Rirelien
@rirelien.bsky.social
limbs, tongue, mind ensnared
the way ahead barred by what?
me and only me
the way ahead barred by what?
me and only me
Reposted by Rirelien
Melissa Mohr's "Holy Sh*t" and Geoffrey Hughes's "Encyclopedia of Swearing" are great. Hughes's "Swearing: A Social History…" has rich detail but not modern. Rob Chirico's "Damn!" covers the US, and Ben Bergen's "What the F" addresses recent shifts from a cog-sci pov
December 1, 2025 at 9:05 AM
Melissa Mohr's "Holy Sh*t" and Geoffrey Hughes's "Encyclopedia of Swearing" are great. Hughes's "Swearing: A Social History…" has rich detail but not modern. Rob Chirico's "Damn!" covers the US, and Ben Bergen's "What the F" addresses recent shifts from a cog-sci pov
Reposted by Rirelien
One of my favorite things is getting to tell friends who are new to NYC that the subway "stand clear of the closing doors please" voice is a trans woman named Bernie Wagenblast and she's amazing.
November 24, 2025 at 6:19 PM
One of my favorite things is getting to tell friends who are new to NYC that the subway "stand clear of the closing doors please" voice is a trans woman named Bernie Wagenblast and she's amazing.
Money well spent.
For 8 great Star Wars movies (or, more exactly, narrative arcs), that seems more than fair to me. ☺️
Disney Spent More On ‘Andor’ Than Any Of Its ‘Star Wars’ Movies
Disney has revealed it spent $60.5 million on Star Wars streaming series Andor in 2024, giving the show a total cost of $705.5 million - far higher than the spending on any of the movies in the saga.
www.forbes.com
November 23, 2025 at 10:26 PM
Money well spent.
Reposted by Rirelien
The problem is less Starmer’s position being untenable, and more the UK being ungovernable. We have two problems:
1. The immovable position from so many that a government must deliver lower taxes and better services. To many still believe this can be done by minor tinkering. /1
1. The immovable position from so many that a government must deliver lower taxes and better services. To many still believe this can be done by minor tinkering. /1
I find the endless, often pointless drama that has typified UK politics coverage for a decade as draining & unedifying as anyone. But, *as of now* & by every relevant measure, Starmer’s position is perilously close to untenable. Of course people are planning for a future where he’s no longer leader.
November 12, 2025 at 8:05 AM
The problem is less Starmer’s position being untenable, and more the UK being ungovernable. We have two problems:
1. The immovable position from so many that a government must deliver lower taxes and better services. To many still believe this can be done by minor tinkering. /1
1. The immovable position from so many that a government must deliver lower taxes and better services. To many still believe this can be done by minor tinkering. /1
Reposted by Rirelien
On a Saturday night I stumbled across something on the internet that made me feel like ****** my pants. A giant dataset of real surveillance operations targeting 1000s of people across nearly every country. Unraveling it and the mysterious company behind it has consumed 1.5 years of my life
October 14, 2025 at 4:49 PM
On a Saturday night I stumbled across something on the internet that made me feel like ****** my pants. A giant dataset of real surveillance operations targeting 1000s of people across nearly every country. Unraveling it and the mysterious company behind it has consumed 1.5 years of my life
A daycare for prematurely world-weary children of
Marvel character: Ironic Youth
Marvel character: Ironic Youth
Big money idea:
A daycare for super-speedy hedgehog children called Sonic Youth.
A daycare for super-speedy hedgehog children called Sonic Youth.
October 14, 2025 at 8:09 PM
A daycare for prematurely world-weary children of
Marvel character: Ironic Youth
Marvel character: Ironic Youth
Reposted by Rirelien
This is both fascinating & frightening. There is a demand for images that show and confirm what people already know and believe to be true, and AI slop meets that demand—with visual content that emblematically visualizes what the headlines report. One could call it synthetic hypervisualization
1/
1/
That TikTok account has a few fake videos of reporters getting detained. They make these videos because it’s a big story in the news. Real reporters are getting arrested. And so people are making AI videos to get engagement on TikTok.
October 11, 2025 at 8:18 AM
This is both fascinating & frightening. There is a demand for images that show and confirm what people already know and believe to be true, and AI slop meets that demand—with visual content that emblematically visualizes what the headlines report. One could call it synthetic hypervisualization
1/
1/
Dubai:
Have seen it described as “LinkedIn with stoning”
October 11, 2025 at 8:45 AM
Dubai:
Reposted by Rirelien
Ask: what did Apple want in return for bending the knee?
Answer: the end of the rule of law in Europe, and with it, an example for others.
Shot:
migrantinsider.com/p/scoop-appl...
Chaser(s):
infrequently.org/2025/09/appl...
on.ft.com/4q2f2FC
Answer: the end of the rule of law in Europe, and with it, an example for others.
Shot:
migrantinsider.com/p/scoop-appl...
Chaser(s):
infrequently.org/2025/09/appl...
on.ft.com/4q2f2FC
SCOOP: Apple Quietly Made ICE Agents a Protected Class
Internal emails show tech giant used anti-hate-speech rules meant for minorities to block an app documenting immigration enforcement.
migrantinsider.com
October 8, 2025 at 7:53 PM
Ask: what did Apple want in return for bending the knee?
Answer: the end of the rule of law in Europe, and with it, an example for others.
Shot:
migrantinsider.com/p/scoop-appl...
Chaser(s):
infrequently.org/2025/09/appl...
on.ft.com/4q2f2FC
Answer: the end of the rule of law in Europe, and with it, an example for others.
Shot:
migrantinsider.com/p/scoop-appl...
Chaser(s):
infrequently.org/2025/09/appl...
on.ft.com/4q2f2FC
Reposted by Rirelien
Klein has been coming out with increasingly weirder stuff over the past few weeks. I think he assumed his little piece of hagiography about Kirk was going to be entirely uncontroversial and has been reaching for anything to justify himself and not admit that he was in the wrong or has to think.
This was revealing. Worth reading. The basic demand is that Coates spend less time thinking/writing his true feelings and more time playing political strategist. Klein asks him over and over him to do Dem strategy; he says no, over and over. www.nytimes.com/2025/09/28/o...
Opinion | Ta-Nehisi Coates on Bridging Gaps vs. Drawing Lines
www.nytimes.com
September 29, 2025 at 2:52 PM
Klein has been coming out with increasingly weirder stuff over the past few weeks. I think he assumed his little piece of hagiography about Kirk was going to be entirely uncontroversial and has been reaching for anything to justify himself and not admit that he was in the wrong or has to think.
But what about people who like cheese and can give you access to more cheese?
September 27, 2025 at 4:42 PM
But what about people who like cheese and can give you access to more cheese?
Reposted by Rirelien
I’m not
It isn’t.
It should be, but you’re working very hard to ensure it isn’t.
It isn’t.
It should be, but you’re working very hard to ensure it isn’t.
September 27, 2025 at 6:25 AM
I’m not
It isn’t.
It should be, but you’re working very hard to ensure it isn’t.
It isn’t.
It should be, but you’re working very hard to ensure it isn’t.
Really excellent, thoughtful piece by @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social; hard-hitting, too. Yes. And while it calls out Klein's pieces, deserving of criticism, I read it too as a plea or a call for a non-cynical return to the uncynical, unironic ideals we must hold to be a functioning society.
I've been sitting with this piece of @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social for two days, reading it, re-reading it. You should too. #EzraKlein is the avatar of a new kind of liberal indulgence for the worst of the far-right, embracing bad-faith as a practice. www.bostonreview.net/articles/how...
How Can We Live Together? - Boston Review
Ezra Klein is wrong: shame is essential.
www.bostonreview.net
September 25, 2025 at 7:39 PM
Really excellent, thoughtful piece by @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social; hard-hitting, too. Yes. And while it calls out Klein's pieces, deserving of criticism, I read it too as a plea or a call for a non-cynical return to the uncynical, unironic ideals we must hold to be a functioning society.
Mac’n’cheese, Beth.
Opening my Shakespeare themed restaurant tonight - The Taming of the Stew.
September 23, 2025 at 8:59 PM
Mac’n’cheese, Beth.
Reposted by Rirelien
Ah, the hallucinating spires
Oxford staff and students will access OpenAI’s flagship GPT-5 model through ChatGPT Edu, a university-focused version with enterprise-level security and controls.
Find out more ⬇️
Find out more ⬇️
Oxford becomes first UK university to offer ChatGPT Edu to all staff
OpenAI’s flagship GPT-5 model will be provided across the University and Oxford Colleges through ChatGPT Edu, a version of ChatGPT built for universities that includes enterprise-level security and
www.ox.ac.uk
September 19, 2025 at 6:50 PM
Ah, the hallucinating spires
Reposted by Rirelien
Dear friends from other countries:
please join the Brazilians as we celebrate this groundbreaking decision.
please join the Brazilians as we celebrate this groundbreaking decision.
A majority of Brazil's Supreme Court judges have voted to convict former President Jair Bolsonaro of plotting to overturn the 2022 election. https://cnn.it/3VIY1Cn
September 11, 2025 at 7:15 PM
Dear friends from other countries:
please join the Brazilians as we celebrate this groundbreaking decision.
please join the Brazilians as we celebrate this groundbreaking decision.
Reposted by Rirelien
Glad the WSJ didn't rush to report inflammatory claims backed by no evidence whatsoever at an incredibly sensitive time.
NYT on the alleged messages on the shooter's weapon:
September 11, 2025 at 4:32 PM
Glad the WSJ didn't rush to report inflammatory claims backed by no evidence whatsoever at an incredibly sensitive time.
We come up against Popper's paradox of tolerance, again, in debating this. There is always a line that I find abhorrent, and that when faced with I recoil from.
More work will be required on deradicalisation, from all of us, if we are to escape this current state.
More work will be required on deradicalisation, from all of us, if we are to escape this current state.
As we speak, ppl whose humanity I cherish & often consider friends—from leftists to Islamists, LGBTQ activists to devout conservatives—lay murdered underground or in authoritarians’ prisons across the MENA region bc they dared to disagree.
Charlie mattered. Free debate matters. A 🧵 on an awful day:
Charlie mattered. Free debate matters. A 🧵 on an awful day:
September 11, 2025 at 9:57 AM
We come up against Popper's paradox of tolerance, again, in debating this. There is always a line that I find abhorrent, and that when faced with I recoil from.
More work will be required on deradicalisation, from all of us, if we are to escape this current state.
More work will be required on deradicalisation, from all of us, if we are to escape this current state.
Reposted by Rirelien
Numéro d'automne, dispo en librairie et sur notre site.
September 3, 2025 at 4:07 PM
Numéro d'automne, dispo en librairie et sur notre site.
Good, non-sensational reporting.
Leaves room to have the real debates about AI dangers/AI benefits/societal impact/intellectual property rights without wasting time on straw men.
Leaves room to have the real debates about AI dangers/AI benefits/societal impact/intellectual property rights without wasting time on straw men.
I've edited this and now think it's the very best thing I've done on AI and the environment, by a wide margin andymasley.substack.com/p/i-cant-fin...
Data centers don't raise household water bills at all, anywhere
A lot of journalism on AI's water impacts is misleading
andymasley.substack.com
August 27, 2025 at 8:25 PM
Good, non-sensational reporting.
Leaves room to have the real debates about AI dangers/AI benefits/societal impact/intellectual property rights without wasting time on straw men.
Leaves room to have the real debates about AI dangers/AI benefits/societal impact/intellectual property rights without wasting time on straw men.
Reposted by Rirelien
Both Marine Le Pen’s Far Right and harder parts of the Left immediately announced that they would refuse to support Bayrou. His survival will therefore depend on winning the support of the Socialists and the more moderate Left.
ENDS
ENDS
August 25, 2025 at 3:41 PM
Both Marine Le Pen’s Far Right and harder parts of the Left immediately announced that they would refuse to support Bayrou. His survival will therefore depend on winning the support of the Socialists and the more moderate Left.
ENDS
ENDS
I love these, and was very happy to rediscover this account when I moved over to bksy from mastodon after leaving twitter.
The English words 'galaxy' and 'latte' are etymologically related.
'Galaxy' stems from the Ancient Greek word for "milk", 'gála', which has the same Proto-Indo-European ancestor as Latin 'lactem', which became 'latte' in Italian.
Click my new graphic to learn more about this word family:
'Galaxy' stems from the Ancient Greek word for "milk", 'gála', which has the same Proto-Indo-European ancestor as Latin 'lactem', which became 'latte' in Italian.
Click my new graphic to learn more about this word family:
August 25, 2025 at 2:15 PM
I love these, and was very happy to rediscover this account when I moved over to bksy from mastodon after leaving twitter.
Reposted by Rirelien
The more things I've made, the less I've been interested in publicly criticizing the things that other people make, because once you make a few things you start to understand what a miracle it is that anything gets made at all
August 24, 2025 at 3:14 PM
The more things I've made, the less I've been interested in publicly criticizing the things that other people make, because once you make a few things you start to understand what a miracle it is that anything gets made at all
Reposted by Rirelien
1/12 This Foreign Affairs piece by Dan Wang and Arthur Kroeber argues the US misunderstands why China succeeds in tech and manufacturing. The problem isn't that China "cheats" - it's built deep infrastructure enabling rapid innovation. I agree.
buff.ly/ZpA3DSo
buff.ly/ZpA3DSo
August 20, 2025 at 8:52 PM
1/12 This Foreign Affairs piece by Dan Wang and Arthur Kroeber argues the US misunderstands why China succeeds in tech and manufacturing. The problem isn't that China "cheats" - it's built deep infrastructure enabling rapid innovation. I agree.
buff.ly/ZpA3DSo
buff.ly/ZpA3DSo
At 50, I need to read this. Perhaps you do too.
Think I'll read this once a week forever.
Patricia Routledge, I love you.
Patricia Routledge, I love you.
August 20, 2025 at 10:08 PM
At 50, I need to read this. Perhaps you do too.