U of T History PhD applications: 96 two years ago, 177 this year

I know we can become deadened to this bc it’s downright surreal. But this is, in fact, a true—not hyperbolic—description of what we’re up against *And* more than 50 Twin Cities businesses are closed tomorrow (some due to worker pressure, some customer pressure, some bc they care) & more informally

“I wonder why they so often choose escalation over de-escalation. I wonder if they know how those who perpetrate violence can come to be haunted by their past actions, even if that violence is mandated by the state.” Rachel Louise Snyder: www.nytimes.com/2026/01/18/o...

Loved being part of this conversation. Well … loved the chance to open up and share an ongoing conversation alongside this wonderful group @alexmaceachern.bsky.social @codeforcanada.bsky.social @bluesky.sboots.ca … big thanks for the opp, PD x @fwd50conf.bsky.social!

If I were a PM who believed we were at a global rupture moment, upending decades of international order, and requiring totally new relations with the world, I probably wouldn’t cut my foreign affairs staffing and budget by 15%

“One mile on a bike is a $.42 economic gain to society, one mile driving is a $.20 loss.” “Which means that Copenhagen, a city of 1.2 million people, saves $357 million a year on health costs because something like 80% of its population commutes by bike.” #CityMakingMath Some costs aren’t costs.

It takes both imagination and strength to actually face the moment as it is

Speech looks great. Growing a bit impatient for actions that back up such words. Had my fill of "peace board" joining, oval office gaffawing, and in-or-out un-named sources Greenland defending.

If you've been following the research this should cause all sorts of alarm bells to go off, but we're still trying to pretend diseases are our friends.

“If you care about the bottom line, budgets & taxes, then you should care about urban biking, because it’s a money saver. It’s ironic when so-called fiscal conservatives attack biking, when their efforts just show a lack of understanding of math.” My interview with @modacitylife.com #CityMakingMath

A big thank you to all our speakers, attendees, and organisers for such an insightful event. More content will be available soon, capturing all the great discussions from today. In the meantime, please do stay in touch, and let's keep the conversation going! #FWD50

When countries get hooked on US tech, their governments are constrained in reining in tech’s harms while most of the economic benefits accrue to the United States. It’s time to break out of that trap — but that means challenging the Silicon Valley model, not creating our own digital colonizers.

all these thought pieces about Canadians going all guerrilla fighter and such falls apart the moment you realize that our entire civic infrastructure and mental models about governance are dependent on digital infrastructure that are monopolized by US tech firms that don't care about "human rights"

“The collapse of the AI bubble is going to be ugly…AI is the asbestos in the walls of our technological society, stuffed there with wild abandon by a finance sector & tech monopolists run amok.“ Read this article by @pluralistic.net.web.brid.gy. Whether you agree with it all or not, it’s important.

Area 51 scientists in 1953 choosing whether to derive the secrets of efficient cold fusion or social media infrastructure from the Roswell crash and choosing the Wrong Path.

jack asked if i would sketch up a poster to tell people in nearby neighborhoods about the partnership between flock and ring, and this is what i came up with. it can be printed on an 8.5x11 sheet of paper.

I really think Hubert Dreyfus nailed this in On The Internet (2002) and I’ll keep posting this page until everyone has seen it. Key para in alt text.

Thanks so much to everyone who has checked in about what it’s like in Minneapolis right now. This should answer most of your questions:

This was one of the most interesting, candid conversations I’ve had while reporting from the tech beat. @anildash.com did NOT pull any punches diagnosing what is happening with the tech industry. If you feel like tech shit is melting your brain lately, read this

One of the points I tried to make clear in having this conversation was: I’m not a radical. I am a *boring middle-aged dad*, who’s raised tens of millions of dollars in venture capital, and worked in tech for decades. I have not lost my mind, or become an extremist. THEY DID.

"This isn’t even venture capital anymore. Venture capital means you take a risk. High risk, high reward. If there’s no risk, that’s not venture capital." —@anildash.com sf.gazetteer.co/theyve-pickl...

Extraordinary article from the Secretary General of the Council of Europe. But I’m going to say this again, where are the Democrats saying that any illegal or forced annexation of Greenland will be reversed as soon as they take power. Why aren’t they making this clear www.nytimes.com/2026/01/19/o...

Online hate and disinformation do not have easy solutions. But the Trump administration’s lies about European regulation are not about free speech. They are about power – preserving its own, promoting its far-right allies in Europe, and protecting Big Tech, writes David Kaye. buff.ly/ruwwdxJ

I wrote up some thoughts about this speech. It feels very relevant today. werd.io/remembering-...

"When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights, are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, extreme materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered." www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlk...

This got buried in a much larger piece of mine but this is one of my firmest, most irrational hopes & core beliefs

turns out letting a cadre of circus peanuts run rampant on your government for the lulz has uh downstream impacts. news at 11

I don't agree with all or maybe even most things here but Evgeny Morozov on Socialism After AI has given me more new things to chew on than anything else I've read on the matter in some time www.theideasletter.org/essay/social...

Excellent piece (as always) from @justinling.ca on the United States and Venezuela, Iran, and Greenland: www.bugeyedandshameless.com/p/read-the-d...

When I lecture to students about how the apparently thriving economy of the 1920s was really a house of cards just waiting to be knocked down, one of the points I stress is how much a small number of the very rich were essentially propping up consumer spending in unsustainable ways

Carleton is looking to hire an outstanding defence economist (and many other scholars) as part of the Canada Impact+ Research Chair program. Please spread the word! carleton.ca/deputyprovos...

For the late/west coast crowd, my latest episode where @smsaideman.bsky.social and I talk Greenland, Article V, and the possible end of NATO #cdnpoli

In earlier years, the United States did more than any country to eliminate the use of offshore bank accounts as shelters -- numbered Swiss accounts ceased to be a thing thanks to Washington's reporting and filing regulations. Now we're watching the president use one.

This is Minneapolis: The temps drop so you need to remember to move your whistle from your lighter jacket to your heavier jacket pocket so you're prepared to keep an eye out for abductions by federal agents... at your kids' elementary school arrival & dismissal.

The answer is right here: emmettmacfarlane.substack.com/p/is-canada-...

Chapter 8 is from myself, @gillianpetit.bsky.social, and Wengshuang Yu titled The Effects of COVID-19 on Public Transit in the City of Calgary: Fiscal Impacts and Equity Considerations

Check out this new edited volume Lasting Disruption Economic and Social Impacts of COVID-19 on Canada Assessing COVID-19’s enduring imprint on Canadian society and drawing lessons for future resilience. www.mqup.ca/Books/L/Last...

Canadian media should really be covering the US through the frame of an authoritarian regime trying to consolidate power. MAGA is using a pretty standard playbook. Have experts on fascism and propaganda discuss the steps these violent movements use to end democratic government.

This will also significantly affect international students and researchers at colleges and universities.

Key UN meetings: Commission for Status of Women in March (good luck to gender equality advocates trying to get into the US), high-level meetings over summer, and UN General Assembly in Sept (climate, gender, poverty, health, all sorts of Woke issues) World Bank meetings are March and October in DC

I don't know how United Nations, World Bank or G20 events go ahead properly in the US now It's not safe for global participants to travel to the US, and in any case, State Dept just froze visa processing for 75 countries www.reuters.com/world/us/us-...

New Virginia legislation would require that the state establish a free tax filing system that considers "the compatibility, security, and integration of such program with the publicly available source code of the IRS Direct File Program as it existed during the 2025 tax filing season."

We are also way behind in renewable technology because we doubled down on fossil fuels. All this time we could’ve been building the infrastructure but renewables were too woke Well, racism has big costs

The latest @showuptoronto.ca newsletter features some sober thoughts about the anti-immigration rally this past weekend and how it relates to our neighbours down south, alongside dozens of opportunities to show up for your communities. buttondown.com/showup/archi... #toronto

The Atlantic piece led me down a rabbithole to @michael-feinberg.bsky.social's longer reflection on his resignation from the FBI. We as a nation are worse off, and it's not even close. www.lawfaremedia.org/article/good...

"Government, too, is part of a delicate American ecosystem—as it erodes, crises that lay bare its indispensability will multiply." Beyond what's already broken, and the lives already lost due to USAID's dismantling, there unfortunately will be more consequences. www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202...

Thoughts about the 2026 City of Toronto budget: What's a budget for, anyway? Spoiler: to express the will of the people. This will be a thread 🧵 /2

I mean it's a low-probability severe-consequence event, right