there’s loads going on in the news today, which might mean you miss out on learning that you can pressure-cook dried beans in 30 minutes. meaning you don’t have to buy tins of them any more.

POSSE is on the front page of Hacker News right now, which I think is kind of delightful. Lots of people discovering the more human, independent approach that the #indieweb advocates.

pork katsu curry for din-dins

That would charge my car 1,000 times, meaning I could drive around 120,000 miles. I could drive between Land’s End and John O’Groats EV charging stations 143 times.

Remember: When Tylenol was poisoned *by an outsider* and killed people, the company recalled all their products & redesigned them. When Intel’s Pentium had a bug so obscure it affected 1 in _9 billion_ long division calculations, they recalled their chips. ChatGPT was made deadly *by its team*.

Good enough wins because of what you are able to treat as externalities

gonna have to use betwixtmas to sort out my tax affairs and financial planning, aren’t i? oh, joy of joys! 🫠

got a swede in the veg box last week and, you know what, swede is nice

good day to you

Love Actually is one long HR training video

Going to send an email to my contacts at Number 10 stressing that finding the opposite to word ‘placard’ is the only exemplar AI project this country— nay, humanity needs.

It’s the last weeknote of 2025, so naturally I’ve forced in two references to The Muppet Christmas Carol. digital-land.github.io/extract-alph...

dusted off the xbox and decided to play some games today. obviously i spent half the day installing the necessary updates, but finally got around to playing this in the evening – which is quite fun! www.theguardian.com/games/2022/a...

the m25 westbound between cobham and the junction for the m40 can just do one.

This ain’t everything that’s been flying around my mind over the last week, but it’s the main bits. #Weeknotes before I go to do a present exchange with my parents. visitmy.website/2025/12/21/t...

Good example of an automation/AI failure mode.

sad that i won’t see any more assemblages in his window on the way to the pet shop or chip shop.

I do lots of hands-on work with teams adopting AI and there is something interesting about what can actually be measured. Most "work" is not pure play task-and-finish tasks, but co-operation and communication, which is much harder to measure. Getting things "done" not the same as doing them faster

don’t think i’ve ever been so involved as i am now in writing words to go into papers, submissions, briefings, etc. and there is only so much about user-centred software development and deployment that you can plain-english.

conservatives: the average sick days per spreadsheet has skyrocketed this year, and all because of bloody mental health!

Once again considering whether I should launch a startup providing good, well-priced technology for underserved parts of the public sector. Boring stuff done well. There’s a gap in the market, a market ripe for disruption. Only I know just how hard it is to sell into that market.

What if AI is not a general purpose technology but is a *generally applied* technology (applied in contexts where it both is and isn't useful) and hence is now an ambient factor, something that gets forced into everything, whether it's needed or not.

less than 48 hours until the boring magic festive party, cannot wait

you know those adverts where elderly people say they have ‘peace of mind’ knowing their family will be able to afford the funeral costs? well, what if that’s a thing for dogs? dragons, i’m looking for £200,000 for a 50% stake in the company

Inspired by attending @govcampcymru.bsky.social , me, @niacampbell.bsky.social and @monikasw.bsky.social have been working on this little website to help promote working in the open and digital resources in Wales… cymruddigidol.github.io

A good thing! Personal opinion but product leads and heads should be all over the economic model and business case for their thing. Make the benefits work.

Just realised I’ve got to start writing this year’s round-up, so here’s all the good stuff I read about product management, digital government, artificial intelligence, placemaking, and other good bits last year.

a weeknote, pondering the similarities of interfaces for data and teams, along with what they afford. mikegallagher.org/posts/APIs-a...

cor be arsed with doing my own weeknotes this week. had a successful weekend doing loads of fun stuff and feel more like watching another film than writing. enjoyed ‘pillion’ last night but have lined up ‘magic farm’ for this evening.

Thank you. For years I’ve maintained with friends – but mostly my partner – that many counties don’t technically exist anymore (because they’re not local authorities) and they are to be known as ceremonial counties. All the doubters and naysayers will be hastily corrected this morning. Ha!

2. We need a strong, functioning statistical system. But it’s quite a boring thing for most people. I have a long-ish thread here watching the topic, but it rarely gets anyone very excited! bsky.app/profile/heta...

mad that you can drive for an hour out of croydon, on almost entirely rural roads, and reach five hundred acre wood in under an hour.

This week, we: - shared a new history of our design efforts, including collaborative ‘mix-and-match’ prototyping - ran research and testing sessions with five users from four local authorities - had some unexpected insights pop up, causing us to consider how we might adapt our plans.

This week, we: - shared a new history of our design efforts, including collaborative ‘mix-and-match’ prototyping - ran research and testing sessions with five users from four local authorities - had some unexpected insights pop up, causing us to consider how we might adapt our plans.

The great big Google Suite versus Office 365 battle, and who has the control over enterprise tools, rages on. Google’s latest gambit to take back control of UK government work machines: Gemini for Government. www.gov.uk/government/n....

uh oh

Deadline-driven delivery

Just got my Microsoft Teams Wrapped. ‘You raised your hand instead of reacting 618 times’

Someone has advertised a role as ’99% remote’

One thing I hear when putting AI in front of people is that they’re worried about their jobs. That’s why I’ve got that position on AI around augmented not artificial intelligence. Automation should lead to innovation, not elimination. boringmagi.cc/2024/12/08/o...

A product is not the same as a technology. You can innovate a thing and package it in multiple ways. Plus other notes in my latest #weeknotes. visitmy.website/2025/12/07/t...

christmas trees really do make your lounge smell amazing

A product is not the same as a technology. You can innovate a thing and package it in multiple ways. Plus other notes in my latest #weeknotes. visitmy.website/2025/12/07/t...

Nice long run and chat with @visitmy.website. Key takeaway: local and global digital problems are not that different, just scale.

(Gray’s herbals are hyper local confectionary nostalgia for West Midlands kids)

The Millere was a stout carl for the nones; Ful byg he was of brawn, and eek of bones. That proved wel, for over al ther he cam, At wrastlynge he wolde have alwey the ram.

What we did on Extract this week. Lots of iteration and planning the next round of research, basically. digital-land.github.io/extract-alph...

maybe you’re also writing your team’s weeknotes right now, and you’re trying to get it done quickly. then may i share this fabulous mix of uk garage as inspiration? www.mixcloud.com/residentadvi...

lol cloudflare is down again

always thought i was a dog person, but this kind of behaviour made me realise i’m a cat person. and also made me realise i’m a cat, but a person.