Pella Bergquist

Yes, some countries have opened up inquiries on this or that citizen’s Epstein ties. But, no one is looking at dismantling the white male elite cabal: it still stands, and proceeds as usual.
The legal theatre is all about controlling the fallout, not about either the victims or of systemic change.

As market liberalism has reached a pivot point many of us knew was incing closer: no longer able to masquerade as ’efficiency’ it doesn’t even try to look like it’s about society, only about monetary might.
We’re now entering the era of global precarity.
Who dare offer an alternative future?

You can’t solve the issues brought by market liberalism by throwing more market liberalism at them. That leads to democracy being substituted with corporate states, and corporate states are by nature at war with each other.

Sounds familiar?

The walk between the old main part of T-centralen and the ’newer’ blue line. Blue ceiling overhead, black and white patterned walkway, almost empty of people despite it being a weekend night.

Underground, subdued. T-centralen at midnight on a weekend.

It’s funny how ’liberal’ in the US is widely used to mean ’left-wing’, when in the rest of the world liberal means being ’soft’ right-wing, distinct from other right-wingers such as conservaties or alt-right etno-nationalists. Ever heard of market liberalism? Very not left-wing!

Ubiquity is the last state before oblivion and relegation to history.
People who strive for empire should do well by remembering that.

Being able to form syllables into words and strings of words into sentences is not a sign of intelligence, nor of self-awareness. Not in parrots, not in machines, not in humans. Which should be self-evident by this point, but humankind keeps surprising me.

"I have brought peace, freedom, justice, and security to my new Empire!"

”Your new Empire?”

”Don’t make me kill you!”

(Bad film, yes, but watching events evolve this where were my brain went.)

#don’tbededra

As totalitarian rule is on the rise around the world, restricting freedom of thought and speech with individual autonomy and determination with it, we civil servants need to continously ask ourselves: at what point do we fail the people, enabling self-serving autocrats instead?
#don’tbededra

Looking out through a window which has a mosquito net on the inside, part covered with ice on the outside, and a view of snowy fields and a setting sun at the horizon.

It’s only 6 months to mosquito season so why remove the mosquito net? ;-)
-23 deg C outside, sunset at 13:14.
Welcome to Norrbotten ❄️

As I see it anyone who summarises 2025 as ’a good year’ can’t have been awake for much of it.

Bäst idag, tack för skrattet!

If you don’t care for the subject matter generative AI is there for you, letting you simulate brain activity. But be aware, when you serve me the results of your ”research” or artefact-producing prompt-fest I do read you loud and clear: you value neither me nor the task, objective, or mission.

AI is the modern version of the Philosopher’s stone. Men fearing their own mortality hunting for the revelation of god in the machine with data as the modern version of Salomon’s gold and key to eternal life. And we’re the ones’ paying for it.

Tech is infrastructure. It has no intrinsic value except as enabler of the choices we humans make.
Our tech, our tools, define who we are and who we might become. What futures are we denying ourselves when we chose only to value what can be codified, quantified, digested, as data?

Good journalism costs money, as it should, but the business model is broken. Publishers clearly care more about making money than about journalism, journalists, readers, or society.

1995: Sees interesting headline, buys a copy of that precise edition.
2025: Sees interesting headline, click link, gets ”subscribe for one year for only…”.
Skips reading, I can’t motivate subscribing to a double-digit number of news ’papers’.

The core misconception that is driving American AI policy Why is President Trump, a man who barely knows how to use a laptop, taking such a big risk ramming through an AI policy that almost nobody, even in his own party, wants?

If anything I’d say the core misconception is that corporations and people who hoard riches have more value than the well-being of ordinary humans, society, and the environment, but yeah.

open.substack.com/pub/garymarc...)

Image of the 1987 edition of Apple’s book Human Interface Guidelined: The Apple Desktop Interface, which was one of the first UI manuals that I read and used in my work, back when.

Liquid glass is a gif galore ricochet from the 90’s. Have Apple really not learned ANYTHING about basic usability, accessibility, and what have you?! What about your own heritage?! This is what happens when you neglect or fire your UX department, folks.

Zoomed in photo of mid-’90’s t-shirt that I unearthed from one of my drawers, featuring the logo of Photoshop plug-in filter company Alien Skin Software.

I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe. Rotary phones ringing in the dark. Bevelled buttons set in a <frame>. The quick switch circuit boards hidden by the snap lid of a Quadra 600. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
Time to start again.

And no lessons learned.

Orbán: I dag blir EU en diktatur – Senaste nytt om kriget i Ukraina Rysslands storskaliga invasion av Ukraina har pågått sedan den 24 februari 2022, då ryska trupper anföll Ukraina från flera håll. Ryssland ockuperar flera regioner i östra och södra Ukraina. Här hitta...

Jag tror Orbán och världens samlade statsvetare, oavsett politisk färg, har helt olika definitioner av vad som kännetecknar en diktatur. Hans verkar vara ’alla styresskick där jag inte får vara den som bestämmer’. Man känner andra som man känner sig själv?

www.svt.se/nyheter/utri...

If people of different origin and of various backgrounds don’t mix but live separately: that is not one society but several parallel one’s. Such a nation hinders mobility, evolution, innovation, and individual freedom. As a strategy it’s called divide and conquer. And it’s happening right now.

Trump criticises 'decaying' European countries and 'weak' leaders The US president says European countries have failed to control migration or take decisive action to end Ukraine's war with Russia.

In his parlance decay means protection for individual and human rights, and restrictions on corporate greed and exploitation. It means equality, freedom to be yourself, autonomy.

If anything, standing up against such a bully is a show of strength. Don’t let him win!
www.bbc.com/news/article...

Nattågstrafiken till Norrbotten halveras Trafikverket halverar nattågstrafiken mellan Stockholm och norska Narvik. Tidigare har det gått två linjer via Norrbotten – men nu kommer en att stanna i Umeå.

Den sittande regeringen bevisar återigen att de är motståndare till järnvägen.

www.svt.se/nyheter/loka...

”Democratizing” is a dogwhistle. It signals denunciation, and the degrading of, knowledge won through hard work and training: it is, at heart, anti-education, anti-knowledge. It runs the errands of de-skilling, for the tech-barons who want the profit without having to pay fair production costs.

A national football association with backbone would just leave Fifa to die a lonely death. Staying on means openly endorsing corruption, taking a stand against democracy and human rights.
But I guess once again money talks humanity down the drain.

A bench under a streetlight, between twin set of stairs: the entry to Kronobergsparken, at dark. The ground is covered by a thin layer of snow.

A brief break from the car crash that 2025 is: I give you winter in Stockholm.

No one: ”Describe the past 5 years in one word.”
Me: ”I’ll give you two: fact-resistent leadership.”
No one: ”…”
Me: ”You’re welcome.”

Photo of the book The myth of good AI: A manifesto for critical artificial intelligence, by Arshin Adib-Mogahaddam

…and when will I have the time to read this?! Hope springs eternal, et cetera et cetera.

Autumn, the ground covered by yellow leaves, tree trunks dark and branches halfway to bare. Stockholm district court seen in the background.

The Instrument of (Swedish) Government (1974:152)

Chapter 1. Basic principles of the form of government

Art. 1. First paragraph.
All public power in Sweden proceeds from the people.

Link to full text:
www.riksdagen.se/globalassets...
Swedish original: www.riksdagen.se/sv/dokument-...