Like any DIY synth geek I've loved Look Mum No Computer for many years. But I didn't expect to him to be the UK 2026 entry to Eurovision. Bravo man, this is the UK at its best, open and inclusive to other cultures, blue tack, string, and very silly. On! youtu.be/niMKvJ-Itq8?...

OpenSAFELY is open from today! Huge thanks to all who supported this vast collaboration: whole population GP data; in a productive platform; innovative privacy protections; unprecedented support from professions, privacy campaigners; &c Now it's over to users! www.bennett.ox.ac.uk/blog/2026/02...

Just bought one of these gloriously absurd mirror masks freddieyauner.co.uk/products/wha...

I wish that Spotify or similar would let people make radio shows, where they play music and talk in between. Since you've paid to access the music, it would be nice to have people share and curate, but with rambling humanity in the chat, not just playlists. This is the narrowcasting of my dreams.

Wonderful to see something good that is not just in the lab or proof of concept

What a huge achievement! A major milestone for science in general and a significant world exemplar. I hope many more similar things follow.

I started my career as a Körner implementation clerk in 1987. Since then I have spent most of my career in jobs with data, information or analyst in the title, all working with NHS data to try and improve public health. I retired last year. This is one of the most exciting developments I’ve seen.

BIG NEWS!

This is excellent news and a huge deal! (Here's my explainer on OpenSafely and why it is incredibly cool.) takes.jamesomalley.co.uk/p/how-to-use...

Brilliant, geeky, healthy news... well done to @bengoldacre.bsky.social et al.

OpenSAFELY is open from today! Huge thanks to all who supported this vast collaboration: whole population GP data; in a productive platform; innovative privacy protections; unprecedented support from professions, privacy campaigners; &c Now it's over to users! www.bennett.ox.ac.uk/blog/2026/02...

The world has its problems, yes. But I've just bought Brigitte Fontaine's 1969 album with the Art Ensemble of Chicago. Don't look on Spotify: you won't find it there. (But YouTube link below...) youtu.be/XgTdI4S3hns?...

I once met a man at hotel breakfast who was in the Potters Bar rail crash. He told a very harrowing story. Then his wife said "ask him what he did after he got out". He looked embarrassed, shrugged, and said "I walked to work". He didn't call. Disasters are incredibly disorienting. Sorrow for Spain.

How you pop to the shops, if it's minus 64° Celsius in your town. This is what I want from the internet: other people's fascinating lives. Not lies about crime in London invented by boring racists. youtube.com/watch?v=uPGI...

Three Yorkshiremen drive their Ford Transits overland from Bradford to Pakistan in time for Eid in the 1990s. Ultimate cosy retro TV. The voiceover is funny, candid, and incredibly warm in its frustrations (eg minute 7, but watch the whole thing). Highly recommend! www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dfbe...

I'm too cheap to buy one - and too lazy to learn the skillz - but this guy's polyphonic ceramic bass whistles are the goat. youtube.com/shorts/X57nT...

Really enjoying the new series of Gone Fishing, tho it was a fierce choice to replace Bob Mortimer with Tom Waits and that guy from the Jim Jarmusch movies youtu.be/sF4OkZ0B-q8?...

I think we forget sometimes that barometers are miracle machines. It’s not windy yet at home; it is raining but nothing exceptional. Without the barometer, if you were just relying on local observations (like most mariners for most of history) you would have no idea it was time to run for your life.

Fuel poverty is more than twice as common among people aged 16-24 than it is for older people. This is a cold country right now. trustforlondon.org.uk/data/fuel-po...

My old friend Patrick Matthews slogged for years to build up a few small struggling cafes in London parks. Now they're a success, so the parks are rewarding him by giving the cafes to someone who offered them more money. www.change.org/p/require-th... veganconfidential.substack.com/p/the-park-c...

At this time of year (a) I want a notarised statement from 1991 to say that I loved port and cheese as a teenager before I became an ancient Oxford prof; and (b) I'm annoyed that delicious port obligatorily contains the drug alcohol. It's like if all hobknobs were laced with ketamine.

In lovely science news, it is now official: I am the inaugural Writer in Residence at the Royal Institution to mark 200 years of the Christmas Lectures: www.rigb.org/explore-scie...

ACCIDENTALLY BOUGHT CHRISTMAS WRAITH. EVERYONE DEAD.

How do we get better dental data? A huge opportunity for the UK! Our editorial in @bmj.com

21 year sentence for using a car as a weapon. Good www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025... But YouTube is full of examples, with 1000s of approving comments. Every driver doing it should be banned, for life. We can discuss how to manage protesters blocking roads: it's not this. youtu.be/u-8qd_5_sAo?...

I'd love it if there was a music subscription service where anyone who wanted to could make a radio show with them talking to introduce the music, and then the actual copyrighted music. Not just a playlist. Not just a podcast with no music. Have I missed this, and it actually exists?

Random colleagues in other disciplines now commonly say "the code's on OSF". It's just so great to see an academic org like COS, that goes beyond advocating for change, and actually builds the tools and services that make science work better. More!

I bought a £150 thing from France. I'm truly delighted to pay £40 tax on import: that's for schools and hospitals. The £11 handling fee for DHL, on the other hand, is purely to cover the expensive slow additional bureaucratic admin needlessly created for us all by Brexit voters. Merry Xmas!

Pluribus - in case you've not - is absolutely brilliant theory-driven sci fi. The central concept is a gloriously versatile projection screen for Big Thoughts About Life. Is it better to be efficient and happy, or a messy human schlong? Etc. Also: every frame a photograph!

I'm delighted to say we have won the Queen Elizabeth Prize for Education with our work on OpenSAFELY, inventing new methods that let researchers analyse NHS GP data while protecting everyone's privacy, and with complete transparency, in a hugely productive platform! www.ox.ac.uk/news/2025-11...

If you'd like to learn more about how OpenSAFELY works - and how we solved the privacy and efficiency challenges, to make national GP data securely accessible - here's a 5 minute video! www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRjR...

I'm delighted to say we have won the Queen Elizabeth Prize for Education with our work on OpenSAFELY, inventing new methods that let researchers analyse NHS GP data while protecting everyone's privacy, and with complete transparency, in a hugely productive platform! www.ox.ac.uk/news/2025-11...

Bonus panel here: www.smbc-comics.com/comic/stats-3 #smbc

The @bennettoxford.bsky.social conference this year is the Oxford Medicines Data Symposium, we thought it was niche, but it's now heavily over-subscribed: if you're on the waiting list and think we should get you a space, then do email the team! www.bennett.ox.ac.uk/events/2025-...

I don't want to be around when the owner of these glasses comes back to find them.

This is genuinely extraordinary

One of the all time great Map Men episodes. Also, you can see why the Dutch are so good at bike infrastructure. If you've literally made land itself, presumably anything feels possible. youtu.be/eq-kgUpd-5E?...

This was v good.

Big fan of building new homes, no strong views on housebuilders, but... why is everyone so righteous about forcing housebuilders to pay for new GP surgeries and schools? They didn't magically create the patients and pupils. We pay for doctors and schools in tax. www.theguardian.com/society/2025...

Here's a mediocre idea for a webapp or twitter bot: "Is It Just Me Or Are The Trains Crap". You tell it the train you're on, and how late it is; you get, in return, contextual information about how unusual that is.

COME TO OUR CONFERENCE! Lots of people work on medicines data: researchers; but also "medicines optimisation" teams, using data to directly improve NHS care; and teams who build data tools. These clans rarely meet... Until now! Join us, Dec 10th, in Oxford. www.bennett.ox.ac.uk/events/2025-...

This is great to see. I want my government to do all it can to stop our allies, the Israeli government, killing more Palestinian civilians. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

Any christmas cake sightings in UK supermarkets? Ocado / M&S has pudding but no cake so far.

Just ordered some fence posts and trellis for same-day delivery. I have no DIY skills and it's raining heavily. With huge respect to my great grandfather - who did a better day's work there than I ever will - this is going to be like Paschendale.

Seating is social and public transport infrastructure and yes, removing the Kirkgate benches was a crime.

I agree with this praise of humans curating things you might like, and I'm surprised there's never been a popular platform facilitating it as a central foreground activity, where you can follow people for their curated links, music, or other stuff.

Lots of these problems are better solved with an annual property value tax, like US states do, ~1-2% per year. We could let people defer it against their house if they wish, taken at death. Can't be dodged: the house is there. And progressive: the rich pay more www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

During all future DIY rages let it be known that on this day, August 10th 2025, I actually was able to quickly find the specific screws I needed in the house.

This is a really interesting public health move. Ban cigarettes with filters, on the basis that they were fraudulent, polluting, and lead to compensatory risk behaviours that do harm. Force smokers to go full filterless cough cough Woodbine, or stop.

Happy to share that (from August 1st) I'll be spending the next 6 months working at the University of Oxford as a visiting researcher! I'll be working with @ndevito1.bsky.social and @bengoldacre.bsky.social on developing and extending features of RegCheck (regcheck.app).