Damien Smith

5-panel SMBC comic update where a man catches a wish-granting talking fish. The fish tells him : "Set me free and you may have anything. But whatever you get, I will instantly give it to your neighbor, twice." The man asks for a magic box that gives him all his neighbor's money one second after he receives any money. The final panel shows the man lounging in a pile of gold saying "infinite money gliiiiitch!" to the dismay of the magic fish, that says that this is why they hate logicians.

This is more easily executable with a three-wish genie, but it's good to be prepared for all circumstances.

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Robert Jenrick says he’s an Anglofuturist. What does that mean? – HOPE not hate In late June, the shadow justice secretary Robert Jenrick took the stand at a conference. Addressing the crowd of Tories and radical-right political figures, he made an unusual statement. “I am what c...

hopenothate.org.uk/2025/10/08/r...

Much of Britain's present-day status in the world is because of that long past, less what it does today. Those against such status need to have that past repudiated.

Not to go all Robert Gordon but the potential benefits as a % of GDP are also much smaller. Going from no internet to internet is a much bigger bang for your buck than going from internet to AI

There's also the NFL broadcast contract, which ends in 2029. Good point to reassess players.

This isn't different from the Banham Commission, or from city deals. The issue is that national politicians don't care about the politics of redrawing local lines, something the Redcliffe-Maud advocates need to find a way to grapple with.

Away Goals rule?

This makes it sound as if it's similar to owner-occupied housing as an asset class, where institutions evolved to ensure some degree of scarcity (and, thus, asset price appreciation).

Modelling/forecasting would become cheaper, leading to wider adoption?

The challenge here is that only politicians can do that while most measures are developed by civil servants, who actually attend the "star chambers". Not saying that this is a good process, but it has become the process.

There is also Gaelic football, and an annual meetup where the Irish and Aussies play each other under so-called "international" rules.

I'd recommend "A History of Future Cities" by Daniel Brook, which is good on emerging cities (including Dubai) and modernisation.

The broad point is that the west is not really thinking about the cultures around globalisation while the Emiratis, Saudis and others are trying to shape it.

The "Wimbledonisation" of the Premier League is shrugged off. England is just the stage - if they could have their own league by brute force they would.
See how Shanghai is now one of the centres of the art world - they are spending a lot but are not buying the same art Europe was.

Also partly because the architects (broadly defined) set out to appeal to them. I keep thinking that the Saudis aren't "sportswashing" in the West with their spending so much as appealing to audiences in Africa and Asia.

I will add that Dubal (and the Gulf as a whole) are more of a lodestar to the rest of the world, not Europe. I recall the remark in the book Aerotropolis that to much of the Global South Dubai is a shiny city like Las Vegas, and that needs to be taken seriously.

There are those who do the same about Gaza...

The other thing is the risk of retaliation. If Chinese censors (say) disallow a Hollywood blockbuster, much of the economics of that genre disappears - they need large audiences given the production costs.

It a repeated trope in UK welfare policy as well if my past experience working on that is anything to go by. (I also got ILR—and citizenship—years ago, so mercifully not subject to this.)

I think, like @twlldun.bsky.social says, it's an elite thing. Elites don't like the idea of it while the public would probably embrace it. There is no polling so it's hard to be sure, but almost all the people writing against ID cards are because they personally don't want to be asked for one.

I think that policy agency was stronger in past decades but, regardless of what you think about it, globalisation has changed a lot and has weakened government agency with it. Just as the public haven't adjusted to this, elites also haven't.

You seem to have a generalised theory of weak policy agency, if your recent posts are anything to go by...

These echo what big IP multinationals are saying (see what's happening in pharma) but these firms, given their core business, can't exit the UK, so I wonder where their point of leverage is.

I agree that "free riding" on top of the foundation models is a good way to go, but I think that the "why is there no European Google" is what is focusing minds. There is a desire for a name/brand: one of the Industrial Strategy goals (in the technical annex) is a trillion-dollar company.

I think that policymakers want a UK entity to own some of the intellectual property rather than having to buy it. Not sure what material value that brings and, if the UK was more magnanimous, there are companies like Mistral in France which are close to home.

A lot of this has to do with public realm aesthetics getting visibly worse. The rise on graffiti and rough sleeping create a sense of disorder; reversing this should be a priority.

Branko Milanovic proposed something similar in one of his recent books, not realising the potential for abuse.

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Trtl. Very light too, though not cheap. Works better than you would think.

This is an odd Matthew Effect of sorts: it's odd that there are no private donors of this scale for art museums (say) outside of London. (The National Gallery of Scotland may be an exception.)
My hypothesis is that Britain didn't have a 'golden age' like the US—billionaires aren't well distributed.