iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

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e.w. niedermeyer @niedermeyer.online · 29/09/2026

where other AI companies have to keep insisting that they're sorta trying to destroy humanity, Meta Platforms knows that actions speak louder than words

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

“Bus Stopping” indeed! The 94 down Oxford Street feels like it’s been a main axis for most of my life. I’m now making the journey for what may be the last time ever before pedestrianisation (laudatory)

Indicator board on a bus, reads rather prophetically “Oxford Circus Station - Bus Stopping”

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Fresh seafood BBQ at Shepherd Bush market is fantastic Choose your fresh fish at Brothers & Cousins fishmonger stall, take it to the Grill Masters stall to cook, visit Oasis juice stall while you wait Can’t recommend it enough

A red snapper fish, beautifully seasoned and grilled

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Jonn Elledge @jonnelledge.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

I want the Prime Minister to look into a TV camera and say the RNLI are heroes, that we do not change policy by street violence in this country, and that he expects any criminal action to face the full force of the law. That's it. That's all he has to do.

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David Robson @davidotley.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

“I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Rain.”

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David Henig @davidheniguk.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

How much we take for granted even compared to 30 years ago, such is the curse of false nostalgia.

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 12/08/2026

I don’t mean to disrespect the sun or anything (like, I mean I’d really miss it if it got angry with me and was suddenly blotted out or something!), but this is too damn hot

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 08/08/2026

The Anish Kapoor exhibition at the Hayward Gallery is a lot less gruesome once you realise how much it looks like really good sorbet

Anish Kapoor sculpture at the Hayward Gallery, London. Looks like a congealed mass of blood. Or does it…?

“Gelato”, Anish Kapoor, 2016. Mixed media - blackberry and sugar

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

Beautiful evening to cycle through central London

Sunset view west along the Thames from Southwark Bridge in London

And east from the same place. The Shard and Tower Bridge, with a cyclist wizzing by

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Richard Brown @richardbrown.bsky.social · 28/07/2026

Also beautiful green floor. Serpentinite, I think.

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 28/07/2026

They say the best time to plant a tree is 40 years ago… so I’m off on a mini adventure to fact-check that 40 years ago this summer, as a sixth-former, some friends and I volunteered on a conservation project in Snowdonia (Eryri) Now we’re heading back to climb a mountain and see whether it worked…

View down the tracks on an above-ground Tube platform. A lot of vanishing perspective going on - symbolic perhaps?

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 11/07/2026

Can someone write a deep dive on what ends up in the “World Food” aisle vs just normal supermarket aisles, and how. Because at the moment it sometimes feels like we’re just “othering” East Asia, and I have questions…

Supermarket shelves on an aisle just called “sauces”. They are from, or styled from, many places including Mexico, Thailand, Caribbean, USA, South Africa…

Shelves in the same supermarket, in a separate aisle specially labelled “World Foods”. The sauces all seem to be from East or Southeast Asia

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 01/07/2026

Great news - Hammersmith bridge stays open for cycling & walking A fashionable YIMBY view of “just knock it down & rebuild already” ignores that there’s no conceivable way that would be a good use of hundreds of millions of pounds Status quo bias is so powerful. But status quo here has changed now

bbc.co.uk

Hammersmith Bridge vehicle plans axed over £300m cost

Hammersmith and Fulham Council now plans to focus on repairs to maintain walking and cycling access.

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 26/06/2026

That’s it. Work’s done for good. Now when’s the next match…?

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 19/06/2026

Personal news… I’m retiring next week 22 years in the same job - but wow did it change in that time! So pleased to see Quod & Socio-Economic team in such a strong position and in such good hands Great things ahead for the company’s new generation I’ll now be spending more time with my passport..

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 12/06/2026

A goal for Saints in the World Cup! 🔴⚪️ #CANBIH

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Sam Freedman @samfr.bsky.social · 10/06/2026

Everyone on X and elsewhere who called for a violent response should be charged with incitement. Everyone involved in the pogrom should be locked up with exemplary sentences. Govt should make it clear that will be the response in future anywhere else. Enough.

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 09/06/2026

Love how panicked these guys are when they see the time What are they late for?

A pedimental relief sculpture of rampant horses flanking a clock. The horses are absolutely terrified. Just swivel eyed and open mouthed, flailing in shock as they look at the clock. It’s at the Household Cavalry Barracks, Hyde Park, London

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 08/06/2026

My phone tells me I’ve only ever had one minute of mindfulness. And it was five years ago Is this good?

Screen grab from phone health app, section titled “Mindful Minutes”, shows 1min, in August 2021

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

Found this petrol ration book when clearing out my dad’s house So I guess I’m all set if the Strait of Hormuz stays shut

Motor fuel ration book:
MOTOR CAR (inc. Tricycle) not exceeding 1100 C.C. The coupons in this book authorise the furnishing and acquisition of the number of units of motor fuel specified on the coupons.

Coupon inside the ration book: 1ST MONTH
NOT TRANSFERABLE
This coupon is issued under the authority of the Minister of Power
One L1 Unit

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 26/04/2026

The swifts are back in London! 5,000km from Africa in five days. And they won’t have touched ground since they left the UK last year

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 25/04/2026

Love my mother-in-law’s anecdotes One minute you’re discussing her garden then suddenly it’s “that time my brother was late for school because the magpie he’d trained to fly in the window and wake him every morning had been eaten by a python” Whoah there, a few things we need to re-wind on please

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 18/04/2026

Just waking up from a hip replacement operation. That was easy - didn’t have to do anything I’m now a cyborg. Might update my profile

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 05/04/2026

My unpopular Easter opinion - you should parboil roast potatoes in boiling water, not from cold (as every single recipe suggests) You want the outside cooked and falling apart (for crispy roasties) but the inside NOT falling apart. Parboil hot and fast, leave the middle to cook once in the oven

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

Enjoyed My Bloody Valentine, 35 years after first seeing them at the Town and Country Club Made more special this time by going with my adult son

View of the stage in Royal Albert Hall. To be honest you can’t see anything but a backlit red haze of smoke

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 24/03/2026

Feels like the Iran war is still only at stage two of this XKCD classic: xkcd.com/349/

An XKCD four-panel cartoon about an IT upgrade titled “AS A PROJECT WEARS ON, STANDARDS FOR SUCCESS SLIP LOWER AND LOWER.”

Panel 1: “0 HOURS - OKAY, I SHOULD BE ABLE TO DUAL-BOOT BSD SOON.”

Panel 2: “6 HOURS - I'LL BE HAPPY IF I CAN GET THE SYSTEM WORKING LIKE IT WAS WHEN I STARTED.”

Panel 3: “10 HOURS - WELL, THE DESKTOP'S A LOST CAUSE, BUT I THINK I CAN FIX THE PROBLEMS THE LAPTOP'S DEVELOPED.”

Panel 4: “24 HOURS - IF WE'RE LUCKY, THE SHARKS WILL STAY AWAY UNTIL WE REACH SHALLOW WATER.
IF WE MAKE IT BACK ALIVE, YOU'RE NEVER UPGRADING ANYTHING AGAIN.”

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 21/03/2026

Lovely to see Sakura crowds and picnics in Ravenscourt Park

An avenue of pink cherry blossom in a park (Hammersmith, London). Crowds of people taking photos, and picnicking on the grass under the trees.

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 19/03/2026

A productive day down the photon mines… Our rooftop solar generated twice as much electricity as our house used today (London)

A graph of electricity used (green line), and solar power generated (yellow line) over the course of today. If you’re fortunate enough to be able to, now would be a great time to install solar and a house battery

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John Oxley @joxley.jmoxley.co.uk · 09/03/2026

Going to be a big summer for middle aged men with heat pumps and solar panels.

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J. Brian Balta @drjbbalta.bsky.social · 09/03/2026

Someone on here yesterday pointed out that you can tell they didn’t see any of this coming because they would have done insider trades on the oil futures market if they had.

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 20/01/2026

People blaming the Mercator map projection for Trump thinking Greenland is bigger than it really is (and at this point, can’t dismiss that) But also, Mercator deceives on *where* Greenland is. It’s actually pretty much the same distance from both USA and Denmark, (c2,000km). Whose backyard is that?

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 29/12/2025

Not sure I’d have been able to make out St Paul’s in this view today, without the help of Manhattan Lofts highlighting it in the background…

The viewing corridor of St Paul’s Cathedral in London, from near the King’s Mound in Richmond Park. You really can’t see much, but across the road there’s a narrow gap in the trees. It’s there somewhere.

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 20/08/2025

So THIS is what central government was using all these years whenever Leeds called asking for a metro system

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 26/11/2025

I understand the worries about EV adoption from the pay-per-mile electric vehicle tax But if this policy sticks, this will eventually mean we finally have the basis of a national system of road tolling. Something that’s been absolutely necessary but always “ten years off” for generations

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Leo Murray @crisortunity.bsky.social · 21/11/2025

I really cannot recommend this excellent piece on Hammersmith Bridge highly enough

nickmaini.substack.com

Hammersmith Bridge

Where did 25,000 vehicles go?

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Paul Smith @pmsmith.bsky.social · 23/10/2025

New appeal stats just dropped and they're 😮 Over the last quarter: • 76% of public inquiries allowed • 59% of hearings allowed • 53% of appeals for more than 10 homes allowed Those rates are all pretty much as high as they've ever been. Data here: assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/68f78d...

assets.publishing.service.gov.uk

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Dave Andress @davidandress.bsky.social · 22/10/2025

Yes, they are actually saying that a "foreigner" who has worked here for decades, paid National Insurance, & is entitled BECAUSE OF THAT to a state pension, would be deported for the crime of claiming it.

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 22/10/2025

Terrifying that a “mainstream” party in the UK is proposing Idi Amin-style deportation of hundreds of thousands of our friends, neighbours, relatives, colleagues, NHS workers… And terrifying too that it’s raised no more than a ripple in the media, and only weak criticism from the government

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Ant Breach @antbreach.bsky.social · 16/10/2025

The official data on productivity shows Britain's big cities have decoupled from the national economy. But while the big cities outside the capital are roaring ahead, London is stagnating. But can we trust this data? Are our regional divides closing? Our new paper investigates:

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 09/10/2025

Now you don’t have to choose! Both of @jonnelledge.bsky.social History of the World in 47 Borders, and @lewisbaston.bsky.social Borderlines: History of Europe in 29 Borders, are 99p on Kindle at the moment. (Only 2.6p per border…)

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Simon Ricketts @simonicity.bsky.social · 28/09/2025

Govt response to New Towns Taskforce recommendations. The Taskforce’s 12 locations still being considered (“Tempsford, Crews Hill and Leeds South Bank looking particularly promising”). More by next Spring so watch this space or rather these various large spaces. www.gov.uk/government/p...

gov.uk

Initial government response - September 2025

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Matthew Pennycook MP @matthewpennycookmp.bsky.social · 28/09/2025

I’m immensely grateful to the New Towns Taskforce, under the expert leadership of its Chair, Sir Michael Lyons, and Deputy Chair, Dame Kate Barker, for producing such a considered and comprehensive set of final recommendations 👇🏻 www.gov.uk/government/p...

gov.uk

New Towns Taskforce: Report to government

The government has published the independent New Towns Taskforce report as well as its initial response to that report.

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 20/09/2025

So impressive what Jim has achieved in the first year of London Centric. If you live here, you owe yourself a subscription

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

London’s weather has had enough of flags it seems

Tattered flags over London’s Oxford Street, half torn off. (These are actually official flags, rather than racist ones…)

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

Tried Amazon’s “Prime Vision” football with live data overlays. Pretty interesting, but you definitely wouldn’t want it on a game you really cared about

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Barney Stringer @barneystringer.bsky.social · 21/08/2025

Hopefully soon they’ll be drinking this instead:

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