Chris Lloyd

Ai Weiwei faced vote about his Royal Academy of Arts, London membership after Gaza tweet After discussions, the institution voted to retain the artist as an Academician

Let me get this straight. The Royal Academy contemplated throwing Ai Wei Wei out for tweeting about genocide in Gaza.

Meanwhile, back with the parqagons of virtue, @royalsociety.org is whistling on its way, refusing to throw out Elon Musk for overseeing the deaths of millions.

Got it.

HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW: “.. In our in-progress research, we discovered that AI tools didn’t reduce work, they consistently intensified it.”

hbr.org/2026/02/ai-d...

You should probably start listening to this podcast that I produce and edit

In the new episode of the podcast, we talk to @ulises-mejias.bsky.social & @couldrynick.bsky.social about their book Data Grab! They talk the 'new colonialism of big tech' and much else. Listen wherever you get your shows, or here: zencastr.com/z/At7zGFhV Please subscribe, share, and get in touch!

Too kind 🙏

Happy Sunday

Sigh

Haha and way more creative

Gays: stop using ChatGPT. Stop using GenAI to make shitty cartoons of yourself. It’s 2026 - you know ALL of the issues with this tech but still you continue.

Back in 2022, we talked to @chadtopaz.bsky.social about equity in STEM subjects. Please go back and listen, and get in touch if you end up using any of these episodes for work/education/policy/social purposes - we'd love to hear from you! Please share, too: open.spotify.com/episode/2nWW...

AHRC Doctoral Landscape Awards Studentships at University of Hertfordshire Start your UK & international job search for academic jobs, research jobs, science jobs and managerial jobs in leading universities and top...

Wanna do a PhD in my department? We have AHRC funding! Please share far and wide www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DQJ769/a...

Guidance for responding to 'A Fairer Pathway to Settlement' consultation We are Amnesty International UK. We are ordinary people from across the world standing up for humanity and human rights.

The UK government is proposing radical and punitive changes to settlement rules. This is settlement, not citizenship. The consultation is open until 12 February; please respond to it and oppose these evil proposals. Amnesty have a good guide: www.amnesty.org.uk/resources/gu...

Abolish or nothing. Reform is part of the problem.

Excuse me

You’re the expert here

Not this

post with an image of the moderation book cover (two people and a dog in regency wear, but with the top half stretched out), plus photo of the author in black jacket with her German shepherd. Turquoise background and text that says Elaine Castillo, Books Up Close, Episode 2.

Me in black jumper holding the novel moderation by Elaine Castillo

Season 2 of my podcast begins! I talk to the incredible Elaine Castillo about her novel Moderation. Find it in all the places you get your shows, or here: zencastr.com/z/4n02i8Ep

It me 👀

John Oxley points out the clear yet often overlooked point that young men 18-24 are the second most liberal, left-leaning group in society (after young women) - being more so than young-ish thirtysomething women, and older women, as well as than men in older cohorts

💀

Lordt

The university bosses getting rich while they’re cutting jobs While academics are being let go and students are racking up debts, vice-chancellors are seeing their pay soar to astonishing levels

Staff cuts. Students in debt yet Vice-chancellor pay keeps soaring.

The mystery of Higher Education in the UK that no one seems to have the answer to.

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/01...

Opinion | Esther Perel on Why A.I. Intimacy Feels Safe but Isn’t Real

“It [love] is an encounter with uncertainty. A.I. takes care of that. Just about all the major pieces that enter relationships, the algorithm is trying to eliminate — otherness, uncertainty, suffering, the potential for breakup, ambiguity. The things that demand effort.”

Shall we invest in actual teachers and education? No! Let’s invest in big tech instead. This is the worst idea you’ve had yet. Please resign.

Sweet Jesus

literally thousands of people with unique expert knowledge and skills being made redundant, universities in the brink of closure, but sure, let's publicly fund the bullshit machine

There is money for "education" if and only if that money is being directly funneled to corporations. Anything involving actual learning, however, well there's no magic money tree

America Now! American Empire - Past, Present and Future Eliot Room, Knowledge Centre, British Library, London (Thursday 29th Jan 18.30) - British Association for American Studies The event is part of 'America Now!', a series of live events exploring the current state of the USA and its place in the world. In a world of hot takes these discussions offer some much-needed deep…

From "Manifest Destiny" to fantasies of annexing Greenland...

The next session of America Now! examines the American Empire in a discussion between Dr Will Norman, Dr Adam Burns, & Dr Hilary Emmett, chaired by Dr Mike Collins.

Thursday 29th January at 6:30pm at the British Library

💪

Gemini's ability to connect the dots is scary-good, well beyond what ChatGPT or Claude can do. When I asked it for sightseeing ideas for my parents, who have already visited the Bay Area a few times, it suggested museums and gardens, correctly inferring they've already done hikes and trips to redwood forests. When I asked Gemini how it knew, it told me it deduced this based on "breadcrumbs" left across my Google account: Family emails, photos of Muir Woods, a parking reservation in Gmail, and a Google search for "easy hikes for seniors." This is so powerful that Google is already trying to preempt the freak-out. VP Josh Woodward said Google takes "steps to filter or obfuscate personal data" from the conversations we have with Gemini.

Some people actually want this.