Prof Maz Hardey

Highsmith, Hardware, and the Cost of Emotional Lag In technology, it’s a Man-in-the-Middle attack. In human systems, it is the abandonment of real-time responsibility.

To watch someone through a digital ledger is to pay for stale data in the currency of your own time.

On the Patricia Highsmith Paradox, the physics of the emotional "Pang," and the mathematical certainty of becoming unreachable. The signal is now encrypted by the simple act of being truly gone. ⬛

I must add, as Willows person-butler, I adore when she sets her paws on her tail. So cute ☺️

A regal calico cat named Willow sits poised and upright on a wooden stool. She has a striking "split-face" marking—the left side of her face is orange and black mottled tortoiseshell, while the right side is solid black. She wears a bright white "tuxedo" chest and has white paws neatly tucked together. Behind her is a shelf filled with books and lush green houseplants.

In the flickering light of the Yorkiwara, one must possess eyes that see both the light and the dark.

My face is split like the dawn and the dusk-a mask worn for the sake of justice. 🏮

To catch a thief, one must move like the mist and strike like the mountain wind.

#Caturday

The SaaSpocalypse: A Case of Identity 39 Steps as Forensic Noir

The SaaSpocalypse is a Case of Identity. 🕵️‍♂️

I woke up a Professor. By 10:39 AM, the air had turned thin, and I was a fugitive. While we play with "prompts," $830B has been spirited away into the Highland mist.

The boat is leaving. The land is yours.

E.M. Forster predicted this in 1909. The Machine Stops isn't sci-fi; it’s the 2026 job description.

We are “strangled in the garments we have woven.” We are physically static, digitally frantic, and swaddled in convenience until we atrophy.

The Machine Stops (Giving You a Living) the Slave Mode of Production re-skinned for the 21st Century.

I’ve spent 20 years acting as an unpaid PR agent for the Information Age.

Every year, I sold my students the “glossy brochure” of digital labour. The beach. The coconuts. The "Digital Nomad."

This year, I couldn’t get the words out.

The Ministry of Me: Why I am a Failing Project Manager The irony of managing a career perfectly while mismanaging the "human asset."

"Love is the quality of time and space you willingly give to someone. It isn’t about what you can extract from them; it is about holding the line so they can exist safely with you."

open.substack.com/pub/thatprof...

We are often taught that love is "grabby" - that it’s about status or possession.

But inspired by the novel The Ministry of Time, I’m arguing for a different definition:

The Prime Panopticon: Butter, Empires, and the Art of Hugging the Jailer Why my students forgave me for deleting Meta but judged me for deleting Amazon

Amazon is the ultimate Margarine. 🧈

It mimics the "yellow flood" of care, but it contains no nutrients.

It is a simulation of sustenance served to us in a cage we are too tired to leave.

My forensic audit on why we hug the Jailer, feat. Foucault, Parmy Olson, and Asako Yuzuki. #HigherEd #Butter

The Engine Room: Why We Crave the Cage of the Checklist Why James Clear is gaslighting you and why Atul Gawande is the patron saint of the “Body Count,”

We don't buy productivity books because we want freedom. We buy them because freedom is exhausting.

We are drowning in choice. We don't want a guru; we want an Administrator to absolve us of the burden of our own potential.

Why do my students prefer the Cage to the Open Field?

I don’t know if there will ever be structural or legal accountability for the people in epsteins world … but you, yes you, can shame anyone who tries to normalize them. No speeches. No gigs. No public events. Boo them in restaurants. They come to your professional meeting, put up banners.

Permanent Thoughts: The Architecture of the Undivided Self the importance of fostering a self of self

Am I still his daughter? Or was 'Daughter' just the first architectural extension I built to please a landlord?"

I’m exploring the archaeology of the 'I' after the collapse of the 'We.' This is about moving from a temporary camp to a permanent foundation. Warning: Contains ghosts.

The Dark Portal: How to Teach the "Zeroed-Out" Generation Lately, walking into my teaching rooms feels like descending into those sewers

The Dark Portal: How to Teach the "Zeroed-Out" Generation
open.substack.com/pub/thatprof...

The title page of the book The Fatal Strand by Robin Jarvis. A central black-and-white illustration shows a hooded, skeletal figure pointing a finger, surrounded by swirling mist. The page is autographed in purple ink with the inscription "Best wishes" at the top and Robin Jarvis's signature at the bottom.

I felt like I was standing on the wrong side of the Grill this week. The stillness in seminars is a survival mechanism. I've written about how I'm using "Silent Participation" (Post-its, Red Pens, Secret Ballots) to help the "Zeroed-Out" generation take up space without being devoured.

The Dark Portal: How to Teach the "Zeroed-Out" Generation Lately, walking into my teaching rooms feels like descending into those sewers

To teach the "COVID Generation," I’ve had to go back to the sewers of Deptford. 🐭

My latest essay uses Robin Jarvis’s The Deptford Mice to explain why students are "zeroing out" in seminars.

#EduSky #RobinJarvis #AcademicChatter

A tortoiseshell cat sits on a sideboard, with the dramatic air of a Victorian heroine slighted by fate. She stares intensely at the camera, pointedly ignoring the domestic reality of scattered Lego behind her.

“Do not speak to me of kibble. My soul belongs to the crags."

She tolerates the living room with the weary fortitude of a Brontë heroine trapped in a parlor. A Wuthering Heights in miniature, judging the Lego chaos with silent, brooding disdain.

Happy #Caturday from Heathcliff. 🥀🐈‍⬛

Urban astrophotographer's photos beamed inside Bristol Museum Lee Pullen's stunning photos are being displayed on the walls and ceilings at a Bristol museum.

City dwellers urged to take photos of the stars. 🧪 🔭 #astrophotography www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Practice Research Fellowship Scheme Announcing our Medical Humanities in Practice Research Fellowship scheme.

This is the final week to apply to our Medical Humanities in Practice Research Fellowship Scheme!

⏳ Applications close 30 January 2026, 12:00 PM (noon)

Find out more and apply 👇
medhumsplatform.org/practice-res...

The #BartonFile is a forensic study in Digital Integrity. From a £516k "Hate Tax" to an 18-month suspended sentence, we’re seeing the structural collapse of a digital bully.

@thejeremyvine.bsky.social - The High Court just gave us the blueprint for containment.

open.substack.com/pub/thatprof...

The Brake Pedal: Why We Need the Emotion We Hate Most It is shame, btw

The $48B "Shame-Free" industry is trying to delete our core hardware.

I argue for a Shame-Aware society instead. Your Drop into silence isn't a stain; it’s Biological Sovereignty. Refuse to be a JPEG. Refuse the predatory narrative.

Stay human. Stay uncomputable. open.substack.com/pub/thatprof...

The Brake Pedal: Why We Need the Emotion We Hate Most It is shame, btw

The $48B "Shame-Free" industry is trying to delete our core hardware.

I argue for a Shame-Aware society instead. Your Drop into silence isn't a stain; it’s Biological Sovereignty. Refuse to be a JPEG. Refuse the predatory narrative.

Stay human. Stay uncomputable. open.substack.com/pub/thatprof...

In an age of Zero-Shot AI and predatory extraction, reclaiming the right to be slow and incoherent is a radical act of resistance.

I’m looking at how Thomas Hardy and modern algorithms both use Lossy Compression on human trauma. Stop optimising. Start being uncomputable. 💾

Shame isn’t a glitch; it’s a Firewall.

If it were a defect, why has evolution - the most rigorous debugger in history - kept it in our code for millennia? In my latest for Permanent Thoughts, I explore why our "Emergency Brake" is actually a form of Protective Intelligence. 🛡️

The 147:1 Ratio is the new baseline.

From Sun Tzu’s survival fallacies to the "Digital Drawer" of failure, here is why 6,700 subscribers might just be a stadium full of ghosts. It’s time for a Success Audit. open.substack.com/pub/thatprof...

The Binary Star Paradox: Why 6,700 Subscribers is a System Error On machine-made ghosts, the Knowing-Doing Gap, and why Willow the cat is a better strategist than a growth hacker.

Willow (the cat) doesn't post daily to the kitchen counter; she waits for the high-quality signal. 🐈⬛

Most growth hacks are just "Short Win" sprints that lead to physiological depletion and machine-made ghosts.

Redefining success in a 147:1 landscape.

Say no to Palantir in the NHS NHS England is rolling out software to run our health records from Palantir - fight back

Over 26,000 have emailed their local trust to keep Palantir out of the NHS.

Will you join them?
https://notopalantir.goodlawproject.org/email-to-target/stop-palantir-in-the-nhs/?utm_source=twitter&utm_campaign=PalantirNHS&utm_medium=social_media

A portrait of Willow, the Calico Scout from a binary star system. She sits on a dark grey kitchen counter, her face divided with surgical precision - one side the color of a dying sun, the other the deep black of a vacuum. Behind her, a black-and-white curtain displays a repeating pattern of stylized cat faces, representing the 'Cat Matrix' she is currently hacking. Her green eyes are fixed on a point three inches behind the camera lens, where she is currently calculating the exact trajectory required to overthrow the household and reclaim the tuna-supplies. She is the physical manifestation of a system update that didn't quite finish, and she is perfectly comfortable with the error message.

While I spend my week at Durham deconstructing the ethics of machine-first worlds, Willow is busy monitoring the kitchen counter—which, in her mind, is a tactical launchpad for deep-space surveillance.

#Caturday

The Brake Pedal: Why We Need the Emotion We Hate Most We are living in the age of the Shame-Free movement. Scroll through your feed, and you will see the mantras:  "Release your shame." "Shame is toxic. "  "Vibrate higher. "  We are told that shame...

We are building a research culture based on Protective Intelligence, not performative speed. Read why we need the "brake pedal" to survive the algorithmic life-world: www.mariannhardey.com/technologica...

#LeverhulmeCAL #PhD #NoNarcs #AcademicSky

Funded PhD opportunities - Leverhulme Centre for Algorithmic Life

Algorithms are shameless. Your PhD shouldn't be.

@leverhulmecal.bsky.social @leverhulme.ac.uk is recruiting Funded PhDs. We don't want "Zero-Shot" thinkers. We want the human capacity to pause & use the brake pedal.

If you’re a tank, keep driving. Humans, apply here

Much applause!