david
@davidweman.bsky.social
Socialist, dog-lover and avid reader. Founded A Fistful of Euros.
Used to be a somebody on the internet, now I'm back to being a nobody and that's OK :)
Used to be a somebody on the internet, now I'm back to being a nobody and that's OK :)
Spent the evening advising a stranger on Albanian inheritance law instead of working or making dinner, today's good deed
November 22, 2025 at 1:04 AM
Spent the evening advising a stranger on Albanian inheritance law instead of working or making dinner, today's good deed
Reposted by david
Spent some hours with Chomsky back then, asked why he went into linguistics, he said it was the easiest major at UPenn when he attended, and he'd be able to devote more time to politics, his real interest. He didn't seem very interested in actual language use.
November 20, 2025 at 9:43 PM
Spent some hours with Chomsky back then, asked why he went into linguistics, he said it was the easiest major at UPenn when he attended, and he'd be able to devote more time to politics, his real interest. He didn't seem very interested in actual language use.
Reposted by david
Man, remember that time Chomsky wrote the forward to a book from one of his friends that was explicitly doing Rwandan genocide denial? He tried to dance around the issue when a genocide scholar confronted him about it.
November 19, 2025 at 12:39 AM
Man, remember that time Chomsky wrote the forward to a book from one of his friends that was explicitly doing Rwandan genocide denial? He tried to dance around the issue when a genocide scholar confronted him about it.
Reposted by david
Google removes a variety of longstanding GMail features if you try to withdraw your default consent (!) to having all your content read and used by Google Gemini via "Smart Features." That's an obvious attempt to coerce consent for privacy violations. Legislatures must act to make this illegal.
November 21, 2025 at 4:08 AM
Google removes a variety of longstanding GMail features if you try to withdraw your default consent (!) to having all your content read and used by Google Gemini via "Smart Features." That's an obvious attempt to coerce consent for privacy violations. Legislatures must act to make this illegal.
Reposted by david
In Undercover Video, Staffer Claims DOJ Will Hide Republican Names In Epstein Files
Sep 4, 2025
Sep 4, 2025
In Undercover Video, Staffer Claims DOJ Will Hide Republican Names In Epstein Files
The Justice Department confirmed the video but said the staffer wasn't speaking based on knowledge from his job.
www.huffpost.com
November 17, 2025 at 1:48 PM
In Undercover Video, Staffer Claims DOJ Will Hide Republican Names In Epstein Files
Sep 4, 2025
Sep 4, 2025
Reposted by david
it didn't even really provide me with any new information but that one email between epstein and some other random rich elite saying "when will the madness end" about the metoo movement felt like a key unlocking my brain that will explain every unforced institutional capitulation we've seen
November 17, 2025 at 2:28 PM
it didn't even really provide me with any new information but that one email between epstein and some other random rich elite saying "when will the madness end" about the metoo movement felt like a key unlocking my brain that will explain every unforced institutional capitulation we've seen
Am I right in thinking that people on here are stingier with faves than on Twitter? Maybe because there's a less tense atmosphere overall? For example, to me it feels slightly rude to comment on a post you haven't liked, but people who seem perfectly genial does it
November 15, 2025 at 3:19 PM
Am I right in thinking that people on here are stingier with faves than on Twitter? Maybe because there's a less tense atmosphere overall? For example, to me it feels slightly rude to comment on a post you haven't liked, but people who seem perfectly genial does it
I used to think, without thinking much about it, that Swedish age of consent laws were fine and now I'm sceptical. We basically have two ages of consent, 15 and 18, depending on the scenario, but no one knows about that second threshhold, and it's rarely enforced
November 15, 2025 at 11:57 AM
I used to think, without thinking much about it, that Swedish age of consent laws were fine and now I'm sceptical. We basically have two ages of consent, 15 and 18, depending on the scenario, but no one knows about that second threshhold, and it's rarely enforced
Reposted by david
oh my god? less than 5 days to pledge to this campaign and I’m at 83% of my goal. i wonder if i can reach a hundred per cent in time…. 🤔
seedandspark.com/fund/girlie
seedandspark.com/fund/girlie
November 14, 2025 at 10:42 PM
oh my god? less than 5 days to pledge to this campaign and I’m at 83% of my goal. i wonder if i can reach a hundred per cent in time…. 🤔
seedandspark.com/fund/girlie
seedandspark.com/fund/girlie
Reposted by david
This is what it’s like to read about the American governing elite right now.
![At least five Tang dynasty (618–907) emperors were incapacitated and killed by immortality elixirs. In historic recurrences, the newly enthroned emperor understandably executed the Daoist alchemists whose elixirs had killed his predecessor, and then subsequently came to believe in other charlatans enough to consume their poisonous elixirs.
Emperor Xianzong (r. 805–820) indirectly lost his life due to elixir poisoning. The Xu Tongzhi (Supplement to the Historical Collections) says, "Deluded by the sayings of the alchemists, [Xianzong] ingested gold elixirs and his behaviour became very abnormal. He was easily offended by those officials whom he daily met, and thus the prisons were left with little vacant space." In response, an official wrote an 819 memorial to the throne that said:
Of late years, however, (the capital) has been overrun by a host of pharmacists and alchemists ... recommending one another right and left with ever wilder and more extravagant claims. Now if there really were immortals, and scholars possessing the Tao, would they not conceal their names and hide themselves in mountain recesses far from the ken of man? ... The medicines of the sages of old were meant to cure bodily illnesses, and were not meant to be taken constantly like food. How much less so these metallic and mineral substances which are full of burning poison! ... Of old, as the Li Chi says, when the prince took physic, his minister tasted it first, and when a parent was sick, his son did likewise. Ministers and sons are in the same position. I humbly pray that all those persons who have elixirs made from transformed metals and minerals, and also those who recommend them, may be compelled to consume (their own elixirs) first for the space of one year. Such an investigation will distinguish truth from falsehood, and automatically clarify the matter by experiment.
After the emperor rejected this appeal, the palace eunuchs Wang Shoucheng and Chen Hongzhi 陳弘志 assassinated him in 820.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:4d2snfeymcblmvoaxvgfs7i6/bafkreicj4uaxsxrzzrod3yxa3uihy7odewkf4jpynd6mplgxek23u2rx5q@jpeg)
![When Xianzong's son and successor Emperor Muzong (r. 820–824) came to the throne, he executed the alchemists who had poisoned his father, but later began to take immortality elixirs himself. An official wrote Muzong an 823 memorial that warned:
Medicines are for use against illnesses, and should not be taken as food. ... Even when one is ill medicines must be used with great circumspection; how much more so when one is not ill. If this is true for the common people how much more so will it be for the emperor! Your imperial predecessor believed the nonsense of the alchemists and thus became ill; this your majesty already knows only too well. How could your majesty still repeat the same mistake?[27]
The emperor appreciated this reasoning but soon afterwards fell ill and died from poisoning. Palace eunuchs supposedly used poisonous elixirs to assassinate Muzong's young successor Emperor Jingzong (r. 824–827).](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:4d2snfeymcblmvoaxvgfs7i6/bafkreieltlwjzprlfasqdo67fgciczehab5vw7qrdojwhixyyet6f33yc4@jpeg)
November 14, 2025 at 6:46 AM
This is what it’s like to read about the American governing elite right now.
Reposted by david
For folks (and journalists) who want to search the Oversight Committee email texts, I made a database for searching the 20k text files:
splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app
splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app
Epstein Document Search
splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app
November 13, 2025 at 1:12 AM
For folks (and journalists) who want to search the Oversight Committee email texts, I made a database for searching the 20k text files:
splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app
splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app
This is the guy that profiled Ed Hugh in the NYT, and I had a little email conversation with him. I've met Joi Ito in person, so this is the second guy I've encountered to that was friends with Jeffrey Epstein. Kind of surreal
November 12, 2025 at 10:21 PM
This is the guy that profiled Ed Hugh in the NYT, and I had a little email conversation with him. I've met Joi Ito in person, so this is the second guy I've encountered to that was friends with Jeffrey Epstein. Kind of surreal
So Celina Midelfart has dated
1) Haakon, crown prince of Norway
2) Robbie Williams, yes the ape biopic one
3) Jeffrey Epstein
4) Donald Trump
And also he dumped her for Melania! She could have been the first lady right now lmao
www.express.co.uk/life-style/l...
1) Haakon, crown prince of Norway
2) Robbie Williams, yes the ape biopic one
3) Jeffrey Epstein
4) Donald Trump
And also he dumped her for Melania! She could have been the first lady right now lmao
www.express.co.uk/life-style/l...
Melania Trump: A model first lady who started life in the Eastern Bloc
WHEN Donald Trump went to a Fashion Week party at Manhattan hot-spot the Kit Kat Club in 1998, the woman on his arm was a 25-year-old Scandinavian blonde called Celina Midelfart.
www.express.co.uk
November 12, 2025 at 9:57 PM
So Celina Midelfart has dated
1) Haakon, crown prince of Norway
2) Robbie Williams, yes the ape biopic one
3) Jeffrey Epstein
4) Donald Trump
And also he dumped her for Melania! She could have been the first lady right now lmao
www.express.co.uk/life-style/l...
1) Haakon, crown prince of Norway
2) Robbie Williams, yes the ape biopic one
3) Jeffrey Epstein
4) Donald Trump
And also he dumped her for Melania! She could have been the first lady right now lmao
www.express.co.uk/life-style/l...
Reposted by david
it's the promotional jpg that gets me
Deepak Chopra asking Epstein if Trump is crazy in March 2017 (after the "Obama wiretapped Trump Tower" nonsense).
November 12, 2025 at 5:23 PM
it's the promotional jpg that gets me
Reposted by david
how did i go so long not knowing we were literally teaching people to read wrong. i knew something wasn't right but jesus christ www.apmreports.org/episode/2019...
How a flawed idea is teaching millions of kids to be poor readers
For decades, schools have taught children the strategies of struggling readers, using a theory about reading that cognitive scientists have repeatedly debunked. And many teachers and parents don't kno...
www.apmreports.org
November 11, 2025 at 6:18 PM
how did i go so long not knowing we were literally teaching people to read wrong. i knew something wasn't right but jesus christ www.apmreports.org/episode/2019...
Reposted by david
pop goes the weasel theory of culture: the left creates pop culture, the right creates weasel culture
November 10, 2025 at 11:44 PM
pop goes the weasel theory of culture: the left creates pop culture, the right creates weasel culture
Always a bit jarring when Millie Bobby Brown is on the tl because anything in the trump era is an "eternal present" blur, but she was a baby when she broke through and now she has a baby
November 7, 2025 at 9:01 PM
Always a bit jarring when Millie Bobby Brown is on the tl because anything in the trump era is an "eternal present" blur, but she was a baby when she broke through and now she has a baby
Reposted by david
the best bit is at the end
November 6, 2025 at 3:27 AM
the best bit is at the end
Reposted by david
Obviously easier in Aus climate, but a great reminder that UK economists helped create our current inflation crisis by declaring that investing in renewables was too much of a long term response to the energy price spike from the invasion of Ukraine.
Australia has so much electricity from solar power that it is going to start offering free electricity to everyone for at least three hours during the day as the wholesale price of power goes negative
electrek.co/2025/11/04/a...
electrek.co/2025/11/04/a...
Australia has so much solar that it's offering everyone free electricity
Australia's extensive solar power penetration makes so much energy that the government wants to offer free electricity at peak hours.
electrek.co
November 6, 2025 at 7:14 AM
Obviously easier in Aus climate, but a great reminder that UK economists helped create our current inflation crisis by declaring that investing in renewables was too much of a long term response to the energy price spike from the invasion of Ukraine.
Reposted by david
This is quite a story: the US employed every strongarm tactic available, including personal threats against delegates and their families, to derail an agreement on reducing shipping emissions that was almost finalized. on.ft.com/47lq3dZ
November 3, 2025 at 2:11 PM
This is quite a story: the US employed every strongarm tactic available, including personal threats against delegates and their families, to derail an agreement on reducing shipping emissions that was almost finalized. on.ft.com/47lq3dZ
Reposted by david
quite literally everything i hear about the economics of this feels insane, especially given the big issue of the tools not doing what boosters say they will do. so many details make me feel very not good!
October 30, 2025 at 11:43 PM
quite literally everything i hear about the economics of this feels insane, especially given the big issue of the tools not doing what boosters say they will do. so many details make me feel very not good!
Reposted by david
so @matteowong.bsky.social & I wrote on data centers: arguably the most important buildings in the world & are, in a way, holding the economy hostage. Byzantine financial instruments, private equity, depreciating tech, hype, $trillion valuations. it’s all there. an ai crash prob starts here.
Here’s How the AI Crash Happens
The U.S. is becoming an Nvidia-state.
www.theatlantic.com
October 30, 2025 at 10:25 PM
so @matteowong.bsky.social & I wrote on data centers: arguably the most important buildings in the world & are, in a way, holding the economy hostage. Byzantine financial instruments, private equity, depreciating tech, hype, $trillion valuations. it’s all there. an ai crash prob starts here.
Reposted by david
I've built a socioeconomic system that depends on everyone to do useful work and act ethically except the people at the top, who get unimaginable rewards for being antisocial frauds and criminals. And I think it will stand the test of time
October 28, 2025 at 7:16 PM
I've built a socioeconomic system that depends on everyone to do useful work and act ethically except the people at the top, who get unimaginable rewards for being antisocial frauds and criminals. And I think it will stand the test of time
Reposted by david
Guy who's pretentious about watching a lot of animal videos: Yeah, I knew what they'd sound like 😏
October 27, 2025 at 5:10 PM
Guy who's pretentious about watching a lot of animal videos: Yeah, I knew what they'd sound like 😏