dudeontheguitar x dododowson - Barajatr YouTube video by dudeontheguitar

My cultural recc from this week. It's a bop! www.youtube.com/watch?v=lN0N...

The Pret cornichon crisis Plus: Sadiq Khan vs TikTok, Whole Foods vs Queensway Market, and the curious row over a Labour mayoral candidate's purchase of an ex-council flat.

Whole Foods will be replacing Queensway Market is awful awful news! It's such an amazing hub of independent traders and home to not one but two of London's best Malaysian restaurants www.londoncentric.media/p/pret-corni...

Huge congrats to @hettieobrien.bsky.social on her new book! If you want to know who is behind the degradation of our public services, look no further than private equity. Hettie's done such a great job of making this hidden world accessible through her brilliant research, journalism and writing.

Welcome to the MrBeastification of British politics: the latest trick up Nigel Farage's sleeve | Kirsty Major The Reform UK leader’s energy bill giveaway certainly grabs our attention – but it’s all a distraction from the real winners and losers, says Guardian deputy Opinion editor Kirsty Major

Loved this by @kmaj0r.bsky.social: what happens when you cross Mr Beast with Nigel Farage? www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Welcome to the MrBeastification of British politics: the latest trick up Nigel Farage's sleeve | Kirsty Major The Reform UK leader’s energy bill giveaway certainly grabs our attention – but it’s all a distraction from the real winners and losers, says Guardian deputy Opinion editor Kirsty Major

I wrote about Reform UK's use of MrBeast's tactics to win our attention and distract us from the real causes behind the energy crisis www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Welcome to the MrBeastification of British politics: the latest trick up Nigel Farage's sleeve | Kirsty Major The Reform UK leader’s energy bill giveaway certainly grabs our attention – but it’s all a distraction from the real winners and losers, says Guardian deputy Opinion editor Kirsty Major

grimly fascinating on the gamification of poverty alleviation by @kmaj0r.bsky.social www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

But were they boarded by pirates Gaby?!

if I were on Artemis II I would simply not come back

UK social media users less active on tech platforms due to rise of video apps Ofcom research shows people also concerned old posts could affect personal or professional life

Interesting part of this at the end. We're chatting to AI instead of each on social media now other now. Just another layer of loneliness www.theguardian.com/media/2026/a...

Say hello to the UK’s most successful growth industry: organised waste crime | George Monbiot Thanks to a sustained ideological assault on regulation, our country has been turned into a literal dump, says Guardian columnist George Monbiot

The result of 15 years of cutting red tape has created a vast criminal network of illegal rubbish dumpers @georgemonbiot.bsky.social

But man, it's so dead on here!

Fast forward to today’s shock, and some observers have noted the speed with which some companies are moving to raise prices. Weeks after the Iran war began, the United Airlines CEO warned airfares may need to go up 20%. Dow Chemical doubled a price hike for plastic resins — used in items like shopping bags and plastic bottles, in about a week, the Wall Street Journal said. And US Postal Service rates for some packages are going up 8%, until next January.

Greedflation, where companies pump the economy for money in anticipation of future gains.

From the Bloomberg newsletter.

Julia Davis for head writer. SNL x Nighty Night

Comments under music videos on Youtube are (mostly) one of the last lovely places on the internet

In the Age of A.I., What Is Taste? And Do We Still Have It? A.I. companies are attempting to hitch themselves to an aura of artisanality. But has the online ecosystem become so polluted that it has warped our ability to exercise taste at all?

Great piece by @chaykak.bsky.social . Tech companies know AI i
s anti-taste. To have taste is to discern. AI trained indiscriminately on data is not discerning www.newyorker.com/culture/infi...

I literally was about to post the same thing haha

Oh, I will check this out! I just finished Empire of AI and it is so utterly brilliant and frightening

Learn With Ms Rachel review – undoubtedly the TV event of the year for millions of us The queen of children’s edutainment is back after four very long months, with her most extraordinary, envelope-pushing and moving special yet. Cue absolute relief for parents the world over

"Friendship & Social Skills suggests that if a toddler can understand that killing children is wrong, that is not a sign of the assertion’s naivety – but evidence of its elemental truth."
www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio...

The Guardian’s positive action work experience is open for applications! There are (paid) schemes for disabled, BAME, and working class wannabe journalists.

Because the media needs more people like us.

Info here: workwithus.theguardian.com/entry-level-...

Please share this with any working class young people you know who might like to try out a career in journalism workwithus.theguardian.com/job-search/e...

Billionaire halts mass eviction after London Centric investigation Exclusive: Asif Aziz's Criterion Capital hoped to replace hundreds of tenants with more lucrative temporary accommodation. That plan has been shelved – for now.

Really great work from @londoncentric.media. It's a crime that temporary accommodation, funded by council tax payers, is more lucrative than long term rentals www.londoncentric.media/p/asif-aziz-...

Come work with me workwithus.theguardian.com/job-search/e...

And the majority of the Your Party spats are still happening on there. Horribly symbolic.

How to win friends and influencers: Labour’s new social media strategy is a step into the future | Kirsty Major There was a backlash when No 10 invited online content creators inside its doors. But in a fast-changing media landscape, this solves two problems at once, says deputy Opinion editor Kirsty Major

I wrote about No10 welcoming the content creators www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Podcast: James Butler, Peter Geoghegan and Ethan Shone · On Politics: Mandelson and the Private Life of Power

Well worth listening to @piercepenniless.bsky.social @petergeoghegan.bsky.social and @ethanshone.bsky.social on Epstein and Mandelson www.lrb.co.uk/podcasts-and...

Content Creation Has Become a Pyramid Scheme YouTube video by Taylor Lorenz

The renumeration from Insta for creators is shocking! @taylorlorenz.bsky.social v kindly shares her insta income as someone with a huge following.

‘Populism’: we used to know what it meant. Now the defining word of our era has lost its meaning | Oliver Eagleton In the 2010s it described an insurgent rhetorical style; in the 2020s it is inadequate to account for the wildly diverging fates of the left and right, says Oliver Eagleton, managing editor of Phenome...

I loved commissioning and editing this essential piece by the v v good Oliver Eagleton www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

These pieces by @robtoes.bsky.social are well worth reading

How the left can win back the internet – and rise again | Robert Topinka In the final part of this series, we look at how infighting has ripped the left apart online while the right has flourished – and how some progressives are turning the tide, says digital media academi...

Final piece in Robert Topinka's series on digital politics www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Oh, this looks really interesting, and something I've been thinking about for a while!