Palantir are about six months away from ordering their employees to leave audio logs scattered around their offices

Getting my binoculars out for a closer look at two birds on the power line, which is of course their cue to be gone. I'm confident they were swallows, though. Then I enjoyed looking at a goldfinch on the fig, and absolutely no other birds in evidence while my bins are in hand. Too shy!

I'm not joking when I say mRNA technology is more important than "AI" and it's a tragedy we're throwing billions into one while our government is aggressively defunding the other.

Review | In the Mountains. He — a comedic ode to the Caucasus mountains Balkar director Said Tolgurov’s second film works to ground the viewer through the breathtaking, mountain landscape of Kabarda–Balkaria.

🎬 OC Reviews: In the Mountains. He — Balkar director Said Tolgurov’s second film works to ground the viewer through the breathtaking, mountain landscape of Kabarda–Balkaria.

oc-media.org/review-in-the-mountains-...

🫡🫡

Today's #CrapColourisation with added AI slop.

The unwonted copper roof to the church tower, the vastly extended pond (which doesn't reflect the 'new' roof and reflects the church weirdly), an extra telegraph/phone pole...

I know this is not generally the kind of post that anthropologists are invited to but I wanted to add: every sci-fi novel in the world with alien intelligent life is like "this whole planet (one biome) is populated by a single 'Culture,' it is driven by a high sense of 'Honor'"

wow that took me back

BBC News on Instagram: "Three successive Israeli attacks have killed at least three paramedics in southern Lebanon, Lebanese officials say, as they accuse Israel of deliberately targeting health worke... 12K likes, 1,233 comments - bbcnews on April 16, 2026: "Three successive Israeli attacks have killed at least three paramedics in southern Lebanon, Lebanese officials say, as they accuse Israel of del...

Yesterday, Israel used a triple tap attack to kill paramedics in Lebanon. This means that they first bombed, waited for paramedics to come, bombed again, waited, and then bombed again. It was all caught on camera.

There is no peace possible with this.

www.instagram.com/reel/DXMzlFy...

omg

this is cool because it's a very obvious concept but it's neat to see it laid out in data!

I love art

[foreign office 2025]

CIVIL SERVANT: Prime Minister we have news on Mandelson's vetting, it turns out-

STARMER: no don't tell me, I want it to be a surprise when the scandal comes out in 8 months' time

CIVIL SERVANT: I really insis-

STARMER: god forbid we have any MYSTERY in our lives any more

nothing is true; everything is permitted

a close-up photo of pale pink cherry blossoms with beads of dew or rain on the petals

A beautiful season. 🌸🌱

I've never had huge celebrations on my actual birthday because the trains often don't run, so I wouldn't be able to get people over, but I do like to alter my blood alcohol composition in a way that's incompatible with work.

My birthday is a bank holiday in the UK so I'm always off for office jobs, and when I worked at McDs I didn't go in. I probably still wouldn't unless money was tight enough I needed the time and a half.

I mean, we all *knew* why they're pushing AI, but it's fun when they just come out and say it.

Frankly I don't care if an asylum seeker lies about being LGBT, because I think we should be generous with offering asylum and I assume they have good reasons to be here. However, given the treatment of LGBT asylum seekers by the Home Office, I find this racist fearmongering especially repugnant.

All the demeaning ways Home Office expects LGBTQ+ migrants to 'prove' themselves With comments suggesting LGBTQ+ asylum seekers are pretending to be gay, how do you successfully prove your sexuality to the UK Home Office?

In light of the BBC claiming that asylum seekers are falsely claiming to be gay in order to gain asylum, here is an article about the difficulties and humiliations LGBT asylum seekers have experienced trying to prove their identities.

www.bigissue.com/news/politic...

For the second day, the BBC are running a story that presents itself as providing evidence of endemic abuse of the asylum system based on seemingly a single encounter with someone who is neither a lawyer nor a registered immigration adviser. Words fail. This is reprehensibly irresponsible.

this is very exciting! I hope you get many good proposals

CfA: Confronting Musical Diversity in Western and Central Eurasian Empires during the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries, 24-25.09.2026 24–25 September 2026, Max Weber Stiftung – Georgia Branch Office, Tbilisi Deadline: 15 May 2026 Convener: Jonas Löffler (Max Weber Netzwerk Osteuropa) Throughout the history...

I'm really looking forward to hosting this workshop as part of my forthcoming fellowship at the Tbilisi office of the @maxweberstiftung.de Netzwerk Osteuropa. Please share widely! mwsgeorgia.hypotheses.org/12561

These are very beautiful and evocative (and, hopefully, invocative).

Geometric composition in Kufic script painted with dark red earth

A series of 4 small pieces inspired by current events. Creating does wonders for my mental health, but this isn't the time for fake positivity. Instead, this is something of an invocation.
(I'll need to take better pics when the light is right)

JUSTICE عدل
Hormuz red earth on paper, 28x28cm.

1/4

Elderly Sonic unconscious in a hospital bed. Rings spontaneously burst out of his body, setting off alarms. Doctors and nurses scramble to cram the rings back in

people "have money", in that they have income. but the number of people seriously burdened by their rent is the highest it's ever been. the cost of living is so much worse than it was a decade or two ago. I know multiple people making the most money they've ever made who are barely hanging on.

Frankly I don't care if an asylum seeker lies about being LGBT, because I think we should be generous with offering asylum and I assume they have good reasons to be here. However, given the treatment of LGBT asylum seekers by the Home Office, I find this racist fearmongering especially repugnant.

'Home Office wouldn't believe I was gay: how do you prove it?' Officials accused of mindset of disbelief towards refugees fleeing countries such as Uganda where homosexuality is illegal

And another, older article on the same subject.

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014...