globally yet.

The interesting question then becomes: what other models might exist to make something planet-scale like this? Is it a public good? Is it public digital infra? How much damage would removing competition do in terms of innovation vs. stability? It's complicated! (My catchphrase, as a consultant...)

Opinion, but... as far as I can see, it's really just economics. Cost to build + cost to run is enormous, and you therefore need a certain volume of clients to make it viable. If you had 1000 providers, 990+ of them would probably go bust. Not sure that's escapable with a purely capitalist model.

I wish people had been much better at pushing back on the "hotels" usage earlier on as well - they're ex-hotels. Now they're asylum seeker accommodation. It was wilful, but very few tried to challenge the framing. (Setting aside the point that reasonable countries don't do this at all...)

I mainly laminate mine for organisation; a well-laminated meat pantry can be easily indexed and stored in ring-binders, allowing quick and easy access to the appropriate flesh-sections as required. Think Zettelkasten, but with more ham.

like whatever your position is on AI, you would be disingenuous to deny that it was almost completely supply-driven

Also: "But we live in a time where more data about us is collected by all sorts of organisations, and often we're not even aware it's happening" is far from a good reason to just go "oh fine then, I guess if lots of people spy on me, it might as well be everyone.

"Misidentification is an important issue but as a police officer, when we did identification parades, people were unreliable too."

Yeah, this is not the compelling argument you think it is, at least, not in the direction you're attempting...

The thing to understand about fascism is that most people you know will be bought off. Bought with promises of peace and stability, bought with business opportunities or paid with actual cash. Most people aren't going to resist. Get used to it and get used to operating in that environment.

It's nice that I'd decided a while ago that I wouldn't be going to the US for any reason, but I've now expanded that to not going anywhere near the US for any reason. Worth trying to work out how to stay globally distanced...

1 Nurse: It’s become a real problem in this area 2 Nurse: We’ve seen the whole community lost to addiction 3 Show a building sign posted: Westminster ‘X’ Addiction Clinic With various Westminster people or looking at their phones outside it Nurse: Ministers, Spads, Researchers… 4 Nurse: Most mornings we’ll get a call about someone acting strangely [Nurse on phone taking a call] Ok - we’ll be right over 5 Nurse: We just have a gentle chat [Nurses approach a minister –Robert Jenrick? - standing in the Palace of Westminster Minister: I understand your concerns… 6 Nurse: Are you OK love? Minister: Yes I’m just hearing legitimate concerns from real voters 7 Nurse: That’s a robot, a Nazi and a poorly-disguised Russian [Show that the people he is talking to are precisely these characters] Nurse 2: Give us your phone, love 8 Nurse: At the clinic we put them in a Grass-Touching Pod, with a real voter to talk to [We see them back at the clinic, holding the minister's head and pushing him into a glass isolation booth with a grass floor. And it is a baffled looking woman, on a chair, ready to talk to him.] 9 Minister: YOU MUST BE WORRIED ABOUT THE COMING CIVIL WAR [woman looks baffled] 10 woman: I just want a bus service Minister: LOOK AT MY FLAG [produces a St George's flag] [ends]

Define your musical taste in eight artists

Moderat
Radiohead
Jon Hopkins
Massive Attack
Bicep
David Devant and His Spirit Wife
Orbital
The Prodigy

This came up a lot when working with MoJ years ago - "what do we do about user right to deletion, etc.?". Well, not a lot when what they want deleted is data from a CPS investigation or similar! Data laws already dealt with this, exemptions/allowances exist for obvious reasons!

Yes, those and the million surround-sound ear-level cicadas...