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Mike Dickison

@adzebill.bsky.social
4.6K followers 475 following 18K posts

Freelance Wikipedian, fan of flightless birds, invented the platypus custard joke that Ricky Gervais stole. Ōtautahi, Dr Him. 0000-0003-1183-2550, Q56458901

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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Watched a presentation where someone spent 125 hours to script, shoot, and edit a 5-minute promotional video for a science organisation. Meanwhile the organisation’s Wikipedia article is just one paragraph long and was written last month by a volunteer in Australia.
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KnitMeAThneed @thneed.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
@universityofotago.bsky.social @otagobiochemist.bsky.social @zoologyotago.bsky.social @otagoreligion.bsky.social It's a beautiful day to go and take a photo of a student flat so you can enter the Wiki Loves Scarfie Flats photo competition tomorrow! w.wiki/UYBq for more info and to register
Wiki Loves Scarfie Flats Want your flat to be immortalised? Get it into Wikimedia Commons and be in to win, 1–23 October 2026
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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
“Wong said other parties have "characterised" Opportunity as being a party of land tax, "but our supporters know we stand for much more than that and we always have". *None* of these policies were mentioned at TOP’s public forum in Chch earlier this year; it was all UBI and citizens’ assemblies.
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Grant Jacobs BioinfoTools/NotJustDNA 🔬🧬🖥️✍️📚🇳🇿 @notjustdna.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
#NZpol Saw this excellent quote-reply to Simeon Brown’s latest attack on Labour. Worth sharing.
David Peez @RebelEkonomista

"The truck driver in Pakuranga helps pay off a lawyer's loan." No, Simeon. He doesn't. Not a cent.

When the government lends a student money, it creates the dollars and credits their account. No tradie's tax was collected and posted to a law degree. When the graduate repays, those dollars are deleted, drained back out like tax. They don't land in the truck driver's pocket either.

So nobody foots the bill. The worker and the graduate aren't on opposite sides of a ledger. Setting them against each other is the trick, and it runs on the same myth as "add it to the tab", that the government is a household counting coins. It issues the currency. The real limits are real resources and inflation, not a truck driver's tax bill.

"Someone always pays." Sure. Just never the person you keep pointing at.

Read more: http://therebeleconomist.substack.com
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the Mountain Goats @themountaingoats.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
this is out now -- a man worth knowing & knowing about.
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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
Some excellent wares at Ōtautahi Made in Te Pae today; open for a few more hours and worth checking out, even in this vile weather.
Very nice hand-bound sketchbooks, some with Fabriano paper about the same price as one from Gordon Harris. Swamp-related screen printing including a lovely species assemblage with a pūteketeke which I don’t think you’ll see in Ōtautahi though. Julie and her glorious textured pottery, quality stuff. Reflective sticker, pūkeko sticker, and tiny harakeke basket.
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Oregon 🕎🎲 @oregonthedm.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Most riveting thing I've seen all week
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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
“The Greens’ candidate in the seat, Donald Mackenzie Mayo, who isn’t on his own party’s list, has taken the unusual step of already urging people to give their electorate vote to the Labour man.” Would be nice to have that attitude in Christchurch.
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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
The stats for NZ are very different: we’ve lost two thirds of our forests, a third about 500 years ago, and another third in the last 150 years.
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Vote for hope in November! Toitū te Tiriti 🇳🇿 @mrjeffhowell.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Absolutely cracking analysis of Hager's "Dirty Work" & the damage a few men (one in particular) did to the delicate precious fabric of our society in pursuit of power & profit. Also a reminder Simon Wilson is one of Aotearoa's best essayists. simonwilsonhopetown.substack.com/p/dirty-work...
simonwilsonhopetown.substack.com
Dirty work and the disinfecting sunshine it deserves
Nicky Hager’s new book ‘Dirty Work’ reminds us how much we’ve lost in the last three years
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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
I met an academic today who wanted to demonstrate how great paid Gemini was at citing sources, and when we tested it this only source it cited was a Wikipedia article I’d written on Sunday.
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The Sapling @thesaplingnz.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Congratulations to Vida Kelly, Giselle Clarkson and Gecko Press – OMNIBIRD has won the Gerard Reid Book of the Year award at the Award st the PANZ book design awards this evening
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Ainsley S @americanbeetles.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
pls note the bats have been carefully depicted HANGING FROM THEIR LITTLE BRANCHES on this radial phylogeny (bats drawn by Fiona Reid, whose portfolio is here --> fionareid.ca)
section of the central bat phylogeny figure from this new bat phylogeny paper; the representative bat from each family is hanging from the taxon label by its little toesies
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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
It would be a shame if this was framed as “collecting all the lizards”. Bathurst are proposing the rip up and destroy the entire ecosystem, dig out all the coal, then reconstruct some vague approximation afterwards. It’s not about saving a few rare snails. But Bathurst wants to frame it that way.
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Idiot/Savant @norightturnnz.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Another fast-track company thinks paying a bribe means they don't have to do their homework.
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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
The Wikimedian in Residence at the University of Otago is running a Scarfie Flats competition, starting 1 October. It's to get people to document and upload photos of classic Dunedin flats under an open licence, for Wikipedia and the historical record. commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Event:W...
commons.wikimedia.org
Event:Wiki Loves Scarfie Flats 2026 - Wikimedia Commons
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Idiot/Savant @norightturnnz.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Some - like Marsh - will no doubt be reprinted. But that will be controlled by her estate. People won't be able to just do it. Or make ebooks. Or remix. Or make derivitive works. And we will have to pay more than we otherwise would. Copyyright term extension is a real theft from the public.
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Idiot/Savant @norightturnnz.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
NZ authors we will lose in the first 5 years after expected term-extension: Mary Scott, Pat Lawlor, Michael Joseph, Dorothy Eden, Frank Sargeson, John Lee, Ngaio Marsh. Their work will be locked up for 2 decades longer than at present.
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Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand @wikimediaaotearoa.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
This Sunday: ESEAP Capacity Building on Education Partnership 💻 How can universities leverage Wikipedia? The ESEAP Hub, in collaboration with Wikimedia Australia, invites you to our upcoming online capacity-building session focusing on education partnerships. 7PM Sun 27 Sept Register: w.wiki/V8S$
A screenshot of the event registration page for the workshop, showing the information available through the link in this post.
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Idiot/Savant @norightturnnz.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
This can be done because Courage died in 1963, and the book has been out of copyright here for a decade. Copyright term extension means similar reprints of NZ authors who died after 1977 or so won't be possible.
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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
The thing I like best about being a freelancer is when big organisations with multi-million-dollar budgets hold off paying your invoice for as long as they legally can and sometimes longer.
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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Sitting in the cafe at uni and there are at least three tables of students around me having a bible study meeting.
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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
I can confirm that Bruce is indeed very friendly, and the Museum of Natural Mystery could only exist in Dunedin.
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The Dunedin Museum of Natural Mystery @mahalski.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Nice to make the Lonely Planet Guide www.stuff.co.nz/travel/36103...
stuff.co.nz
The ‘coolest’ and ‘quirkiest’ NZ region has just been named one of the world’s best places to visit
A two-headed calf, a mummified cat, graveyard tours, steampunk and some of the world’s rarest penguins have helped propel Dunedin and Waitaki onto Lonely Planet’s list.
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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
If you were wondering who is having very earnest discussions about L’affaire Sheeran outside of Bluesky and media headlines, it’s undergraduate students at UC. Two overheard conversations analysing his politics and media strategy.
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🔜 Soon Lee @soonleenz.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Farrar vs. Farrier: how to tell the difference. By @xtotl.bsky.social Toby Morris.
Screenshot of a post by artist Toby Morris with very simple sketches showing the difference between the Davids with caricatures of their heads: Farrar is bald & is shorter, placed lower on the screen, Farrier has dark hair & stubble & is taller, placed higher than Farrar on screen.
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Koen Sebregts @dorsalstop.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
"Instead of researchers being questioned about their companies’ habit of plagiarizing academics’ work or using customer data to train models without consent, the public’s imagination is redirected to fears about what the future might hold upon the arrival of fictional superintelligent machines."
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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Um, first living penguin species in 100 years perhaps? Eudyptes warhami was described from the Chatham Islands in 2019; it went extinct about 500 years ago.
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Caroline Ball @heroicendeavour.eurosky.social · 21/09/2026
"Wikipedia is the most widely used reference work in history and one of the most valuable training resources available to the generative AI industry; and yet that same industry is systematically undermining the conditions that make Wikipedia possible." 👏
link.springer.com
Towards a practice of knowledge commoning: academics’ ethical duties to defend Wikipedia in the age of generative AI - AI and Ethics
Wikipedia is the most widely used reference work in history and one of the most valuable training resources available to the generative AI (genAI) industry; and yet that same industry is systematicall...
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Sang As It Ever Will Be @sanguinarynovel.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
They can't have missed the comic from the Hero Initiative about this
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depths of wikipedia @depthsofwikipedia.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
here are more ways to start editing!!! it's fun and you shouldn't be scared!!! bsky.app/profile/dept...
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Bhen Goodsir @bhengoodsir.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
Right now, 13% of shops in Auckland and up to 15% in Wellington are sitting completely empty. Yet commercial rents haven’t dropped in two years. Why? Because the current system protects commercial property values over vibrant, thriving communities.
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Dylan Reeve @dylanreeve.com · 20/09/2026
These policies seem good. Fundamentally there is something broken about the incentives for commercial landlords that sees them willing to let tenancies sit empty.
rnz.co.nz
Greens announce reforms to lower commercial rents, fill empty shops
The Green Party is pledging to restore city centre vibrancy by ensuring market rent reviews for small businesses can lower rents, and letting councils run rental auctions for spaces that have been emp...
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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
LibriVox is a public-domain volunteer-read audiobook site, and to my delight has a multi-volume Insomnia Collection of very boring texts including A Textbook of Assaying for the Use of Those Connected with Mines; Chapter 6. librivox.org/insomnia-col...
librivox.org
Insomnia Collection Vol. 001 | LibriVox
LibriVox
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Abbie Jury 🌱 @tikorangi.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Imagine the outrage if we had a left-leaning government and the dollar sat as low as it is now. NZ$ should be around 93 to 96c Australian. But it is now sitting just above 80c. Has been around 83c but dropped further recently. Where is the analysis and reporting on this?
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Andrew D Thaler @drandrewthaler.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
It's probably better framing to think off these guys as 19th century robber barons than some scions of New Tech. They're running the same boring playbook and we don't even get railroads out of it.
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Andy McKay @korimakoecology.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
"Close to 300 critically endangered kākāriki karaka/orange-fronted parakeets have been counted at the Brook Waimārama Sanctuary in Nelson, up almost 100 on last year’s survey."
thepress.co.nz
Endangered parakeet numbers soar at sanctuary
Close to 300 critically endangered kākāriki karaka/orange-fronted parakeets have been counted at the Brook Waimārama Sanctuary in Nelson, up almost 100 on last year’s survey.
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Lois Beckett @loisbeckett.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
An AI book list with three categories: 1) smart books that explain and critique the AI industry 2) VERY flawed but ~illustrative~ books on AI 3) books that provide deeper political/social context, including some fiction (lmk what you'd add to the list) www.theguardian.com/books/2026/s...
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Grant Jacobs BioinfoTools/NotJustDNA 🔬🧬🖥️✍️📚🇳🇿 @notjustdna.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
#SciComm #NZ Some people might like to check the weekly ‘Month of Learning’ online talks coming up. – Four 10-minutes talks over a lunchtime www.scanz.co.nz/events
scanz.co.nz
Events — SCANZ - Science Communicators Association of New Zealand
Join us for networking, professional development and science storytelling events around Aotearoa New Zealand!
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Bethany Black @bethanyblack.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
I really need journalists to learn that every time OpenAI or Anthropic or xAI says that their model has broken containment and could destroy humanity that it’s a marketing pitch by companies running out of cash with high overheads and no profitable business model wanting more investment.
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CEO Johnny Cans @oldmatecans.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Happy second iRex ferry arrival week! This is the week the second rail enabled bigger ferry would have arrived in Aotearoa, six months after the first. We currently will not receive any new ferries until 2029, and at present have one ferry working and will go 4 years without a rail enabled ferry.
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huck mason @tylerhuckabee.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
rip annie dillard
One of the things I know about writing is this: spend it all, shoot it, play it, lose it, all, right away, every time. Do not hoard what seems good for a later place in the book or for another book; give it, give it all, give it now. The impulse to save something good for a better place later is the signal to spend it now. Something more will arise for later, something better. These things fill from behind, from beneath, like well water. Similarly, the impulse to keep to yourself what you have learned is not only shameful, it is destructive. Anything you do not give freely and abundantly becomes lost to you. You open your safe and find ashes.
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André "Normal" Alessi @andrealessi.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
At my office job where management has been insisting on using AI for everything, we had a "fun" team exercise where we asked Copilot what animal we were based on our daily interactions with it, and it told every single person in a team of ten people that we were most like a border collie lol.
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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
If journalists said things like “support for Labour is probably between 28 and 34% and for National somewhere between 27 and 33%” it would be more accurate, but they wouldn’t get to write long articles about tiny changes in poll results and a possible hung parliament.
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Tze Ming Mok 莫志明 @tzemingdynasty.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
WITNESS THE GLORY OF NEW ZEALAND MENTIONED
RNZ home page
Tūrei 15 Hepetema, 7:46pm
Top stories
'I woke up in New Zealand yesterday': Stephen Colbert's long journey to the Emmys
TV

The former late-night talk show host took home what might be his cancelled show’s last award at the Emmys - and name-dropped his new home in the process.
1h ago
US comedian and writer Stephen Colbert accepts the award for Outstanding Variety Series for "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" onstage during the 78th Primetime Emmy Awards at the Peacock Theatre at LA Live in Los Angeles on September 14, 2026.

'We are deeply sorry': Government apologises to Tom Phillips' children
Public inquiry
2h ago
WAITOMO, NEW ZEALAND - SEPTEMBER 11: Police at the location of one of the campsites just off the Te Anga Road near Waitomo where Tom Phillips and his children had been hiding for the last four years. Tom Phillips was killed after getting into an armed shootout with Police. 11 September 2025. (Photo by Dean Purcell/New Zealand Herald via Getty Images)

'It's getting worse': East Cape residents face ongoing flood fallout
Local
1h ago
Rivers diverted across properties in Te Araroa following January's storm

'Butt out of our business': Auckland mayor's message to local government minister
Election 2026
Today
Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown taking questions after discussing the findings of the State of Auckland report, the Auckland regional deal and the city's national role.

NZ fuel supplies face increased risk, and no price relief
Business
52m ago
Composite of hand pumping fuel, money and cars.

Woman told police she had Tom Phillips in her car - they never arrived
Investigation
2h ago
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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
If anyone in Ōtautahi wants to help with the Books of Mana project, we’ll be working on lvl 2 of Tūranga all Sunday: let me know if you’d like to join in. A good way to learn some Wikipedia and Wikidata.
The worktable in Ngā Pounamu collection? Level 2 of Tūranga. Books of Mana, 180 Māori-authored books of significance.
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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
BRANZ is an internationally well-respected research institute that’s *independent* of any government department—folding it into MBIE for vague cost-cutting reasons is stupid. www.rnz.co.nz/news/busines...
rnz.co.nz
Decades of building industry research at risk
The future of our world-respected building research association is looking shaky with a government move to cut the dedicated levy that funds it.
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Dr Sarah Hendrica Bickerton 🏳️‍🌈 @sarahhbickerton.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
For crying out loud ... the whole point about having an expert independent building research agency is that they have EXPERTISE and are INDEPENDENT. Taking away their funding and folding them into a governmentl ministry is the polar opposite of this.
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Mike Dickison @adzebill.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
The cognitive dissonance with people who dutifully recycle and drive an EV and support Palestine and buy free-range eggs but then talk to a text-extrusion programme all day is quite something.
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André Brett @drdrehistorian.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
- Restoring the Bay Express (Wellington–Napier) and the Southerner (Chch–Dunedin–Invercargill) - Chch and Dunedin suburban rail on existing corridors (Chch to Rolleston, Rangiora, Lyttelton; Port Chalmers–Dunedin–Mosgiel) - Affordable economy class on TranzAlpine, Coastal Pacific, Northern Explorer
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