Andrew Leyshon
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andrewleyshon.bsky.social
Andrew Leyshon
@andrewleyshon.bsky.social

Economic Geographer. Co-author, The Rise of the Platform Music Industries (Agenda, 2025) with @allanwatson1.bsky.social & FinTech Capital (Zone, 2026) with @paullangley.bsky.social. Attended obscure Welsh Comprehensive of which even Elis James was unaware. .. more

Economics 60%
Business 14%

Suggestion for a future IWWIW: the geographical anomaly of Welsh clubs playing in English leagues. As a Cardiff fan, I'd like more people to know about the reasons for their invitation, in the hope it might help reduce the tedious demands by other supporters to 'Get back to to the Welsh league'.

Reposted by Andrew Leyshon

Labour has quietly gutted funding for Britain’s struggling regions – it’s an economic and political disaster | Larry Elliott
Labour has quietly gutted funding for Britain’s struggling regions – it’s an economic and political disaster | Larry Elliott
A stark new report highlights the price paid in Britain’s former industrial heartlands for this silent demolition job, says Guardian columnist Larry Elliott
www.theguardian.com

Yes, I used to take my son when he was briefly into Warhammer when he was a pre-teen. Luckily, we were local but some people would happily travel miles to get there.

Reposted by John Hogan

Yet another example of what Michael Lewis has described as “an experiment in capitalism with too much money”. Searching for this kind of ‘spatial fix’ not new, as @quinnslobodian.com describes in Crack-up Capitalism.

www.ft.com/content/b127... Tech elites are starting their own for-profit cities
Tech elites are starting their own for-profit cities
They want to escape from regulation and ‘failing’ democracy — but are they more opportunistic than libertarian?
www.ft.com

Apart from the Truss/Kwarteng mini-budget, when in the last 50 years has a UK budget not factored in the likely response of the financial markets, given the open nature of its relatively small economy?
The most misleading thing about Rachel Reeves’s budget? Who it was really for | Aditya Chakrabortty
The most misleading thing about Rachel Reeves’s budget? Who it was really for | Aditya Chakrabortty
Labour backbenchers have been cheering it as a win for the most vulnerable in socety. In fact it was aimed at the bond markets, says Guardian columnist Aditya Chakrabortty
www.theguardian.com

Would need a large cast over several seasons, funded by a deep-pocketed platform, clearly.

Well, he doesn't *have* to be in it, but if you twisted my arm I could see him as Tony Blair given that GJ was briefly a junior minister in the Department of Transport in the late 1990s before she fell out with him. MR could even talk to his mate Michael Sheen to get some notes on the role.

Enjoyed watching Netflix’s The Beast in Me, despite its many flaws. My key takeaway, however, was that if she can master the accent then Claire Danes would be perfect as the lead in a ‘Glenda Jackson: The Westminster Years’ biopic. Need to give the Dan Hodges role a bit more thought though.

That Nottingham is perceived as an unlikely location for all this is best revealed in the chapter on Games Workshop in Elizabeth Currid-Hackett’s book, Starstruck (2011), in which she recounts a train journey from London to interview a star game designer. It has strong Heart of Darkness vibes.

A Nottingham-based example of the financial returns possible from successfully leveraging affect: Games Workshop is now valued at over £5bn.

on.ft.com/3KpJycC How Warhammer won
How Warhammer won
The maker of the fantasy figurine game is now valued at £5.25bn. What keeps the battle raging on?
on.ft.com

I'm constantly shocked (but not surprised) by how little we discuss the additional financial burden placed on young people by the Clegg-Cameron student loan regime.

@rmcunliffe.bsky.social is one of the few journalists who brings it up continuously - once again in the wake of the budget 👇
Rachel Reeves hits young graduates with a double stealth tax
The Chancellor plans to raise as much money from freezing loan repayment thresholds as from the mansion tax
www.newstatesman.com
If you’re in or near @uonresearch.bsky.social tomorrow (Tuesday 25/11) then why not come along and see me present research, jointly undertaken with @allanwatson1.bsky.social, on music and platforms. The Music Dept is an important part of UoN’s research & teaching ecosystem: long may it continue!

Reposted by John Hogan

A useful reminder that above all else financial capital hates inflation because it erodes the real value of wealth over time. Lots of useable quotes here. on.ft.com/488mVmh What big bond investors want from the UK Budget
What big bond investors want from the UK Budget
Gilt market players call on government to cut spending and steer clear of inflationary tax rises
on.ft.com
i: Reeves to unveil £600m raid on foreign student
university fees #TomorrowsPapersToday

Reposted by Andrew Leyshon

Create Music backs catalogue-buyer Circuit Capital with $500m

The latest entrant into the catalogue-buying game is Circuit Capital, a new fund launched by management collective The Circuit Group. It’s backed by $500m in capital from Create Music Group (CMG), which it plans to use to acquire…
Create Music backs catalogue-buyer Circuit Capital with $500m
The latest entrant into the catalogue-buying game is Circuit Capital, a new fund launched by management collective The Circuit Group. It’s backed by $500m in capital from Create Music Group (CMG), which it plans to use to acquire catalogues, but also invest in labels, publishers and other kinds of music companies. Its focus is particularly on the electronic-music sector. “Circuit Capital is our way of ensuring that when artists decide to sell or scale, they can do it with people who speak the same language and share the same values,” said The Circuit Group co-founder Harvey Tadman.
musically.com

Reposted by Andrew Leyshon

Most of the discussion around America's AI strategy abroad has focused on the AI Action Plan - but perhaps more important was the Executive Order on exporting the AI stack.

🧵
Sam Watts, composer of #TheTraitors theme and UoN music alumni, shares his thoughts on the newly renamed University of Little England course closures...

#StopTheCuts #SaveHE

c.org/pdK6xxk6yf

After that, I kind of wish the assassination attempt on Nick Mohammed’s character had been successful at the end of the latest series of Slow Horses.
Next time someone tells you that train drivers "just push buttons" show them this from the BBC
Today is the official UK publication day for Silicon Empires! I'm excited to have it out and hear what people think.

There's an enormous amount happening every day in AI, and it's difficult to gain a stable perspective. I wrote the book to try and get some secure hold on that constant flux. 🧵

Or, as @brettchristophers.bsky.social’s put it in relation to the renewables energy sector, the price is wrong. It’s not supply and demand so much as profitability that matters.

giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/... New homes: even if you build them, there’s no one to buy them
New homes: even if you build them, there’s no one to buy them
We’re often told housing demand exceeds supply — so why are new homes struggling to be built and bought?
giftarticle.ft.com
Co-authored with @andrewleyshon.bsky.social for a forthcoming special issue of @finandsoc.bsky.social, this essay takes Elon Musk's planned FinTech makeover of X as a provocation for a critical analysis of so-called 'embedded finance' and the evolution of FinTech
www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
Embedded finance and FinTech disappearance | Finance and Society | Cambridge Core
Embedded finance and FinTech disappearance
www.cambridge.org
If you enjoyed @kateconger.com and @rmac.bsky.social's
Character Limit, and wondered about Musk’s ambitions to turn X into a fintech behemoth, then you might be interested in a new Open Access paper by @paullangley.bsky.social
and me on fintech's 'disappearance'.
www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
Embedded finance and FinTech disappearance | Finance and Society | Cambridge Core
Embedded finance and FinTech disappearance
www.cambridge.org
New post just out:

"On the edge"

On my unexpected week in hospital and five things I learnt about the state of the NHS.

(Free to read)

open.substack.com/pub/samf/p/o...
On the edge
My week in the NHS
open.substack.com

I used to take my Nottingham raised son to see Cardiff City play away at various teams in the Midlands a few years back. I only realised the impact the away end had on him when he refused point blank to even consider Cardiff as a possible University destination on grounds of personal safety.
"Sometimes you have to ask yourself: How did I get here—sitting in Saudi Arabia, listening to Louis C.K. do jokes about Barely Legal magazine?"

I went to Riyadh to see the transformation of a country with the world's biggest cultural chequebook. Gift link:

www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...
How Many Comedians Does It Take to Change a Country?
What it’s like to watch Louis C.K. do stand-up in Saudi Arabia
www.theatlantic.com

The pause in Defender manufacturing in 2016, due to a need to adapt the design to confirm with Euro NCAP pedestrian safety, prompted Jim Radcliffe’s Ineos to develop its look-a-like Grenadier, so there’s that too!