Andrew Perchard

The New ChatGPT Resets the AI Race With GPT-5, OpenAI is making its strongest effort yet to hook users.

This feels like a depressing capitulation by the @theatlantic.com; a magazine that used to have some substance to it…

This month's DEPOT deindustrialization blog is on "Proletarian (green) Publics in Transformation: Perspectives from the Ruhr" by Ute Eickelkamp and Stefan Berger.

deindustrialization.org/proletarian_...

That’s brilliant news. Congratulations Claire.

😂😂 It’s 9.28 and some Big T is already looking attractive

Research culture element of REF 2029 set to be shrunk - Research Professional News New ‘4-star plus’ research rating also being considered by Research Excellence Framework team, briefings suggest

Faced with the crisis in UK HE, and with the opportunity to opt for a sensible if imperfect reversion to 2021 (not least out of a fairness to staff being laid off in droves), REF 2029 have decided to descend further into absurdity!

FYI @smidbob.bsky.social in case you haven’t seen.

Thanks for sharing Steven. That’s a great piece.

🤦🏻🙄

True but given the calibre of many university senior management teams I suspect they’ll listen to the lists ChatGPT or Grok have put together 😉

File under: If anyone was going to do it, he was…

Reform Splurged £1.3m on Right-Wing Newspaper Adverts During Election Nigel Farage’s Reform UK paid almost £1.3 million to conservative publications during the 2024 general election campaign. The right-wing populist party, which frequently claims to be a victim of media...

Nigel Farage‘s Reform UK funnelled £1.3m into right-wing tabloids during last year’s general election campaign.

Roughly 25% of the party’s £5.5m election spend went on buying adverts in the Daily Mail, The Sun, and the Daily Express.

@adambarnett.bsky.social @writesbright.bsky.social

Interesting piece. I mean I guess there’s been quite a lot of research over the last 15-20 years on Scotland’s role in the transatlantic slave trade, and public debates about that 🤔

A deliberate attempt to slur both the Scottish Government and @thesnpmedia.bsky.social, a public service, and to deflect from the awful track record of the private water companies polluting English and Welsh rivers and lining their pockets.

Environment Secretary urged to apologise for ‘misleading’ Scottish water claims Holyrood’s Climate Action and Energy Secretary has written to Steve Reed about ‘inaccurate and misleading comments’ about water quality in Scotland.

UK Environment Secretary must apologise for ‘misleading’ Scottish water claims.

Claimed water “pollution levels in Scotland are worse than they are in England”.

Water Commission found 66% of Scotland’s water bodies to be of good ecological status; 16.1% in England; 29.9% in Wales.

Ooft! 😂

Industry dynamics and trade association power: The shifting nature of business influence in UK aluminium This article examines industry dynamics and their influence on ­business-government relations through a study of the UK aluminium industry, focusing on the changing role of its leading trade associ...

Article from Niall MacKenzie, Duncan Connors and me on changing nature of business-govt relations in UK aluminium and role of trade associations to advance business interests. Open Access.

Blair and Mandelson are at the heart of this, both lining their pockets from Big Tech through their consultancies.

Blair’s pushing of AI agenda on behalf of Big Tech.

Inside the relentless race for AI capacity The quest for superintelligence is spurring a data centre boom — but critics question the cost, environmental impact and whether it is all needed

"To suddenly start building data centres which are so much denser in terms of power use, for which the chips cost 10 times as much...[&] there is unproven demand and which eat up all available grid power and suitable real estate--all that is an extraordinary challenge and a gamble." A. Lawrence 1/3

The EU has validated Trump’s bullying trade agenda [FREE TO READ] The US president’s deals are not a win-win for the global economy

"Trump has ushered in an era in which panic rather than policy drives the global trade system. For those that ought to be able to push back, such as the EU, it has looked more like cowering to a bully." Strong FT editorial on Europe's submission to Trump. on.ft.com/3U52oag

Were they playing Black Sabbath?

60,000 Gazans have been killed. 18,500 were children. These are their names. Palestinian children have been killed at a rate of more than one per hour since the war began.

Gift article

60,000 Gazans have been killed. 18,500 were children.
These are their names.

wapo.st/3IRLZn6

It’ll probably have its dire effects more speedily than mesothelioma!

Sumitomo recently sold their share in New Zealand’s Aluminium Smelter at Tiwai Point last year so now Rio Tinto are sole owners after NZ govt offered renewed 20y power contract. RT investing heavily in renewables in Australasia & its Al portfolio after trying to ditch it just over a decade ago.

The green freeport deal in 2023 and HIE’s £10m investment will have really sweetened that deal where Mitsui’s concerned. What it’ll offer in terms of benefits for the Cromarty Firth, H&I and Scotland is another question entirely.

OpenAI and UK sign deal to use AI in public services The US tech firm behind ChatGPT say it will work with the UK government to 'deliver prosperity for all'.

What could possibly go wrong… 🤨

Kyle and Reeves are in pocket of Big Tech.