Helen Dawson

Upload boring document/ URL to Google notebook LM and choose the explainer video option?

Covid inquiry live updates: UK did 'too little, too late', leading to thousands more Covid deaths, says inquiry The inquiry says an earlier lockdown could have saved 23,000 lives in the first wave in England - and lockdown could have been avoided altogether with earlier interventions.

TLDR: We washed our hands while they sat on theirs.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/cm...

#covidinquiry

WORD OF THE DAY.

Excellent.

To give up spreadsheets for forty days.

It’s not necessarily about you. People subscribe in the moment but periodically spring clean. By changing platform, you’re now back on their radar and have given them a prompt to unsubscribe. Just like if the gym changed your direct debit, you might think that you never go there.

WTAF #exhausting

I think you have given us a masterclass in disagreeing agreeably 👏

Haven’t there already been loads of experiments on this: LLM to write code/ a macro, which is then deployed in Excel? What’s the secret sauce that I’ve missed?

I'm sad to say that since leaving Twitter/X my sales for live shows have dropped quite a lot - it turns out that even though it's a dreadful place it was still useful for getting the word out about events. So any shares / RTs of my posts about live shows are hugely appreciated!

Computers used to scream every time they connected to the Internet. They knew. They tried to warn us. We did not listen.

Love it

An operational policy to stop pursuing trivial infractions could be implemented rapidly. Write off the “backlog” and divert resources into making a better design of system going forward. And maybe write some principles to guide decision making.

Mother of autistic boy left with £10,000 debt after breaching DWP rules by £1.92 a week Over five-year period Oksana Shahar – who cares for her son – was paid a small amount more than carer’s allowance earnings limits allow

What is an independent review going to find that isn’t obvious from the explanation in the article?

www.theguardian.com/society/2025...

Read an actual book

an illustration of a man holding a cell phone with the words disconnect & decompress ALT: an illustration of a man holding a cell phone with the words disconnect & decompress

Have a digital detox

Pronouns: really what is the problem? Seems basic courtesy that you’d call people what they prefer to be called. If it’s not really your thing, well do your best & try and avoid giving offence. But the idea that you’d actually prohibit or penalise people for any of this - incomprehensible

For a bit of civil engineering try Autoshenanigans Secrets of the motorway on YouTube

Word of the Day is ‘quockerwodger’ (19th century): a puppet individual whose strings are pulled entirely by someone else.

Look at “Tell Us Once” - the service for telling all gov departments that someone has died in one go. It’s really good.

Musk's Junta Establishes Him as Head of Government Imagining how we'd cover overseas what's happening to the U.S. right now

Having watched with growing alarm the developments of the last 24 and 36 hours in Washington, I thought I’d take a stab at how the US media would cover this story if it was happening in a foreign country. Here’s that story that should be written this weekend: www.doomsdayscenario.co/p/musk-s-jun...

The malgorithms have been at it again

I put segments of chocolate orange in mine on high days and holidays and the occasional rainy day.

Someone just mansplained me in a comment on #LinkedIn. Reader, he then liked his own comment.

Motivation to make 2025 ‘your year’ dead after reading just three work e-mails 2025 can already go and f**k itself, according to you this morning. Despite bounding out of bed with a renewed sense of energy and self-worth, all of that went away the minute you settled down at y…

NEWS! Motivation to make 2025 'your year' dead after reading just three work e-mails

This title if the comic is ‘Googling Stuff…’ The comic shows two columns: on the left is “Then” showing search results with one thing listed as “the thing you want” On the right column is ‘Now’ - also showing search results but in this case it’s a whole bunch of stuff you don’t need: AI TAKING A WILD STAB AT IT WITH SOME BLATANT MISINFORMATION SPONSORED RESULT SPONSORED RESULT SPONSORED RESULT SPONSORED RESULT PEOPLE ALSO ASK VIEW PRODUCTS And then right at the bottom just off screen is ‘the thing you want’

Googling Stuff: Then v Now.

Such a good point. It reminds me of that trope about women not applying for jobs if they don’t meet the criteria, while men do. What if it’s not a lack of confidence but brutal realism about not wasting their energy….

Who would play you in a movie? I have my answer.

If you’re building a coaching biz, check this out

I don’t think there is enough conversation about the implications inside a home. Particularly, needing a hot water tank (vs many homes having reclaimed that space) and the implications of home insulation if you don’t have cavity walls.

You’ve pulled out the line that absolutely resonated for me. Developers unwilling to compromise are often the bottleneck, not the public.

Worth turning up in this place just for this thread. Must read Material world now!