Nearly finished work for the day. Looking forward to putting some time into defeating my current nemesis boss in Hollow Knight: Silksong (*amazing* game, btw - I may post more on that another time). Trouble is, I'm also considering having a tinned cocktail. The two activities may not mix well.

I see To Kill A Mockingbird is going to be on in the West End again. I don't remember a show coming back (as opposed to a transfer like The Producers) so quickly before. (We saw it in 2022, and it lasted until May 2023.) That won't stop me from going again of course. It's a fabulous play. All rise.

It really pains me to say this, and I know people have been talking about Stack Overflow dying for ages, but I really think this *is* the beginning of the end - at least of the site I used to love. meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/43...

@samfr.bsky.social No idea if you remember saying this might be an interesting thing for the web site, but bloc-based voting intention polls is now on the site... election2029.uk/blocs - if you have any other suggested groupings, they're very easy to add :)

From EE: "For all of your numbers, we’ve moved you to our latest pounds and pence terms. In future, your price change won’t be affected by inflation, so you’ll know exactly how much it will increase each year." Sounds great, right? Except the price changes are *massively* above inflation.

Enjoying #TheTraitors Ireland, but it's sort of the diametric opposite of UK Series 4. Just - what?

At Hadestown again after a gap of just over three months - new Hermes, new Persephone. Can't wait.

I've just remembered that Farage was going to announce a high profile defection from Labour to Reform this week. Did I miss it in all the other news this week, or did it not happen? (Perhaps another computery problem for Nigel?) @samfr.bsky.social Was there a defection that got mostly drowned out?

one of the best things ever

I hadn't clocked that Siobhan McSweeney is hosting #TheTraitors Ireland. So that's clearly on the Must Watch list now.

This is the first time I've felt this way, but this time I'm actually cheering on Team Traitor. It took me a while to warm up to them, mind you. Definitely a different vibe to other series. #TheTraitors

Was Keir Starmer's speech basically, "We're not backing down on Greenland, but we're not going to do anything hugely bold/rash either"? If so, he took an awfully long time to say it.

Please sign and share. The far right are getting political representation through stealth. Starmer has been awful, but the mass election of Labour was the electorate **trying to boot the right wing out of politics petition.parliament.uk/petitions/73...

I'm very confused. I've seen there's a new party registered with the Electoral Commission: the Haringey Socialist Alliance. But the web site for it is about Your Party instead. Why register a new party if you're going to encourage folks to vote for a different one?

Blogged: "Election 2029: Load Testing" - codeblog.jonskeet.uk/2026/01/18/e...

Blogged: "Election 2029: Models and Reality" - codeblog.jonskeet.uk/2026/01/17/e...

Rewatching One Man, Two Guvnors on National Theatre At Home. We previously saw it during lockdown and I remember it being funny - but it's even better than I remember. Really hoping the NT Live shot of Here We Are comes out soonish. (And the Hadestown proshot, though I suspect that'll be later.)

<sigh> My election site doesn't currently cope with an MP changing party twice in one day as happened with Jenrick. Will get it updated when I get a chance (which won't be for an hour or two...)

Slightly surprised my feed isn't flooded with references to this... new ElectoralCalculus/PLMR MRP which has Labour coming *6th* (after LibDems, Greens and SNP). I don't think anyone's really saying this is what will happen, but it's still mindblowing. www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/blogs/ec_vip...

Watching The Great Pottery Throwdown a bit more actively than before. I'm not really that interested in pottery, but people being kind and empathetic (and that almost being a signature in itself) is just very, very watchable.

@robfordmancs.bsky.social @psurridge.bsky.social Just received an update from Amazon about my order of the Election 2024 book: "Expected by Sun 19 Jul" - are you into a second printing already?

I've just read Steve Yegge's introductory post on Gas Town (steve-yegge.medium.com/welcome-to-g...) and have figured it might be interesting to do a v. small scale longitudinal-ish experiment. I'm personally a bit of an AI-coding skeptic, but I can see I'll need to at least explore it more in 2026.

Thought I'd try to load test my election site. Unfortunately it's so close to being an *ideal* web app (just naturally, not due to any cleverness on my part) that it's saturating the gigabit ethernet port on my laptop without the server process getting beyond about 5% CPU usage.

Blogged: "Changing Immutable Collections" - codeblog.jonskeet.uk/2025/12/31/c...

Just watched "Wicked - for good" and as well as being great as I expected, I was struck by an indictment of populism that I hadn't figured out before. Not sure if I was just missing the obvious before, or whether a new political context just makes it much clearer, but wow.

Just on our way home from Into the Woods at the Bridge Theatre. It wasn't the absolute best production of it that I've seen (that was probably at the Menier), but it was immensely enjoyable nonetheless. Every time I watch Into the Woods I end up just grinning from ear to ear. Such fun.

Just dropped @hollywebb.bsky.social and friends off at the station on their way to the protest at the new trans-exclusionary Girlguiding policy. So proud of them all. (Their signs are fab.) I gather some folks are bringing binliners for a post-protest litter-pick - the most Girlguiding thing ever.

Bingeing Traitors (UK) season two. I wonder if anyone's ever counted up how many times contestants say "100%" in any context. (Any time they say they're 100% sure of something, that seems to be a pretty good indication they're wrong.)

Gosh, Stack Overflow seems to be down. Let's check whether it's just me... <heads for downdetector> Oh.

Make no mistake, Your Party has achieved something today that I had not thought I'd see... They've made Reform UK look disciplined. (Admittedly that's on the basis of a) reporting on Zarah Sultana boycotting the first day and b) watching some of the live stream. Maybe the rest was better...)

Well here's a terrifying sentence: "Heathrow Airport's plan for a third runway, which involves moving the M25 motorway, has been chosen by the government." I'm sure that will absolutely be done without making the M25 even more of a car park than it already is at times. No disruption here, guv!

I don't know what brought Linden Lea into my head this morning, but now it's stuck there. It's not like I'm the kind of person who would enjoy a rural life, but both the words and the music are so beautiful that I'm now yearning for an apple tree to lean down low for (or at least near) me...

I suspect @ldfreedman.bsky.social is going to have a busy week. Surprised to see Russia (at least ostensibly) agreeing to the peace plan given Lawrence's analysis. I can only assume there's more going on behind the scenes - or that the supposed support is more for show/pressure than for peace.

I've just finished listening to the utterly wonderful "Don't burn anyone at the stake today" by @naomialderman.bsky.social. Thoughtful, informative, practical, hopeful (despite everything) - I can't recommend it highly enough. The audiobook is wonderful - it's "spoken" rather than "read". Amazing.

Just finished Cabaret with Reeve Carney and Eva Noblezada. Even with high expectations, we were blown away. Just wow. Ruthie Henshall was fab as well - I last saw her in Les Mis in the 90s...

@benhollebon.co.uk Not sure how active you are on here, but if you are - does your role include tech *within* churches (e.g. A/V)? Would love to have a conversation about making A/V simpler and increasing accessibility and inclusiveness of worship.

@mrchrisaddison.bsky.social Did you first see The Producers at the Menier? If so, would love you to check my memory. I remembered *two* giant Nazi pigeons during Springtime for Hitler, but at the Garrick there was only one - and it was earlier in the show. Is my memory duff, or has this changed?

This needs more attention: Zohran SPLIT the straights with Cuomo. ALL of his margin was from LGBTQ+ voters. Every Dem who ever said “we should abandon the transes” needs this shoved down their fucking throat with a ramrod.

So many questions. Primarily: a) Reform UK now believes if someone changes party there should be a by-election, do they? Let's apply that consistently... b) How can you stand for Reform UK - as recently as July 2025 - and *not* be aware of their anti-immigration stance?

Every time I've watched Apple TV (on the Google TV streamer) in the last week or so, it's forced me to sign in again, which I can only do with an Apple device, of course. (I have an iPod Nano pretty much purely for that purpose at this point.) Very frustrating.

It feels to me like the Green's recent surge off the back of Zack Polanski becoming the new leader is really not what Your Party need in the run-up to their conference. If you were a disaffected left-wing voter looking for an alternative and weighing up Green vs YP, which looks more credible?

Full marks to the BBC weather site for correctly showing the repetition of 1am in the UK this weekend. (Hopefully most other weather sites get this right too...)

The Plaid win in Caerphilly, by a significant margin, with good turnout for a by-election (over 50%) is really interesting. My *guess* is that it includes quite a bit of tactical voting to keep Reform out. If that's replicated next May, it could be a slightly bizarre election.

Why do by-election results in Wales take a long time to come out? Because they count the votes so Caerphilly!

Okay, for the folks who asked: here's the majority AI view, writing up the reasonable, thoughtful view on AI that the vast majority of people in tech hold, that gets overshadowed by the bluster and hype of the tycoons trying to shill their nonsense. anildash.com/2025/10/17/t... Please share!

If you've been on the fence about subscribing to Sam's substack, just go for it. Every post is gold.

Second Hadestown poster acquired. This is now my 18th time seeing it - but it's been 2 1/2 months since my last visit and (illogically I know) that feels like an absolute age. Looking forward to seeing Nicola Roberts as Persephone. Tough part, but everyone does it differently.

It's very kind of US and French politicians to go to these lengths to make UK politics look normal.

So, now that Your Party has an Electoral Commission ID, and is in the new ElectoralCalculus/PLMR MRP, I should add it to election2029.uk It's unclear what colour I should use though. Maybe it'll become more obvious after their conference.

Read my two letters to the #UK: 1. Protests: I call for a review of the legal framework and the reconsideration of provisions in the Crime & Policing Bill that could restrict freedom of assembly. 2. Trans people: I warn against exclusion&zero-sum approaches 👇#HumanRights www.coe.int/en/web/commi...