the enthusiasm for generative AI would not have been possible without prior decades of capitalist conditioning to view works of art as products, rather than acts of culture and shared human life

The Anglo-Saxon model

If you think that dramatic spikes in ocean temperatures aren’t much of a concern, it’s time to think again. There is no time to wait. #ActOnClimate #climate #energy #heatwave #ClimateBreakdown

Some of my editorial work comes via Reedsy. Over the past year it's become completely overrun by people (I can't call them authors) who are asking for editorial help on manuscripts that have been generated by #AI. Often, what they want is for someone to make the text sound more human.

Wondering how things are going for Elon?

French authorities are taking X to court because Grok is now doing straight up holocaust denial. Gas chambers intended for disinfection, cyanide residue tiny, ‘story’ persists because of taboo against critical examination. (Full translation in alt text)

Exhibition Launch: *Manchester Museum, December 2, 2pm* Come and have a glass of wine (or something more sensible!) while exploring some super interesting artefacts used to predict the future! Funded by the @britishacademy.bsky.social Info: www.museum.manchester.ac.uk/event/the-ar...

An absolute 🤯 at every level

Maybe it's just me, but I find the positive tone of posts like this infuriating. It isn't "good" news. To limit warming to 2 (not 1.5) degrees, emissions must fall by ~8% p.a., every year, from NOW. Fossil fuel use GROWING for ~5 more years would be an unmitigated disaster.

The Soviet-era statue of Friedrich Engels at Tony Wilson Place in Manchester. It was originally installed at Mala Pereschepyna in central Ukraine and was discarded in a field after the display of Soviet symbols was outlawed in 2015. Engels lived in Manchester and Salford between 1842 and 1869.

URGENT: 6 WEEKS LEFT - We're 743 signatures away from forcing a Government response The UK Government is rolling out freeports and free zones nationwide with billions in taxpayer money, yet operates with an alarming lack of transparency. petition.parliament.uk/petitions/72...

🚨 BREAKING: The government has tabled their plan to restrict repeat protests. Demonstrations could now banned based on the 'cumulative disruption' that previous protests have caused in the area - regardless of if they have been organised by the same people or not. This is worse than we feared.

Today, I revealed that City lobbyists have been seconded into the Treasury under the Labour Party, and that the Treasury wouldn’t tell me whether they are ‘helping’ write Rachel Reeves’ budget: open.substack.com/pub/abolishw...

New: a $60 mod to Meta's Ray-Ban glasses disables the privacy LED light. This is supposed to light when people are filming with the glasses. We bought the mod, verified it works. Now you can never be sure whether someone wearing Meta Ray-Bans is filming you or not www.404media.co/how-to-disab...

E.E. Cummings once had a collection of poems rejected by 14 publishers. When he eventually got it published as "No Thanks" in 1935, he dedicated it to those 14 publishers in a visual poem shaped like a funeral urn

The British government is Very Sensible and so can be trusted with the power to decide which protests have happened Enough Now and don't need to be heard from anymore thank you very much. It will be fine. When Reform get in they will be even more Sensible about all this. inews.co.uk/news/politic...

I was very excited to come home to find the author copies of my book had arrived! Though one young reviewer is disappointed that there are no tractors in it, if you are interested in early modern poetry and the occult, you can order below 👇 www.liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/doi/10.3828/...

What will it be like to work or study at Lancaster University, if the current plans to fire 1 out of 4 staff members are implemented? How will these impact local communities and businesses? And who will be held accountable? Sign our petition to stop unnecessary cuts to education! chng.it/xJpLzrsVvs

This is my regular reminder to everyone that jstor is open to the general public now; a free account there will give you access to 100 papers a year.

Govt claims requiring all adults in Britain to have “digital ID” will “help control borders” and “illegal immigtation”. That could only be true if police are given powers to require ID, without suspicion of a crime. A 🧵explaining why:

If you are concerned about how your data might be hacked, abused or sold, and more generally about unecessary digital surveillance, sign the petition. [Let's not even both talking about the fact you will need a smartphone in order to have one of these]. petition.parliament.uk/petitions/73...

We already *had* this for immigrants. They want the digital ID cards so they can be dicks to everyone.

Since Lisa Nandy is doing the media round for Lab this morning, here she is in October 2023 being asked 3 times whether Israel breached intl law when it cut off power & water to Gaza. Nandy refused to answer & when pressed she said it would be grandstanding to answer the question

Published today by ​Leverhulme Early Career Fellow @adambridgen.bsky.social @durham-university.bsky.social is a new, co-edited, open-access essay collection: British Working-Class and Radical Writing Since 1700. Available, for free, at: uolpress.co.uk/book/british...

Deleted my academia dot edu account. Not even sure why I had it anyway.

We want robust, enormous research that is SUCH good research, you already know how important and right and insightful it is before you even start it. We want research so predeterminedly world-changing that there is hardly any point actually doing the research at all.

In December 2023, Israeli president Isaac Herzog was pictured signing bombs due to be dropped on Gaza. Next week he’ll be in the UK at the invitation of the British government.

We built a calculator that doesn't work, but don't worry, it's also a plagiarism machine that will tell you to kill yourself. It runs on the world's oceans and costs 10 trillion dollars.

If the new (massively expanded) immigration detention centres Reform are proposing are (rightly) being compared to concentration camps, then how might we refer to the ones currently in operation I wonder?

The mainstreaming of far right discourse 2015 to 2025 in two pictures. The first is from a right wing troll that caused widespread outrage. The second is a supposedly serious journalist just asking questions

Please help. Please sign. I work on a part-time degree for mature students to study for a BA in English Literature & Community Engagement. Its direct access and designed for those who didn't or couldn't go to Uni at 18. Bristol plan to close it. We want to save it. docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

- 400 jobs to go at Lancaster University - 1 in 4 people will be made redundant But where's the financial evidence for this extreme action? Please read 👇 Sign the petition 👇 chng.it/7F52bThYqn

There are two key problems with the new UK government position that it will recognise Palestine unless Israel ends the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and commits to a two-state solution. [brief 🧵]

www.gov.uk/government/n... This guidance mandates that children are taught that they have different legal rights based on their biological sex. So much for kicking misogyny out of classrooms.

NEW from Liberty Investigates and The Herald: Scottish university agreed to monitor students for arms company www.heraldscotland.com/news/2530867...

Our water bill in Devon has just come through today. It's doubled. Our town had the cryptosporidium outbreak. We've had sewage in our beaches and the river. And the CEO of South West water got a £300,000 pay rise as this was all happening, which she told me was a "cost of living increase".