Ah wait! I know this one! Is it "shareholders' pockets"?

Well, day one of home dialysis training was a mixed bag. I did the setup all myself just fine - which was good! But I think we took off too much fluid, because I felt awful afterwards - and my rheumatoid arthritis flared horribly. Feels like one step forward, two steps back.

Exciting. Day 1 of the useless Thanet Parkway station. Nobody got on or off.

This ultra expensive new station is in the middle of nowhere. You can't get to it, except by car. There are other stations nearby. If they expect new homes to pop up around it, locals are worried that we don't have the infrastructure to cope (doctors for example) 🤷🏻

The reason the public's "not ready" is because there's been so little investment in non-automotive solutions. UK public transport is expensive, inconvenient, and unreliable. Cycling in cities like London is really dangerous. Electric vehicle infrastructure is still sub-par. https://x.com/ProfJSDavies/status/1685690475070492672

Tomorrow, I begin 10 days of intensive training to do haemodialysis at home. My AV fistula isn't ready to use yet, sadly, so not sure what they'll do to train me to needle myself - I'll have to use the central line in my chest for now.

A reminder that the government advice to vulnerable people is STILL shielding in all but name.

"You are advised to try to avoid contact with people who have symptoms of COVID-19"

"work from home if you can"

"keep your distance from others"

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-guidance-for-people-whose-immune-system-means-they-are-at-higher-risk/covid-19-guidance-for-people-whose-immune-system-means-they-are-at-higher-risk

This decision is literally: "meh. Cheaper to keep disabled people in permanent lockdown, confined at home. And nobody cares about them or will notice, so we'll get away with it." https://x.com/martin_eve/status/1685544925046181888

Head of vaccine task force in the UK confirms that the reason vulnerable people in the UK weren't given Evusheld - and thus had to stay shielding, their lives wrecked - was because government didn't want to spend money on us. Disgusting when they bunged so much to their cronies.

Another good example of bad email handling: Google Scholar uses your Google account. If you change the address on the Google account, as I have, you can't view alerts set to the old email... But they still go to the old address, not the new one. You can cancel these though.

Rosalind Franklin – chemist and X-ray crystallographer at @BirkbeckUoL http://blogs.bbk.ac.uk/bbkcomments/2023/05/30/rosalind-franklin-chemist-and-x-ray-crystallographer/

Prof Bampton: UK's planning was for a droplet pandemic. So they wrongly assumed Covid must be solely droplet-based. The assumptions in planning overrode the observational reality.

Also, now: "the UK is no better prepared for any new pandemic threat" https://covid19.public-inquiry.uk/documents/inq000174768-witness-statement-of-kevin-bampton-on-behalf-of-the-covid-19-airborne-transmission-alliance-dated-19-04-2023/

Also awesome this week: new EP from @thelongchamps on tici taci. Nostalgia for the Future. https://www.junodownload.com/products/the-long-champs-nostalgia-for-the-future/6206754-02/

Also excellent new music today from the ace Rich Lane, under his "Chug Norris" persona https://cottonbud.bandcamp.com/album/dark-sweaty-ep

I am also quite excited about the new Alabama 3 album, Cold War Classics Vol. II. The first two singles are great https://www.junodownload.com/products/alabama-3-north-korea-explicit/6214602-02/

This weekend I will mostly be: reading a PhD thesis; finishing final edits to my book; and completing a secret programming project.

This is, for me, the musical excitement of the decade. New Fluke. Remixes from Sean and Dunc 😍 https://t.co/xb3kw7P0nG

I have every Fluke, 2 Bit Pie, and Syntax release ever made, *except* Xmas Demos (the promo for Puppy). Jon Fugler of the group made my music productions dreams come true when he did vocals on my track a couple of years ago https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0VDIQUBkRRQ

Just learned that tramadol is to become a banned substance in pro cycling. Tbh, if you can cycle on that stuff, you deserve some kind of medal.

Can't use apostrophes correctly in the press release though. https://x.com/timeshighered/status/1684980793255309321

Every time a celebrity dies and there's suddenly a massive social media contest to show to whom they meant the most, the cynic in me wonders why I haven't seen any previous posts from them about said celebrity. I think we should celebrate more people while they're alive.

Though I'm probably only thinking that because I'm grumpy on dialysis

Fatigue is among the debilitating symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis, but it's virtually impossible to explain to those who have not experienced it. People think it's "tiredness". It's not. It's far far worse. Reality-shaking exhaustion. And you can't sleep or rest to solve it. https://x.com/edyong209/status/1684549675318231042

The best I've managed for describing it to non-sufferers is that it's similar to how wrecked and exhausted you feel when you have flu - because your body is mounting an immune response, in both cases. It's just that, in RA, the immune response is against your own body.

Jeff Severs has set up a sponsorship donation drive for unwaged scholars to get scholarships for International Pynchon Week events. I loved these conferences so much, even if I cannot now attend due to ill health, and so donated so others can enjoy them https://www.gofundme.com/f/international-pynchon-week-scholars-fund

Just had an email titled "Exciting news regarding API keys".

Narrator voice: the news was not exciting.

The constant bribery with treats is helping Luka to love me 😂

Home from hospital at last. Lots of things I should try to catch up on, but am shattered, so will settle down with @jeffjarvis's new book...

Of course, Farage believes that nobody should be discriminated against in commercial contexts on the basis of their politics or who they are. I mean, that would be outrageous, right? https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/apr/28/ukip-christians-legal-protection-same-sex-marriage

Sadly, this is what rheumatoid arthritis does. It causes misery, illness, and awful pain through active autoimmune inflammation. That inflammation, in turn, erodes/destroys the joints permanently. Which also hurts. A lot.

I have been lucky to go this long with severe disease - almost 20 years - before incurring such damage. But it's another thing that will, once more, make life harder for me.

Had rheumatology today.

My hip is permanently damaged, with visible joint erosion, and active ongoing severe inflammation. It needs surgery but, as the consultant said, now is not a good time for this, given the new dialysis and we will try to delay.

Finding this actually quite a difficult thing to deal with, psychologically. Even if we can get the active autoimmune inflammation down now, I will also have to deal with a damaged hip -- which hurts 24/7 already -- and the prospect of replacement surgery.

Appropriate attire

Today, I'm off to a London hospital for MRI scans of my neck, back, and hip. The first looks very deformed after a year of serious rheumatoid inflammation. The lower back is also screwed. And the hip is clearly damaged given the noises it makes and pain it causes.

Then it's BK viremia tests to see if I've made any progress clearing this - the first step towards any transplant possibility. Finally, I'll round off the thrilling day with a rheumatology clinic.

I give up. We're governed worldwide by death cults. https://x.com/DoctorVive/status/1684167246942179328

That you spend longer in prison if you claim and maintain your innocence is really perverse. Especially when it turns out to be true.

Appeal court overturns Manchester rape conviction of man who spent 17 years in jail
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jul/26/appeal-court-overturns-manchester-rape-conviction-of-man-who-spent-17-years-in-jail-andrew-malkinson?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

Consistently bewildered that people put so much weight on the affordances of social media platforms, when really it's the network effect/number and quality of people in your network that makes a platform good or otherwise.

Of course, moderation matters too.

Or go for models that do not work on an APC basis https://x.com/mjgbakker/status/1684103192143855616

The bad news: I have to go to hospital on 12 of the next 17 days. The good news: I should be equipped to do dialysis at home after this training.

(e)X

I didn't realise, before I started dialysis, what the hard bits were. I think I thought you just sat there and that was it.

If only. Vomiting, diarrhea, headaches, severe muscle cramps, hypotensive drop, fatigue all very common. It's not great fun! But it is lifesaving.

Without the right and ability to inspect software and hardware systems, including source code, this yields uncontestable power to opaque third-party systems. https://x.com/darrenpjones/status/1683534811099480076

This is the woman who cares so much about taxpayer funds and their judicious expenditure that she claimed £400+ per month in expenses for a house she wasn't even living in. https://x.com/martin_eve/status/1683512710493872139

Suella Braverman broke law by denying asylum seekers £3 a week, judge rules. £3 per week.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jul/24/suella-braverman-acted-unlawfully-over-asylum-seekers-judge-rules?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

It literally needs to be proportionate to "the end of the world".

Rishi Sunak says net zero strategy must be ‘proportional and pragmatic’

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2023/jul/24/rishi-sunak-labour-housebuilding-michael-gove-uk-politics-live-latest-updates

"Is it any wonder they don’t want anyone to know anything, to understand anything, to think?"
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/jul/23/dopey-rip-off-degree-plan-is-beyond-this-tory-education-minister?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

I have changed 170 account emails today as I migrate my primary email. I still have 150 to go. There has to be a better way than the ongoing hell of "please enter the SMS verification, your email verification & your memorable date. Actually, now please call customer services."

And then there's this.

'Covid is not over': Why some Scots are still shielding
https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/23665979.covid-not-over-scots-still-shielding/

A reminder that the only strategy the government has for the most vulnerable group is perpetual lockdown that is still ongoing.

We - Evusheld for the UK, now Forgotten Lives UK - took no funding from AstraZeneca when we were pushing for Evusheld to be authorised.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2023/jul/22/revealed-drug-firms-funding-uk-patient-groups-that-lobby-for-nhs-approval-of-medicines?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

When you're too much of a bloodsucker to have an account at Coutts https://x.com/MarkBowsherFilm/status/1681718159307407360

The Uxbridge election going to the party that campaigned against environmental issues (ULEZ) is a clear indicator to me that democracy is seriously incapable of saving our species from catastrophic climate disaster. We're so screwed.

I've used Google Workspaces for years and associated the domain email with many external service logins. Some sites do this well and link to the Google ID. Some, though, link to the _email_, which is a serious security risk if you rescind future control of the domain.

"The bank apologised, saying that the comments were 'totally accurate but meant to be secret'"

You see, the seagulls took out loans to spend on dividends to shareholders instead of improving the infrastructure. Damn seagulls! https://x.com/Feargal_Sharkey/status/1682676122885017600

Textpocalypse in Private Eye magazine @mkir

I know it has security implications, but the fact that there isn't a common API for changing profile details is a huge pain. I need to change my primary email everywhere and it's going to take... Ages. If only a password manager could do it in one click...

My MP.

The future - if there is one - will look back on this as a crime.

How "altruistic" https://x.com/xriskology/status/1682392845318082560

I really hope I will have moved to doing it at home by then, because, otherwise, Christmas Day is looking fun

1. It's Gerwig, not Gurwig
2. This makes it sound like she went from something bad (English student) to being a success
3. Related but tangential: if you Google "Greta Gerwig" right now, the results are all in pink https://x.com/shefenglish/status/1682344811699875844

Yay!

My next book has been unanimously approved by the Stanford faculty editorial board. I should have the final MS ready next month ready for production.

Man who stole 200,000 Cadbury Creme Eggs jailed for 18 months https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jul/20/man-who-stole-200000-cadbury-creme-eggs-jailed-for-18-months

A guy at my hospital has been on and off dialysis since 1977! He's had 4 transplants but is still going strong. He's been really helpful in teaching me how to set everything up, but says he regrets there hasn't been more progress in renal replacement therapy over this period.

Urgh don't look at the replies, which are all "maybe it's because they're woke".

An actual answer is: if A-levels were a dead cert predictor of degree outcomes, we wouldn't need to examine students further. But students often flourish later than age 18. https://x.com/Telegraph/status/1682126340567203840

King Charles to receive huge pay rise from UK taxpayers
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jul/20/king-charles-to-receive-huge-pay-rise-from-uk-taxpayers?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

My friend Kerry's Midsummer Mechanicals is back at The Globe this summer! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvfjrH0Wmoc

Lioness believed to be on loose in Berlin
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jul/20/lioness-believed-to-be-on-loose-in-berlin?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

Time for an early lunch, jamming to this A Love From Outer Space classic https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVLZtzn5HWk

"The oncoming burden of long COVID faced by patients, health-care providers, governments and economies is so large as to be unfathomable" https://www.nature.com/articles/s41577-023-00904-7

I mean, I really like The Chemical Brothers, but I think I'll pass on the £165 hoodie, t-shirt, slip-mat, vinyl bundle for the new album...

I am afraid that my PhD graduation at Sussex was emblematic of how the university treats protest. The VC had called the police to quash student protests the week before. But, at graduation, they showed footage of early years protests at Sussex, as a badge of how "radical" it is. https://x.com/kingstonucu/status/1681964947545227265

Should be in prison, not further demanding the demise of our public services. Remembering also that his wife setup a private healthcare company that was liquidated with £5m debt. https://www.ukliquidators.org.uk/news/liquidated-healthcare-firm-backed-by-cherie-blair-owes-creditors-5m https://x.com/itvpeston/status/1681765291301240835

My view: the latest Ithaka S+R draft report is hugely regressive and presents an exclusionary, insular future vision for scholarly communications.

https://eve.gd/2023/07/20/the-latest-ithaka-sr-draft-report-is-hugely-regressive/

@samoore_ @rmounce

Now I am become @gbilder, destroyer of closed infrastructures.

With thanks to @ernestopriego for the photoshop.

Mm, yeah. Proofing time this weekend. Coming out later this year, open access, in a Orbit special issue on Percival Everett.

What concerns me is how the scheme went from -£14bn to +£7bn in such a short space of time. This seems to indicate either extreme instability in the worth of the fund or a totally flawed assessment mechanism. And just because we now LIKE the result shouldn't mean we trust it. https://x.com/ucu/status/1681650466353029124

ORCID Increases Financial Support for ROR https://info.orcid.org/orcid-increases-financial-support-for-ror/

"On Monday, the Mail also carried a story about a woman who married a Victorian ghost announcing her divorce. No wonder the paper is keen on steering its readers away from degree-level education" - most amusing from Research* playbook

Wow. The latest Ithaka report reads like a hit job on open scholarly communications. Really disappointing. Allowing "global" equitable participation is a threat to trustworthiness? According to "some observers" (it uses this shadowy deflective language throughout).

"Unfortunately, as a laughably libertarian mess (LLM), I cannot spell 'Britain' and my model is constrained by concepts in my training corpus, up to 1930." https://x.com/ProfDaveAndress/status/1681346247645446151

Such a transparent move to reinstate the polytechnic/university divide. Cultural studies only allowable to privileged applicants. Everybody else just gets to be trained for their station in life. https://x.com/RishiSunak/status/1680848107708338177

The irony is that if people can't get jobs after their degree, it's more likely because the Tories have wrecked the economy, not because the courses are "low value".

A good example: my university has a weird prestige status. Very well respected in research circles, but not necessarily well known in the public eye. So we might be branded "low quality" by Sunak... Yet I validate the MPhil degrees at Cambridge as external examiner. 🤷🏻

The basic fact is: because the academic labour market is so tight, wherever you go in UK HE, you will be taught by top experts in their fields, with PhDs and published books. Variation in prestige is mostly due to historic wealth of universities, not quality of courses.

It's a mirror of the historic class system to which the UK still clings. Hierarchy must always prevail. Subversion of said hierarchy must be punished.

There was a lot of discourse about how bad the UK's lockdowns were for mental health. Yet many clinically vulnerable people are STILL having to shield, living hugely reduced lives, over three years later. We're working to understand the mental impact of this. https://x.com/4gottenlivesuk/status/1680835032062066690

Doctors call for return of face mask guidance. Good. This should just be the case, covid or not. Medical settings are full of vulnerable, immunocompromised patients who deserve protection from infection, as standard care.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-66215539

Can't wait until I can do dialysis at home and get my afternoons and evenings fully back on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Hopefully not too far off.

The question is: can Djokovic escape from Alcaraz?

SSH might surprise you — in all the wrong ways
https://blog.devops.dev/ssh-might-surprise-you-in-all-the-wrong-ways-a5926d11ff11

"Her later works consist of life-sized knitted skeletons"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michele_Beevors

This week, @gbilder is coming to visit. This is the last time we met. I'm sure it will be a very sensible few days of serious work.

"a Home Office consultation found the Grenfell Tower Inquiry's recommendations would be too costly"

Some lives in contemporary Britain are literally deemed too "costly". https://x.com/timboxall/status/1680171397929115649

I always thought Barbie was a terrible anti-feminist icon that encouraged unhealthy body image and traditional harmful gender stereotypes. Now it's been ironised for rehabilitation though?

Some days, I despair of rheumatoid arthritis. Things were all getting better. Good trajectory with new immunosuppression. Then, today, out of the blue, my neck and shoulders are on fire with pain again so bad that I'm being sick. Hard mentally to handle the randomness of attacks.

And today - a vast improvement, for no discernible reason. But I'll take it!

https://x.com/WxNB_/status/1680208246785679360

As Tracy Chapman is trending, I'm revisiting this ace edit https://soundcloud.com/lndkhn/lndkhnedits014-tracey-chapman-give-me-one-reason-lev-tatarov-thommie-g-edit

Errm. Something has gone very wrong with twitter.

This first post was meant to say that I have a backlog of not yet listened to records. Starting with Underworld - And the Colour Red https://x.com/martin_eve/status/1680245760879734786

The new Crazy P presents with a @hardway

Then there's this very nice Glok EP from Andy Bell...

The new Crazy P presents with a @HardwayBros track remixed by veritable duo of HWB meets Monkton Uptown (Duncan Gray)

Electro blues outfit Skeewiff performing a classic Herb Alpert track

And, bought pre-scandal, the anniversary reissue of Rammstein's Sehnsucht.

Funding public sector pay by hiking the Immigration Health Surcharge is totally unjust. The PM says he "won't raise taxes"... Except for migrants.

Most of my renal nurses, whose skills keep me alive every week, are migrant workers. I need and value them.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1U8L5_fGaAKY3QUeNr0iROraamxguoZXOShjutZVrmO4

This ITV article is really bad. Doesn't ask WHY Thames Water has a "£14 billion mountain of debt". The answer is: because they borrowed money to pay shareholder dividends! See Guardian graph...
https://www.itv.com/news/london/2023-07-12/water-bills-will-have-to-go-up-next-year-thames-water-boss-admits

Oh please please please. That would be so funny. https://t.co/VJIR2kcz3j

50% of Harrison Ford's role in the new INDIANA JONES movie is saying "nazis" in a disdainful tone.

Ever since its founding 200 years ago, @BirkbeckUoL has been criticised for offering non-utilitarian learning to working class students. But why shouldn't workers study art history? Why should only the privileged be allowed literature? https://x.com/HetanShah/status/1679936994229747712

Absolutely disgusting. They know the price of everything and the value of nothing.

Sunak to force English universities to cap numbers of students on ‘low-value’ degrees
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2023/jul/14/rishi-sunak-force-english-universities-cap-low-value-degrees?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

Exciting stuff in the post today as Raphael Kabo's book is out, in the New Horizons in Contemporary Writing series, which I edit.

I think it's great that Kidney Research are running this video.

Starting dialysis is much harder than you imagine. It's quite a shock to the body - I've been throwing up, having violent cramps, and a dodgy tummy for a day afterwards. https://x.com/Kidney_Research/status/1679801079771406337

This AM I went to the cinema for the first time since the pandemic began. Heavily masked and with only a few other people in the room, I enjoyed the new Indiana Jones film. Particularly liked the representation of Operation Paperclip/von Braun in the Jürgen Voller character.

Hyperbolic headline -- sadly many dogs end up for longer than 500 days in shelters (Luka was in a shelter for 8 *years*) -- but good people https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2023/jul/14/experience-we-adopted-the-loneliest-dog-in-britain

I regret nothing about the autocorrect on this calendar entry

Current vibe: Shunt Voltage - Generator

https://www.facebook.com/paul.watt.399/posts/pfbid02z8WU69w3bc38JxgVwrFgtorQZUC6qFXK6h5xTuB2JaxrvM91HZZLc7gTRFzkYkc8l

A new policy at @CrossrefOrg: "Crossref now offers unlimited sick time off to all full-time employees. We trust you to take the time you need in caring for your health... and family... For you to enjoy a good work-life balance and be productive, your health must be a priority."

I am especially grateful as I've had the roughest 9 months of health in my life ever, just as I kicked off at Crossref. But they have been nothing but supportive. And it gives me a sense of loyalty to the organization. I want to do good work for them, because they treat me well.

This is such a humane policy. Of course, you need to have some HR contingencies, but starting from a culture of trust -- and recognizing that employees are people, with health needs beyond their control -- is really positive.

I should say that since I have had permanent jobs in academia, I have also had great kindness and support from academic institutions -- and I can't fault them. But it's got to the point where I am having to work from hospital wards so much that teaching was nigh on impossible.

Credit: Poorly Drawn Lines

One sees you in a while, the other later etc etc https://x.com/BirkbeckUoL/status/1679485324475654144

I'm kindof shocked at this Guardian reporting, which relegates disability to "other inequalities" in the opening paragraph, when disability was a massively predominating factor in pandemic deaths
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jul/13/equality-bodies-had-no-role-in-pandemic-planning-uk-covid-inquiry-hears?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

I mean, it's pretty classic Tory. Pay fewer people more. https://x.com/PippaCrerar/status/1679450672842899456

It's a good job we have The Sun to protect our country against the sexualisation and exploitation of young people

A guarantee of OAPEN’s independence: we cannot be sold or acquired  – OAPEN – supporting the transition to open access for academic books
https://oapen.hypotheses.org/621

Harvard withdraws papers in dishonesty expert scandal
https://www.ft.com/content/64f76797-d390-45fd-b00f-2cab6412bdcb

My code submission to this third-party library that implements the Crossref API was accepted. Now their library can also support features from our experimental Labs API
https://github.com/fabiobatalha/crossrefapi/pull/59

My colleague, Obanda, on starting his new role at @CrossrefOrg
https://www.crossref.org/blog/perspectives-my-thoughts-on-starting-my-new-role-at-crossref/

I know organisers are doing their best, but the argument that "disability accommodation costs money" would, if upheld, prohibit all accessibility measures ever. https://x.com/DH2023Graz/status/1679064167607566336

Ex-Manson follower Leslie Van Houten released from prison after 53 years

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jul/11/leslie-van-houten-released-prison-charles-manson

"Can you guess which name my husband chose?"

Was it "Johnson"? https://x.com/IndiaAstrifera/status/1678767570059677697

UK charity foundation to abolish itself and give away £130m
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/jul/11/uk-charity-foundation-to-abolish-itself-and-give-away-130m?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

Ah haha. https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/jul/11/carrie-boris-johnson-announce-birth-baby-boy-frank

Had the technician around to appraise our house for home haemodialysis today. We passed the home check! Next steps: custom electricity and plumbing to wire the machine in.

"If you ever really cared about Ken, you would know that nobody cared about Ken. So your hypocrisy is exposed. This is why his story must be told"
https://www.theguardian.com/film/2023/jul/11/ryan-gosling-ken-barbie-movie-quote-quiz?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

I can't explain it, but have just heard that my article in BOOK HISTORY was the most downloaded piece of the year. But not by a small margin. It was ~10x more downloaded than the second article. That it's open access must have some bearing but can't be all https://muse.jhu.edu/article/872063

I wonder if it was posted to reddit or something?

This looks like a brag - but I'm actually curious about what has happened here and why this should be the case.

Their "purpose" being to traumatise small children and to make it clear that Britain has no compassion. https://x.com/ECPATUK/status/1678415191992680449

'A headteacher has said "every day is an exciting day" after falling into a sinkhole ahead of his school's summer fair.'
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-merseyside-66136277

Oh yeah! My first time wiring everything up myself on the dialysis machine. Success!

🎶The red line's connected to the... Out flow. The out flow's connected to the... Dialyser. The dialyser's connected to the...🎶

A decent research appraisal system would value negative results when they came from sensible hypotheses that would have advanced the field significantly if correct.

That is: radical but plausible hypotheses that turn out, nonetheless, to be wrong should be valued.

This week, @gbilder upgraded our Abstractonator game at @CrossrefOrg to use GPT-4.

Can you tell the machine learning-generated abstracts apart from the published version?

https://abstractonator.labs.crossref.org/

Every time someone tells me that open access publishing would be "damaging for ECRs", I think: err, and all the non-affiliated ones would still be able actually to read... https://x.com/historyhaze1/status/1676981721831538689

I mean, this is unbelievable.

Overseas students want to come study at UK universities - even gasp! non-Russell Group ones.

And the Con Party wants to stop it. 🙄🤦 https://x.com/JohnRoss49/status/1678190641619034113

I seem to have returned from holiday to some 90s timewarp where everyone on my feed has either been to a Blur or Pulp concert last week.

I've had a really refreshing week off. Predictably, I didn't feel great for much of it and I was quite limited in what I could do in my current state. But I do now feel mentally recharged after it and am full of enthusiasm for my next projects!

Also out this month on tici taci: The Long Champs - Nostalgia for the Future. A lovely release. I particularly like "Mind Trip, Right On" https://ticitaci.com/releases/the-long-champs-nostalgia-for-the-future.html

UK parallel in GCSEs https://x.com/MrSidetable/status/1677391190046416922

And one of the reasons people need advice before buying tickets is that the ticketing system is incomprehensible.

Tickets have names that require you to know the esoteric meanings of phrases like "super off-peak anytime return". https://x.com/Captain_Deltic/status/1677741965373308928

Keir Starmer: "I hate people who want there to be a habitable planet for future generations".

Honestly, he's so appalling. https://x.com/James_BG/status/1677943523666960386

Had a dream last night in which I wrote a long blog post about how transparency is the opposite of trust - because if you trusted, you wouldn't need transparency. That said, transparency can also engender trust. https://t.co/WsOzi7JbpW

You should see their cover of Immigrant Song https://x.com/Ottojizzmark/status/1677618141675810817

Wahey! Here it is. New Primal Scream Remixes on tici taci. Vinyl only. https://www.juno.co.uk/products/sons-of-slough-vs-running-out-of-time-vinyl/958069-01/

Whenever I shave my head (since I had cyclophosphamide I'm patchy and bald when I grow my hair) I remember a scathing comment @Rachael_Gilmour once made to me about preening academic men who think they are Michel Foucault. Just need the winter turtleneck. 😂#feelingguilty

Out this week: the second compilation showcasing a decade of tici taci records!

https://ticitaci.com/releases/va-tici-taci-decade-volume-2.html

I am an external examiner for Cambridge MPhil degrees.

Yes, there are problems with UCU rhetoric about "sector-wide surpluses" - because it's so unfairly distributed - but institutions like Cambridge should be leading to fix this, not shrugging "fate".

No fate but what we make. https://x.com/USSbriefs/status/1677626353569374208

Me in light of OPPENHEIMER: so few of us leave a legacy. But it may be better to leave no trace than to have done damage.

My friend: imagine being the person who created this meme. A legacy. "As I pass away from this earth, I can know that I created: HELLO / YES. THIS IS DOG"

Right. I need to stop laughing at Bluesky memes and do some book editing.

A question that I'm sure will be tested in court: what's the legal difference between a search engine ingesting in-copyright material to build an index and then to show users summary information about it and ingesting the same material into a machine learning model?

Our boy is getting a bit less nervous, after 8 years in a shelter 😍 https://x.com/NiallHarbison/status/1677535616584790019

Right, lads. Need to up the game. No more 3* work for me. I'm only doing 4*.

Seems a very bad idea. The only way it can work is by testing extreme hypotheses with massive consequences. This is high risk for scant return and encourages bad science/p-hacking for a result. https://x.com/timeshighered/status/1677582814173167617

Ha ha ha ha ha ha. Half of Twitter all saying "Yalta".

You don't know anything about history, do you, Andrew? https://x.com/afneil/status/1677446985278685184

The Spectator.

One of the few publications where I believe a paywall does the world good.

Can report that it's going to take me a few goes to learn how to setup the complex disposable tubing. But I am underway! https://x.com/martin_eve/status/1677320423271178245

Probably the hardest thing my wife had to do as a teacher was to tell her class, through tears, of the death of one of their friends. So grim.

Police release woman on bail after fatal Wimbledon school crash
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jul/07/tributes-to-girl-eight-killed-in-wimbledon-school-crash?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

Exciting* stuff tonight. I'm beginning the training to learn how to do haemodialysis myself, at home! Easy at this point while I have a central line... A bit trickier when I have to IV cannulate myself in a few weeks. Wish me luck!

* for me

Just disgusting - it's traumatised children arriving on their own.

Robert Jenrick has cartoon murals painted over at children’s asylum centre
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jul/07/robert-jenrick-has-cartoon-murals-painted-over-at-childrens-asylum-centre?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

Avalanches above, business continues below https://t.co/cAEnsQZOOQ

Probably the last person to say this, but running to Zuckerberg's platform, because you don't like what Musk's is doing, doesn't seem a great fix?

Interesting that the lawsuit alleges that OpenAI used shadow libraries for the training corpus.

Two authors are suing OpenAI for training ChatGPT with their books. Could they win?
https://theconversation.com/two-authors-are-suing-openai-for-training-chatgpt-with-their-books-could-they-win-209227

A reminder that we're looking for input on this digital preservation project! https://x.com/CrossrefOrg/status/1674469029526876177

When we fail to address these harms, while continuing to talk in vague terms about the potential economic or scientific benefits of AI, we are perpetuating historical patterns of technological advancement at the expense of vulnerable people.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2023/jul/07/five-ways-ai-might-destroy-the-world-everyone-on-earth-could-fall-over-dead-in-the-same-second?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

Cryptic crossword setter Nutmeg (Margaret Irvine) obituary
https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/2023/jul/06/nutmeg-margaret-irvine-obituary?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

Crossword blog: meet the setter – Nutmeg | Crosswords
https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/crossword-blog/2017/apr/10/crossword-blog-meet-the-setter-nutmeg

Thames Water investor USS pension fund to be quizzed by watchdog over stake
https://www.ft.com/content/3f475309-c2e5-4056-a029-dfc9c6cc8133

I was Googling this vile being just earlier, having seem a succession if articles by her in The Spectator, all bashing the NHS. https://t.co/hueanBY53K

Barthelme, not DeLillo, but hehe https://x.com/synekura_audio/status/1676676029606252547

Two months ago I was in grade 3 hypertensive crisis with a blood pressure of 186/116.

Yesterday, after dialysis: 87/50. Whoops! Too low. Amazing, though.

Decentralisation, federation, and fragmentation always seem to lead back cyclically to centralisation, to make systems usable. Social media is in a chaotic fragmenting phase of the cycle at the moment.

"Why don't you strike when you are on holiday instead?" has to be among the thickest things I've ever heard a politician say. https://x.com/andreajenkyns/status/1676702779736309766

"I know how those young people feel" https://x.com/Peston/status/1676889531142885377

I am "very uncomfortable" that the leader of the bloody Labour Party isn't supporting legitimate and legally protected industrial action for better working conditions. I would feel "very uncomfortable" voting for him. https://x.com/Phil_Baty/status/1676855040026238976

Harvard Professor Under Scrutiny for Alleged Data Fraud
https://behavioralscientist.org/harvard-professor-under-scrutiny-for-alleged-data-fraud/

Whenever you praise the NHS, there's always some neanderthal troll who pops up to criticise it being a "cult". But under a US-style insurance system, I'd now be bankrupt and probably dead. So those people can go do one.

Happy 75th birthday to the NHS!

One of the nurses on the dialysis ward has baked all the patients cupcakes.

We must make sure that this humane institution, that treats on need rather than wealth, lasts at least another 75 years.

A nice-looking new volume just out on paper production in early modern Europe. And it's open access. Thanks to @ronaldsnijder for the tip off!

Paper Stories – Paper and Book History in Early Modern Europe https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/63796

Unpublished letter by Abraham Lincoln discovered in Pennsylvania
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jul/05/abraham-lincoln-letter-discovered-pennsylvania-sale?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

Dangerous precedent.

Publisher contracts need to specify the retained right to publish expressions of concern and to retract papers.

Scientist sues publisher to block expression of concern
https://retractionwatch.com/2023/07/05/scientist-sues-publisher-to-block-expression-of-concern/

The British Medical Association today.

"It is outrageous that... staff and patients are still, knowingly and repeatedly, being exposed to a level-3 biohazard"

https://www.bma.org.uk/bma-media-centre/first-major-survey-of-doctors-with-long-covid-reveals-debilitating-impact-on-health-life-and-work-and-wider-implications-for-workforce-and-health-services

It's a cap... But not the good kind that would sustain sector diversity. Instead, the kind designed to penalise non-Tory voters, as per the Daily Mirror article yesterday.

England set for student number controls plan
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/ministers-set-push-student-number-controls-england

Woo hoo Wordle in one!

Today we went to @theowlcamber - and they were totally amazing. Once they heard I was vulnerable, they gave us our own isolated area and asked what else they could do. And the food and drink was really superb. So good!

And Luka enjoyed it, too!

Hachiko: The world's most loyal dog turns 100
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-65259426

Harvard’s legacy admissions targeted after race-based criteria ruling
https://www.ft.com/content/6045f442-640d-45d5-9cb8-dab7f3bee405

NHS "slashing bureaucracy" actually means "cutting admin staff so that doctors spend longer doing menial tasks rather than treating patients". https://t.co/aHsEgQmCWH

Xenophobia is going to tear our care system apart. It's disgusting.

I am treated in hospital by the kindest, most diverse team of professionals, from all over the world. I am grateful to and for every single one of them.

This discourse makes heroes feel unwanted. https://x.com/AnnaYearley/status/1675843071886479360

So the totally surreal part of this first holiday in 4 years is that I've had to be driven back to my usual haemodialysis centre for a session. In future, I might be able to go to a remote centre if travelling. For now, it's the usual place - and then back to the holiday...

The "Plan B" wasn't so bad 😊

"Reports of school staff dying from COVID are now scarce"

Mostly because all the vulnerable ones have already been killed or had to quit their jobs in fear of their lives. https://x.com/ELHopkins/status/1675798460988006400

We've known that Covid massively increases diabetes risk for 1.5 years now. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-00912-y

Yet here's the BBC giving credence to the "maybe it was lockdowns" nonsense. Probably to help us sleep at night after infecting a whole generation.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-66054946

Nice looking restaurant where we had a booking now say "oh, sorry, we stopped serving food outside a few weeks ago".

Me: "could you do it for us as a small one-off adjustment? I have kidney failure, rheumatoid arthritis, and immune deficiency and can't go inside".

Them: "no".

I should say: they did offer a reduced "graze" menu... But why, if you're doing this already, can't we just eat the full menu outside?

My fingers are more crossed than a crossed thing that's very crossed.

AstraZeneca says new COVID drug could guard against all variants of concern to date
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/new-covid-drug-astrazeneca-immunocompromised-fda/

Was just imagining Sunak's contribution to the "who do we not save?" conversation in the pandemic:

"Is there some way to find out their voting record?" https://t.co/bUDQ5ZRggF

Nobody who needs it "hates" the NHS. They are frustrated by its under-funding - which is a result of politics. The only people who "hate" it are those who think healthcare should be about profit, rather than... Healthcare. https://x.com/JujuliaGrace/status/1675582479141412864

Sending solidarity and sympathy to US friends hurt by the SCOTUS rulings this week. It's not my country - and heaven knows we have enough of our own problems here in the UK - but it is heartbreaking to see what progress we had so reversed, globally.

Bowie tourism insisted upon by @artofile - apparently the site of the video for "Ashes to Ashes" - at Pett Level.

Looks a bit Q

Alison Bechdel: ‘The Bechdel test was a joke... I didn’t intend for it to become a real gauge’
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/jul/02/alison-bechdel-test-dykes-to-watch-out-for-cartoonist-interview?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

This is on the government. As unions are right to say: doctors' working conditions are patients' treatment conditions.

Patients will ‘pay the price’ for ministers and unions failing to stop strikes, says NHS chief
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/jul/02/patients-will-pay-price-for-ministers-and-unions-failing-to-stop-strikes-says-nhs-chief-amanda-pritchard?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

The problem with using religious belief as a reason to discriminate is that it undoes all characteristic protections and trumps everything else.

"I believe disability is a sign that God is punishing people and so will not serve them."

First they came for Nigel Far*ge and I did not speak up, because I think he's a disgusting man who has caused untold damage to our country and instilled hate against refugees. https://x.com/toridoki/status/1675426652686352385

Suspicious doggo in a holiday cottage

“At the end of every seven years you shall grant a release of debts. And this is the form of the release: Every creditor who has lent anything to his neighbor shall release it; he shall not require it of his neighbor or his brother, because it is called the LORD's release." https://x.com/CanPanicNow/status/1674862972563251209