If you were looking for an exposition of what British values *could* be you could do a lot worse than Ian McKellen wielding Shakespeare like a rapier.

Individual journalists might thrive, but the press as a collective actor - and as understood in constitutions - cannot survive without a minimum of professional solidarity. Don’t just ask the next question after yet another obscene attack on a female reporter.

Reminder that "jaywalking" was literally made up by american car manufacturers to shift the blame for accidents from drivers to pedestrians. "Jay" was a slang term meaning "idiot" or "rube".

Some initial reactions to the 'published on a Sunday afternoon' letter from the CEO of UKRI. 🧵 www.ukri.org/news/open-le...

are those freedoms in room with us right now

"The idea that trans inclusion at the ponds is somehow imposed against the wishes of users simply does not survive contact with reality. Londoners have looked at the evidence... and overwhelmingly said: this works, this is fair, and this reflects our values." celord.com/2026/01/29/h...

@404media.co The fascinating @BBCRadio4 #Vastaamo scandal of therapeutic data theft @JennyKleeman is not a one off. Chat & Ask AI leaked data on #mentalhealth & #suicide. www.404media.co/massive-ai-c... www.bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/ubertherapy @brisunipress.bsky.social

From the Chartists to the suffragettes, and from the civil rights movement to the anti-apartheid struggle, every great protest movement has found strength in song. There is extraordinary power in music. More than one injustice has fallen before a hail of ballads.

I know most people find procedure dull as dishwater but I honestly don’t think the media does the public any favours by continually describing the rules of our legislature as if they’re kept in a wizard’s tower guarded by an enchanted rat

“Why am I so sad today?” I ask myself after staring at my little handheld sadness machine and clicking all the sad little things that will definitely make me sad

work with me and @drdaveobrien.bsky.social as part of @creativepec.bsky.social! we're recruiting a postdoc to work on the arts, culture and heritage sectors using quantitative methods. please share, please feel free to email me directly with any Qs! jobsite.sheffield.ac.uk/job/Sheffiel...

*PSA 2026 Annual Conference* #PSA26 opening keynote: ‘AI for Democracy’ with Prof. Helen Margetts OBE FBA, Prof. of Society and the Internet @ox.ac.uk 📆 Monday 30 March 2026 🚨 Early booking deadline extended to 2 February ➡️ Register online

like big tobacco funding cancer research

Again, cutting through the hoopla about AI for mental health is @survivingwork.bsky.social: "And there’s the rub. The people most likely to turn to this form of support are the most likely to be harmed by it." See her book Uber Therapy @ubertherapy.bsky.social www.survivingwork.org/surviving-wo...

Since AI slop is again all over Scientific Reports, a thread on the economics of grey-zone publishing. Why does slop keep getting published? What does it mean for science? How can we stop this? Background readings: Understand the strain: tinyurl.com/2b6wxx5r Stop the drain: tinyurl.com/3jfscscy

oh man, lettuce truthers :)

Having Johnson & Cummings in Downing Street when Covid struck was, just like Brexit, an entirely avoidable disaster caused largely by utterly appalling journalism. And now exactly the same clowns, arses & bigots with bylines are rolling out the red carpet for Farage. www.thetimes.com/article/1b15...

Key points include: High exit rates among carers and early to mid-career workers: Professionals aged 35 and under are significantly more likely to leave & Those with caregiving responsibilities - often women - face disproportionate challenges of low pay, out-of-hours work and limited flexibility.

Buckle up - because this now amounts to a direct and deliberate attack on our country and its cultural sovereignty. Which side our politicians take - Trump's or the BBC's - over the coming days and weeks will speak volumes about their patriotism.

The idea of a $1 billion lawsuit from Donald Trump is utter nonsense www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/cd...

There’s no screening for ovarian cancer and it’s really difficult to spot: you can’t squidge your ovaries in the shower to check for lumps. Also it’s very good at masquerading at other things, like IBS and diverticulitis. Please take a look at this list of symptoms - and share if you can.

"The data shows no evidence to suggest that younger men are more inclined than other demographic groups to support the British far right" ✍️ @turnbulldugarte.com & @emiliabelknap.bsky.social analyse the demographics of Reform voters and argue the gender gap is marginal ukandeu.ac.uk/most-british...

This is disastrous; hospices do such important work, not only to give people a good death, but to provide pain management and other services to people with terminal conditions. The staff in hospices work so, so hard and the fact that these institutions depend on charity to operate is a scandal.

Chatbots — LLMs — do not know facts and are not designed to be able to accurately answer factual questions. They are designed to find and mimic patterns of words, probabilistically. When they’re “right” it’s because correct things are often written down, so those patterns are frequent. That’s all.

Elon Musk is once again inciting violence on British streets because the government has taught him there are literally no consequences for doing so. They even carry on using his far-right social network to promote government policy as he does it. The absence of backbone is *astounding*.

Asylum seekers, housed in hotels in Manchester, are reaching out in their own words to address the concerns of the local community. Please take a minute to read their letter, & share it with the people in your life who need to hear the truth about the people they are protesting.

This is an important book from my friend @ubertherapy.bsky.social looking at the business models of mental health companies and platforms. When mental health support is so necessary for an increasing number of us, this concerns us all

This made me laugh because I wrote the speech she’s referring to. I inserted the line about Chicken Tikka Masala after I noticed a supermarket survey listing it as by far the most popular purchase among consumers. Gill is wrong. The British people have voted with their stomachs.

Chaotic neutral mainly. I like the happenstance of it, and it links the reading of the book with what was going on at the time.

🧵🚨 The UK’s independent scientific bodies are highly vulnerable to politicisation - over the past 5 months I've been working with @martinmckee.bsky.social to map out their vulnerabilities and it's not good news. Today our report is published! www.ucl.ac.uk/policy-lab/n... 1/11

I spoke to British Future's Sunder Katwala, who was a refreshing antidote to all the far right rhetoric on immigration, flags, etc. Britain is not nearly as divided as extremists suggest, he says, and we're "a generation ahead" when it comes to multiculturalism. www.theguardian.com/world/2025/o...

Amazing nuggets in the PPE Medpro High Court ruling The company was incorporated on 12 May 2020 and referred to the Covid "VIP lane" by Michelle Mone *the same day*, despite having no track record in manufacturing PPE Who could have predicted that anything would go wrong?

The govt wants to get more disabled people into work, but isn't making full use of the tools at its disposal In my new report for @citizensadvice.bsky.social I've looked at how our social security system could do more to make sure that when disabled people want to work, work really does pay /1

"The overwhelming weight of evidence still supports paracetamol as the safest option for pregnant women when used as recommended. The real danger isn’t the medicine – it’s oversimplified claims that create fear and undermine trust in healthcare."

The best opponents of misinformation are not political journalists because they see it as part of a power game. It takes expert journalists to expose the lies and also how dangerous they are.

Autism is back on the front pages. Why not read the book that my excellent @manchester.ac.uk @manchstm.bsky.social colleague Dr Bonnie Evans has published on the history of autism? It's open access and you can read it online for free. www.manchesterhive.com/display/9781...

It is 20 years since Conor Gearty gave the Hamlyn Lectures on Can Human Rights Survive? As a mark of respect following the dreadful news of his, Cambridge University Press & Assessment has made these lectures Open Access for the remainder of the year. You can find them here: lnkd.in/e5Xrt2G5

Clickbait headlines are a major source of misinformation and misrepresentation. Useful headlines would have been: 1. Young men support Reform less than other men. 2. Age is much more important for Reform support than sex. 3. Reform is most popular party among 50+ men and women.

UK government report based on internal civil service trial finds Copilot doesn’t increase productivity, and indeed makes Excel take longer and with more errors, and requires Powerpoint users to have ‘corrective action’ applied to their outputs. www.theregister.com/2025/09/04/m...

Brilliant lads, we're getting roasted for not being normal about flags by the Northern Irish

The Government is doing its best at the moment to imply it has no problem with the ethnonationalism now rearing its ugly head. And I don't understand why. 1/5

The Afghan women's football/soccer team, who relocated to the UK to escape the Taliban's removal of female rights, including exclusion from all public life #WomensArt #AfghanWomen

OF COURSE I WOULD

I am one of the 14 authors who chose to leave the Polari Prize, and I find myself frustrated and saddened at the way this entire story has been represented. 1/

As more of us (and our universities) migrate to Bluesky, early research by @mikethelwall.bsky.social finds it is not only being used to share research but is hosting 'more meaningful scholarly dialogue' than its predecessor arxiv.org/pdf/2507.18840

On holiday, I notice that there are wind turbines on the shore of Lake Garda, which very much makes me think that residents with a view of some incredibly mid Cotswold or other can put a sock in it.

😂😂😂

David Runciman’s extended essay series on BBCRadio4 charting the victory, achievements, challenges & demise of the 1945 Labour Government is 1 of the best ever contributions to this strand. Essential listening for understanding where Britain is today www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p...

🧵 In February, I got a message from Anna*, a female police officer. She was a domestic abuse specialist, responding daily to calls from women abused by their partners. But she was also in an abusive marriage herself, for more than a decade - and her abuser was another officer.

🥵 Hot in #London? Find cool spaces 🥶 and water fountains 💧near you, with our interactive map: apps.london.gov.uk/cool-spaces/ 👍