from the dial-up days

“If I had understood the situation a bit better I should probably have joined the Anarchists.”

— George Orwell

“It takes much longer to get up north, the slow way.”

— Ian Dury

“Information is power. But like all power, there are those who want to keep it for themselves.”

— Aaron Swartz

open commonplace book →

notes

more notes on bluesky →

writing

  • A “top ten” library page sounded simple until music proved impossible to whittle down. New rule: one in, one out. First swap: Plain White T’s “Hey There Delilah” in, Paolo Nutini’s “New Shoes” out, with every departing favourite archived below as a living tribute.

    read on →

  • A £13 Casio F-91W from Argos, unchanged since 1991, and why it’s started to feel like a political statement. A battery that lasts a decade, a back you can unscrew and fix, and a small act of resistance against an economy built on planned dissatisfaction.

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  • Doomscrolling before your feet hit the floor is a tool of the status quo. Borrowing from the Stoics, the dichotomy of control still applies to climate grief: I can’t rewrite energy policy before breakfast, but how I show up to fight for it is entirely mine to choose. Coffee up. Chin up. Let’s get to work.

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  • I’ve spent years leaning into blogging as quiet resistance to platform social media, so joining Bluesky sounds like a contradiction. It isn’t. Built on an open protocol, more intentional than algorithmic, it’s a tool I’m using on my own terms, not one I’m subject to. And no, the blog isn’t going anywhere.

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  • I barely open Wikipedia myself anymore, I ask an AI instead. But that AI learned from Wikipedia, which makes it less like a website I visit and more like a public park everyone relies on. Renewing my £5 donation felt less like paying for a product and more like funding the digital gardeners.

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  • Should AI have rights? Thinking through the case for capacity over origin, the case against category errors and diluted accountability, and a slower middle ground built on duties before rights. If a book moves me, does it matter whether the author was human?

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  • The UK’s 10-year settlement route forces some migrants, carers, nurses, parents already building lives here, through nearly £19,000 in fees and repeated renewals before they can settle permanently. A look at why campaigners say five years should be enough, and why this shouldn’t become the standard for everyone.

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  • I believe in the BBC, just not in the TV licence that funds it. A flat £174.50 a year hits people on Universal Credit as hard as millionaires, and can land you in court if you don’t pay. Funding it through general taxation, like Norway, Finland, and Sweden do, would be fairer.

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  • 26°C in Paisley isn’t a fluke anymore. A look at how Scotland’s climate is shifting, hotter summers, wetter winters, rising heat-related deaths and wildfire risk, and what it’ll take beyond clean energy to actually adapt.

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  • An anti-burka message got me thinking about how rarely these complaints are actually about fabric. If freedom of expression means anything, it has to include the freedom to dress how you like, even when that makes other people uncomfortable.

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