Maria Farrell

you will be just great. (as a similarly unhealthy dog-person) and your cat will love snuggle times on days you can't do stuff.

Good for the older people (and thank you to them, too).

I'm rather chuffed to learn he has me blocked! (never followed the guy, interacted, or knew much about him at all. I assume I must be on a tech bro blocklist)

More than 460 arrested at protest over Palestine Action ban in London Protesters, some clad in black and white Palestinian scarves, chant ‘shame on you’ and ‘hands off Gaza’

466 people and counting arrested yesterday in London for holding signs that say “Palestine Action”

An absolute disgrace, shambles of a country.

‘Half the tree of life’: ecologists’ horror as nature reserves are emptied of insects A new point in history has been reached, entomologists say, as climate-led species’ collapse moves up the food chain even in supposedly protected regions free of pesticides

We should be launching large-scale projects to save the biosphere. Instead rich idiots are putting all of our resources into propping up stochastic parrots.
www.theguardian.com/environment/...

FOSDEM 2025 - Networked Journalism: Bringing long-form publishing to the Fediverse

Just rewatched this superb talk on Ghost and ActivityPub:

'Who’s most likely to win this fight is who wants to win it most. That requires we, the collaborators, be more competitive, get outside our comfort zone, and not just focus on how what we’re doing is open but to try and make it better." 👊

Ever since I was a little girl I knew I wanted my book about Henri Bergson to be part of a list of best books of the week in the New York Times alongside the first tome of Cher's memoirs

congrats! Dying to hear more as and when. xx

Me looking tired up on Exmoor in front of some trees and wind turbines having just completed a 4 mile training run

I am running the London Parks Half Marathon for SANDS in memory of our first son Olly who died at 9 months in 2012.

Just did my first 4 mile training run (see knackered man below)

SANDS has been a wonderful support. Anything you can give will be welcome. Thanks.

www.justgiving.com/page/mark-th...

Much of the mission of what @tupped.bsky.social and I are cowriting at the minute is developing this fantastic blog into an academic article.

A co-production I am fascinated and delighted to see. 👊

I mean, I am a <little> biased....! but I loved them with all my heart before you did one, so

This so recalls Ted Chiang's The Great Silence to me. Other intelligences and beings are already here!

There are people everywhere. Look around.

In her collection 'What makes this book so great', @jowalton.bsky.social - ISTR - has an essay on exactly why spoilers in intro essays are such a bad faith thing to do.

It was the first time I thought 'yes! they're so patronising and superior', assuming we don't first and foremost read for story.

Notable exception is the intros to reissued Tor science fiction classics, which have short intro essays that studiously avoid spoilers while communicating what makes the book so great and where it sits in the genre.

But still I only ever read them after the novel itself. (then they're great!)

Spoilers in Penguin Classics intros are unforgiveable, IMHO.

They smack of condescension and do this double-thing of micro-managing your first experience of a book while also assuming you know the story already (or that STORY isn't why we read these things at all). It's just so low.

Discrimination against a helpless minority, practised and affirmed under a Labour government, like it’s just some normal thing to do to people, to invent new ways to make their lives difficult, because you’re irrationally terrified of their existence.

(I still need to read that!)

yes! (I've taken an interest as not too long ago I researched where in or around Belfast an, um, Irish Catholic married to an ex BA officer could comfortably live. not safely - that's not a huge problem these days imho - but to have neighbours who wdn't be phased. Sadly I won't need this info now)

It's so painfully painfully evident that JKR never went to boarding school herself.

Mind you, she's expert on the kind of reflexive sadism so many have experienced in those institutions.

Pretty clear to me whose side she'd have been on in the abusive horrorscape I attended.

"When a neighbourhood appeals to a broader section of society, homes become easier to sell, reducing the risk associated with property investment." True

but also, NI middle class self-segregates much less (look at spots like Malone) so bigger houses in wealthier places also just cost more.

Oh Kate you WENT THERE 👏

Israel destroys Palestine’s last surviving seed bank, echoing a colonial legacy of erasure Israel’s destruction of the Hebron seed bank echoes centuries of settler-colonial tactics worldwide: erasing Indigenous food systems to dominate land, knowledge, and collective memory.

Horrible, on top of so much horror. Thank you @walidhouri.bsky.social for taking on this difficult reporting

Questions for Ireland as investigation reveals Microsoft data centre use by Israeli military A Guardian report has revealed Microsoft’s cloud services are used by Israel’s Unit 8200 to archive millions of Palestinian phone calls.

www.thejournal.ie/microsoft-da...

what AI bubble?!

oh, you mean the one that's so big it's doing quantitative easing all on its own?

no the economy will be FINE when that bursts

we'll get RAILROADS

She's right. (as someone who very nearly bawks every time I see one 🦐)

🍿

yes. and the normalisation has been strategically driven by hiring Labour grandees - I'm thinking of Tom Watson here - as gambling industry lobbyists. It is such a stain on individuals and the party as a whole (the tories were always a lost cause).

Good for Gordon Brown.

Oh yes. The liberalisation of gambling is one of the worst examples of corruption against the public interest in recent times. Just tax this crap to death