FWIW, I think Klein's piece is unnecessarily complimentary about Kirk's achievements. Just as it undesirable to speak ill of of the recently dead, it is not obligatory to be nice about them. But the fundamental truth in that final line is what matters.

"We are all safe, or none of us are." And that goes for Washington DC as much as it does for Washington, Tyne and Wear.

Let’s go with the idea that these drones over Poland mistakenly ended up there. All the more reason for NATO to announce a no-fly-zone over Western Ukraine in order to prevent such unfortunate mistakes in the future. Simple. Close the skies.

HOW STEPHEN. HOW HAVE YOU MADE THIS ABOUT HARRY POTTER

My video about how LLMs are not search engines has led to many, MANY comments telling me that I should be using Perplexity. Some insisting that Perplexity does not hallucinate. Out of a list of 26 papers it just provided me (in "Research" mode) 4 were real. FOUR. 85% hallucination rate.

This They Might Be Giants TONIGHT SHOW performance of "Birdhouse In Your Soul" from 1990 remains firmly lodged in my noggin thanks to the Tonight Show Band's full commitment and Doc Severinsen's incredible trumpeting... It took an already great song and made it transcendent.

Possibly the best reason to tune into Bluesky is Stephen Bush’s insatiable (and obviously entirely correct) demand for someone at HBO to talk us all through their thinking here.

In the latest post on our Substack I try to make sense of the mutual incomprehension between teachers & students about the role of AI. Is it OK for students to use AI to write their assignments if that's the most efficient thing to do? If not, why not? substack.nomoremarking.com/p/what-is-th...

I was explaining to my Ukrainian colleague the phrase ‘There’s no such thing as a free lunch’. She told me the equivalent in Ukrainian is ‘The only free cheese is in the mousetrap’ - which is so much better

Re: stripping citizenship, look. There is no legal mechanism for him to do it. The very fact that he is talking about it tells you, yet again, what he is. He’s an aspiring totalitarian who wants absolute power over people’s lives and to use it to reward friends and punish enemies. That’s really it.

New York Times editors as they're handcuffed and sent to a concentration camp: "Experts say this is a bad thing to happen."

This kind of smart, walkable, mixed-use development is illegal to build these days.

Hugh Muir recalls the response of London Mayor Ken Livingstone to 7/7 from Singapore. I agree that, despite his flaws & failings at other times, that this was an important message www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Tuesday

Movie you've watched more than six times with a gif. Hard mode: no Star Wars, Star Trek, LotR, Marvel.

This is very funny and exactly how I’d expect AI agents to work right now (rather erratically) but also how I’d expect humans to behave (trolling the AI to buy tungsten cubes)

Worth a watch: Head of Signal, Meredith Whittaker, on so-called "agentic AI" and the difference between how it's described in the marketing and what access and control it would actually require to work as advertised.

Not that her skills as a journalist ought to matter: the President of the United States shouldn’t be calling for any accredited journalist to be fired.

This is truly wonderful to hear

@chriskempshall.bsky.social I expected to love this as a geek who loves history & has always adored the idea of an in-universe history book. I didn’t expect to be moved by it as an educator, seeing something written well enough to teach invaluable ideas in an incredible accessible way.Huge congrats.

Absolutely enormous pub dog 😍

Education being, of course, entirely unrelated to one’s socioeconomic position…

This is dark

The BBC weather forecast is becoming apocalyptic

Broadcast Kneecap from Glastonbury, but voiced by an actor

It’s a good thing Congress isn’t alive to see this

It's infuriating how 99% of the coverage of this new war doesn't bother to mention that it is happening because we had an agreement to limit and monitor Iran's nuclear program, which even Trump's own aides said was working, and he blew it up because it was negotiated under Obama.

"hey 35 to 50 year old newsreading liberals what was the run-up to the iraq war like" is the most precision crafted bait possible on this website

Very pleased to be hosting 'Addressing Causal Questions in Higher Education Evaluation' today at LSE, chaired by Prof Emma McCoy and Jonathan Schulte. Packed room for our keynote speaker @johndavidblake.bsky.social (Office for Students). Great start to the day! www.lse.ac.uk/2030/educati...

I look forward to the Oxford history of Britain for 2020 to 2030 being called something like “Red Wall, Blue Wall, Berlin Wall”

I’d love to know what Macron knows and what he just told Meloni. That’s one hell of a reaction. #G7

It is both my job and my hobby to explain ways the English education system could be better, but I always remind myself that, given its scale, geographic complexity and demographic diversity, it is genuinely very successful in ways other systems frequently cannot match.

Don't read this looking to be cheered up but make damn sure you do read it.

QUALIFIED CLASSROOM TEACHERS: a wonderful OfS colleague of mine, is looking for YOU for a one-hour interview abt how you think and talk abt neurodevelopmental conditions. Details below, please consider donating a little of your time — there’s also a TWENTY QUID voucher in it for you!

‘I once fell out with the US president so spectacularly that it caused one of the largest outbreaks of online schadenfreude in history’

Galaxy brain: Lift the two child cap, but the third child onwards has to join the army, like you're impoverished regency gentry.

Dear Mr. Clegg I have started a business, selling the contents of your house I knew when I launched I did not have legal access your house Without this access my company will not be profitable Others have told me I have a flawed business model, but I disagree Please advise how I should proceed

Yes, they were murdered by Richard III.

“Hi, to demonstrate how much I love my family, can I ask a tech company to access vast swathes of not only my personal data but also that of the family of my children’s friends, to ensure that the bare minimum annual celebration of parental love is as bastardised as possible?”

The BSL during Finland was sensational #Eurovision

Did they not air the final season of Game of Thrones in Poland, so they’ve sort of come up with their own? #eurovision

Join my extremely recently founded campaign for Proper Respect for Microphone Stands #eurovision

Latvia was one of the last countries in Europe to convert from paganism. Last week by the look of this. #eurovision

UK offering a song made entirely of bridge, like the number just before the big showstopper at the end of the first act of middling musical designed to get some plot across without bothering anyone too much. #eurovision

Ukraine are fighting for the freedom of all Europe. And thank god they are, or we’d have to withdraw all our support immediately in punishment for that #eurovision

My television subtitles inform me “this programme contained Repeated Flashing images”, so that’s something to look forward to. #eurovision

"Content is no longer the point.... old ways of learning are insufficient to thrive in this new era" Oh dear. Someone in the UAE has been drinking the Kool-aid supplied by tech companies. www.thenationalnews.com/news/uae/202...