Stephen Taylor

@totallyshow.bsky.social FIFA are going to award a "peace prize" at the 2026 World Cup Draw. Presumably doing what the Nobel Committee wouldnt do and giving it to Donald Trump. After awarding World Cups to Qatar and Saudi Arabia, presumably Gianni wanted to do something *less* controversial?

It was announced at the end of the League Phase, I think. I presume Slot wasn't very happy about it, given the effort LFC put in to get the top spot. 'Big Draw' won out.

New set of forest towns to be built between Oxford and Cambridge Communities in the middle of new national forest to show how housebuilding can be delivered alongside nature

"It is protected by an energy shield which is generated from the nearby forest towns of Oxford".
www.theguardian.com/environment/...

I also couldn't understand why they didn't ‘lock’ bracket - 1st gets lowest entrant from play-off. Instead, Villa (8th) get Brugge (24th), Lille (7th) get Dortmund (10th). That'd make some difference between finishing in certain places in the league phase, beyond having to play the play-off round.

Every rankings e-mail I receive (THE, QS etc.) ends up in my institutional e-mail quarantine. Think of all of that labour around soliciting e-mail addresses and a lot it ends in invites being filed as spam…

UNAids is set to close in 2026 – four years early. Are experts right to be alarmed? The move to shut the agency comes as aid budgets are being slashed, leading to fears that global progress on HIV may be reversed

Excellent piece on the worrying decision to ‘sunset’ UNAIDS in 2026. The rise of injectables has given the tech fix brigade a victory, but it was also the advocacy, social and demographic work of highly stigmatised communities that marked out UNAIDS. www.theguardian.com/global-devel...

Exploring Earth Photo 2025 competition shortlist and the dazzling dahlias at Anglesey Abbey this morning.

Enjoying the faulty train signal outside Bishops Stortford that is only showing red/stop this morning.

GB News’s US expansion feared to be new way for Trumpian views to reach UK audience White House backing was on full display as GB News launched The Late Show Live

“Britain has been infected by a mind virus that sees no value in place,” says chair of GB News. They’ll be on about scale next.

www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

‘Haunting Biology’ by Emma Kowal Emma Kowal Haunting Biology: Science and Indigeneity in Australia Duke University Press, 2023 264 pages, 27 illustrations, appendices, notes, references, index This book is like a magnificent conve…

A good overview by M. Susan Lindee at History of Anthropology Review: histanthro.org/reviews/haun...

Haunting Biology: Science and Indigeneity in Australia

Can’t recommend this book enough (having had it recommended to me by an Australian undergraduate student). The chapter on the ghostly afterlife of the Golden Ridge Station hair sample collected by Alfred Haddon in 1923 is worth the price of admission alone.

www.dukeupress.edu/haunting-bio...

The Barn Emmett Till’s murder is one of the most infamous in American history; a moment that, more than any other, awakened the world to the racism of the Deep South. Yet despite growing up just a few miles fr...

Time spent with this excellent book has been one of the benefits of the return to long commutes this semester. The focus is on the murder of Emmett Till, but with a focus on the long history and geography of the Delta landscape that made that horror possible.

www.penguin.co.uk/books/467703...

Alien Earths For thousands of years, humans have wondered whether we're alone in the cosmos. Now, for the first time, we have the technology to investigate. The question should have an obvious answer: yes or no. B...

I’m not sure what I think about this book. It’s an accessible overview of planet hunting, but for all the possibilities of life elsewhere never really gets to addressing the fundamental shock that alien life on *one* exoplanet would be to our entire sense of being.

www.penguin.co.uk/books/460729...

Nice trip to Audley End today with the kids. Last time I was there, I got engaged.

Hi @totallyshow.bsky.social. The four best-ranked UEFA Nations League group winners that finish outside the top two of their World Cup qualifying group will advance to the UEFA play-offs. As things stand, that currently includes Moldova and San Marino, but not Italy, Scotland or Belgium. Go minnows!

For a future Extra episode: Slasher talks football beyond the Iron Curtain.

Future geographer has a birthday party today, and I provided some consultancy on the design of the cake.

So @totallyshow.bsky.social, Almaty is closer to Tokyo (5329 km) than it is to Newcastle (5539 km). Roll on the Champions League draw!

Can you unpack how Palhinha ends up at Spurs? It felt quite an understated move. That was a protracted transfer from Fulham, but a case of too much class at Bayern? If so, both Spurs loan money and player interest seem off to a flier.

On Savage Shores A New Statesman Best Book of the Year 2023. A Waterstones Book of the Year 2023. An Economist Book of the Year. One of Smithsonian Magazine's Ten Best Histor...

This is a great and accessible book on indigenous histories, particularly the experiences of those who chose or (more likely) were compelled to come to Europe’s “savage” shores of inequality, violence and intolerance.
www.weidenfeldandnicolson.co.uk/titles/carol...

Really great, James.

Alea iacta est

The Eastern Front In the second volume of his landmark First World War trilogy, Professor Nick Lloyd tells the story for the first time of what Winston Churchill once called the 'unknown war': the vast conflict in East...

Some of the fiercest fighting in World War I was in Serbia, Poland and elsewhere in Eastern Europe. I enjoyed Nick Lloyd’s different perspective on that conflict and learned a lot.

www.penguin.co.uk/books/443194...

It's time for Pierre to do stand-up! It's time for you to watch! Why not just embrace that, for God's sake? All earthly glories fade! Co-host of the Frank Skinner podcast. As seen on World's Most Dangerous Roads (U&Dave), The Mash Report (BBC Two), Stand Up Central (Comedy Central). Heard on The Now Show and The News Quiz and Breaking The News (BBC Radio 4, BBC Radio Scotland).

Thanks @pierrenovellie.bsky.social for a great night on the front row at @monkeybarrelcomedy.bsky.social #edfringe yesterday.

I very much deserved my “sniping” but he was just so funny! #comedy #DaretoDiscover
www.edfringe.com/tickets/what...

First time using Google AI mode in search. Completely made up answer that bore no semblance to the original search response.

What did you make of the pre-penalty preparations? It looked from the overhead camera like England hadn’t really figured out takers and order. Spain were huddled in a supportive group. A lot of the psychology of penalties seems to favour the Spanish approach. Although maybe not this time!?!

Quinine's Remains by Townsend Middleton - Paper Scholarship is a powerful tool for changing how people think, plan, and govern. By giving voice to bright minds and bold ideas, we seek to foster understanding and drive progressive change.

Just devoured Quinine’s Remains by Townsend Middleton. Rooted in fieldwork across Darjeeling’s overgrown - yet somehow surviving - cinchona plantations, it eloquently excavates the afterlives of empire, colonial medicine, labour regimes, and conflicts around land.

www.ucpress.edu/books/quinin...

The Phillies debuted the “Coldplay Kiss Cam” tonight 😂

(via X/JasonFox29)

Is João Pedro the new Liam Delap?

Quite the paragraph here on pregnancy tests and frogs.

www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...