iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 58m

The NEET rate basically hasn't changed for the whole of this century (except post-GFC and post Covid). It's been the same with tougher welfare sanctions and weaker. More apprenticeships and fewer. Higher employer national insurance and lower. I draw two conclusions from this....

2137

Reposted by Ben Barclay

David Lutz 🏳️‍🌈 @kpanic.bsky.social · 59m

People used to complain a lot more, now it's more or less only used for comedic effect. Sometimes even for non-monetary values. Like, eg: "I've lost 8kg of weight! That's, like, 16 in Marks!"

011

Ben Barclay @benbarclay.bsky.social · 56m

Stay safe and listen to the latest advice if you're anywhere between Valencia and southern Catalonia. Torrential downpours and flooding expected.

020

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Dan Kaszeta FRHistS @dankaszeta.bsky.social · 1h

"Britain is secretly Atlantis" is one helluva drug.

12576

Ben Barclay @benbarclay.bsky.social · 2h

On the currency, in Spain there's no obvious nostalgia for the peseta any more. People used to complain that prices went up with the introduction of the euro, in some instances justifiably, but I haven't heard anyone talk about that for ages. I wonder what it's like in other countries?

594

Ben Barclay @benbarclay.bsky.social · 3h

Historic month for EV sales in Spain: 18.4% market share, and almost 25% amongst private buyers. The overall average is dragged down by fleet purchases, and particularly car hire companies. Still, previous best month was 13.4% - last month. Before that, 11.9% last September.

060

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Kees van der Leun @sustainable2050.bsky.social · 15h

Lowest on record (1866-2026)! The water level in the Rhine keeps reaching new lows. 6.12 m above sea level already was a new all-time low in August, but now we're at 6.06 m, and still going down.

04325

Ben Barclay @benbarclay.bsky.social · 7h

The last five years of glacier loss in the Alps are a good example of a step-change in the impacts of climate change. Although we know the underlying trend, it’s hard to predict, but when it happens it very visibly changes our natural environment in just a few years.

1113

Ben Barclay @benbarclay.bsky.social · 14h

Glaciers need a bigger y-axis.

152

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Dr Stylite @columnist.bsky.social · 15h

What a difference

2476

Ben Barclay @benbarclay.bsky.social · 16h

Of the 3 big Burnham second term policies, I think PR is the one that it makes most sense to push through without a new mandate. The obvious justification is the polling. FPTP doesn’t work for 5-7 biggish parties.

282

Reposted by Ben Barclay

LeRaffl @leraffl.bsky.social · 19h

My favourite overview of who transitions how fast to battery electric vehicles. Observations: 1. The slower transitioning countries are those that start to transition later. 2. The fast transitioning countries are generally from Asia or South America, while North America is abysmally slow

33912

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Simon Evans @drsimevans.carbonbrief.org · 20h

NEW ANALYSIS: Record wind and solar save UK from gas imports worth £5.9bn during Hormuz crisis 🌤️ wind/solar generation up 14% in 2026 to date 🏭 gas down ~10% 🚢 >100 LNG cargoes avoided

12461185

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Melissa Nadia Viviana 🐸 @resistrebelrevolt.net · 29/09/2026

"Sometimes you don't survive in whole. Just in part. But the grandeur of life is that attempt. Being as fearless as one can and behaving as beautifully as one can under impossible circumstances." -Toni Morrison

18322

Ben Barclay @benbarclay.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Thought Burnham’s speech was genuinely interesting. On the triple lock, it bears repeating that its justification has always been that UK pensions are very low compared with those of their peers. The fact that it is “unsustainable“, “unfair”, etc compared with salaries is a feature, not a bug.

251

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Prasad Jallepalli, MD, PhD @prasad.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

5 potatoes cubed is still 5 potatoes because potatoes are root vegetables

783511880

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Teresa Ribera @teresaribera.ec.europa.eu · 29/09/2026

Scaring heat, global warming is accelerating.🌎🔴 Always a pleasure to meet with Celeste Saulo, @wmo-global.bsky.social Secretary General. We had a valuable exchange on what observations and the latest science are telling us, and on the major challenges ahead.

1197

Ben Barclay @benbarclay.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Non-asylum seekers with non-explosives. Farage will be delighted.

240

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Will Jennings📉🗳️ @drjennings.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Haven’t been following the story closely but releasing people on bail suggests maybe this wasn’t the security threat reported rather than evidence of a woke criminal justice system?

1113522

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Shawn Hennessey ☀️🍷 @sevillatapas.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Yeeks… at the Catedral de Sevilla 💦💦💦

0141

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Jim Pickard @pickardje.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

as a satire on so-called late stage capitalism how could one beat investors pouring a trillion into a company offering to wipe out humankind

992119740

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Chris Meder @evcurvefuturist.com · 29/09/2026

Plug-in #EV share of new passenger-car sales/registrations around August 2026, counting BEVs + PHEVs/EREVs. The remarkable thing isn’t Norway approaching 100%. It’s who else is on the list. Different continents. Different incomes. Different grids. Different governments. Same technological S-curve.

57724

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Brian McNoldy @bmcnoldy.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

It would be unprecedented in the satellite era and even in the past century to have a hurricane season with no hurricanes. In the past century (1926-2025) the fewest number of hurricanes in a season is two, and that happened in 1930, 1982, and 2013.

bmcnoldy.blogspot.com

Fay lingers, Gonzalo dissipates, Hanna forms

Updates and summaries on tropical Atlantic activity... including easterly waves, tropical storms, subtropical storms, and hurricanes.

1259

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Melaine Le Roy @subfossilguy.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

A (not so) classic view of the lake reflections of the two most beautiful mountains in the Mont Blanc massif yesterday! 😍 📷 by @lomdumtblanc.bsky.social 🙏

1505

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Nick Lloyd @spaincivilwartours.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

1914 photo of Federico García Lorca teaching his sister Isabel to read music... He'd be about 16 here in their Granada home.

26723

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Jonathan Hopkin @jonathanhopkin.eurosky.social · 28/09/2026

When the median voter thinks something that makes them better off makes them worse off, that’s a recipe for some very bad politics

2408

Ben Barclay @benbarclay.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

I struggle with long texts, but I got as far as “boom” and it all sounds pretty awesome.

000

Ben Barclay @benbarclay.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Interesting article about problems facing cereal producers in Spain. Rising fuel and fertiliser prices, a 30% drop in harvests due to heat and drought, and prices that haven’t risen sufficiently to compensate because they are set by international markets. But then it says we’re importing inflation…

182

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Faine Greenwood @faineg.com · 27/09/2026

Women trying to succeed in Silicon Valley AI and effective altruist spaces are reporting feeling serious social pressure to attend sex parties - where people have reported being sexually assaulted, like below. Events like Aella’s “Slutcon,” which is happening again this weekend.

Ann Pierce
@itsannpierce
20h
I am disheartened by this as well. I already lost a bunch of followers for agreeing with @tautologer, but it's saddening to see local nerdy women being caricatured as Karen-like outsiders and getting pushed out of the scene. This is exactly why you hear so few concrete, names-attached stories of sexual harrassment and assault. I'm told there is a history of discrediting these because the "slut normalization" thing is top priority and these stories get inconveniently in the way of spreading this ideology.
I got roped into attending last year's Saturday Slutcon party because so many local and out-of-town friends were there (to echo sentiments @tautologer expressed about "slut events becoming central to the larger scenes). Mostly I hung out with people I knew and that was great. But in the course of my 3-ish hours there, there were 2 times my "no" was not accepted by a man I didn't know, and I was physically pushing a huge guy off of me who was rubbing his penis on me, who continued to do it despite my physical force against him, and after I finally wriggled away from him, told him I wanted to dance alone etc., he came back and did it again.
This was scary and bad, but it didn't even cross my mind to report this because one of the other people who didn't accept my "no" earlier in the night was the bartender (an officially sanctioned authority at the event), and I knew the event was organized exclusively by women into CNC (who are vocal about how rapey behavior turns them on), so I figured this sort of thing would just get me laughed at. And anyway, I heard there were a lot of other incidents like it. Later though, someone encouraged me to report this story to the organizers, and despite my embarrassment I did, so *they know* that this and other incidents happened. This is why they cut the Saturday night party this year and created a larger training program for the flirt girls - *because* of things like this last year. Yet the narrative bein…

People who haven't been to Slutcon are saying "it's just group therapy," "it's just innocent flirting." But the environment is much like a sex party in that many people are nude, there is making out and sex acts happening out in the open. I think it's pretty unreasonable to expect that every nerdy girl who likes rationalist bloggers or is into EA/AI safety should automatically be comfortable with this! That if she's not, there's something wrong with her, we don't want her in our scenes, etc.
Not to mention, it's explictly an event *for men*, where men are the clients and the "flirt girls" are the product. Last year I overheard an exchange where a man felt "led on" by a flirt girl and was trying to get her punished/kicked out. (A dynamic that seems inevitable in this context!)
Anyway- it does sound like they've upped their consent education a lot this year, are more organized, and that's good! As I've told my friends who are attending: I hope they have fun!
I heard several accounts last year of women who had no problems and really enjoyed the event. That's great!
Just... can we live in reality about this? There are real reasons why male-female sexual dynamics are tricky.
Encouraging autistic men who can't yet read body language to go around asking to see womens' boobs is maybe a bit ill-advised. Maybe not everyone should be/identify as a slut; maybe it's not for everyone.
And yeah, filtering the Bay Area Al safety scene down to only women who are super comfy with this eliminates *most* women - including many of the really smart, nerdy, weird women who've been in the larger scenes for years. What a loss for humanity.
I absolutely understand why people with a minority sexuality would want to create belonging, would want to create spaces for people like themselves. But why do it like this/at this cost?

20643271107

Ben Barclay @benbarclay.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

A plague on both your fucking houses.

150

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Dave Vetter @davidrvetter.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

Lewis Goodall thinks that the "delay" to Heathrow's third runway is a signifier of the UK "falling behind."

3154

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Paul French @chinarhyming.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

I never don’t include at least a couple of pubs on one of my Voicemap GPS walking tours! For my walk Writers, Artists and Ne’er-do-wells: A Bloomsbury and Fitzrovia Walk it’s the Newman Arms at 23 Rathbone Street, established in 1730. voicemap.me/tour/london/...

051

Ben Barclay @benbarclay.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

It turns out there are lots of MPs I’ve never heard of. 27 is my best score, and I doubt I’ll beat it. Some cool names, and some familiar faces who I’d forgotten were still in parliament. Shouldn’t Tim Farron be running a religious cult, or a shoe shop, by now?

220

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Jan Rosenow @janrosenow.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Electricity is 23% of global final energy but delivers 37% of useful energy and powers 46% of the global economy. We don't need to replace every fossil joule. We need to replace the services. A much smaller task. Great to see the @iea.org’s new Electrification report finally measure this.

5371159

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Éamann Mac Donnchada @almagroschool.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

500 housing rights activists camped in Puerta del Sol, Madrid the geographic epicenter of Spanish politics. Yesterday a major demo in the same city calling for Sánchez to be tried for treason, elpais.com/espana/2026-...

elpais.com

“Hasta el final, compañeros”: Sol vuelve a acampar quince años después del 15-M

La protesta por el desahucio de Maricarmen desemboca en una acampada en la Puerta del Sol, donde los manifestantes reclaman al Gobierno que apruebe un nuevo decreto de vivienda

141

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Thomas I-G @thomasig.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

Labour pledged within their manifesto to reform social care, we're still waiting for Casey Commission to release their report. Waiting for another three years to get any movement on this, even if it is on a different scale to what was envisioned then, is disappointing to say the least.

1164

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Dorian Lynskey @dorianlynskey.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Shipman’s really gone all the way huh. “The courts are a conspiracy against the nation”?!

1123534

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Elinor Elliot @elinorelliot.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

When people tell you who they are, believe them.

52512

Ben Barclay @benbarclay.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

There are still plenty on the right who present Johnson as a moderate/centrist with personal flaws but socially and economically liberal.

030

Ben Barclay @benbarclay.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Out for some tapas and a 8-10-year-old girl has understandably got bored of sitting at the table with her family and is tearing around on her grandmother’s mobility scooter.

060

Ben Barclay @benbarclay.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Latest ever 40 C day on record for Spain. And not just 40 - it reached 41.3 C.

224

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Felicity Hannah @felicityhannah.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Teenagers. They’re a treat.

WhatsApp message that reads “what’s for dinner were I to come back?”

3863327

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Helen Barnard @helenbarnard.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

A weekend treat! Foodbanks across the UK are asking people to join them and @trusselluk.bsky.social and write to @andyburnham.bsky.social asking him to use the Autumn budget to reconnect Local Housing Allowance & rents. Because no one should have to choose between food & rent.

23221

Reposted by Ben Barclay

David Roberts @volts.wtf · 26/09/2026

I got to Copenhagen this morning and have been biking around all day and, y'all, I don't know if you've heard about this, but ... this place has pretty good bike infrastructure. You read about it but it's still just mind-blowing to see. Swarms of bikes, everywhere. Swarms!

4396089

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan @london.gov.uk · 25/09/2026

The world needs to get to grips with the climate crisis now - there’s no time to lose. Global leaders must get serious about lowering emissions, and actively invest in measures to mitigate the disastrous impacts of extreme weather.

theguardian.com

Huge El Niño projected to cause more than 450,000 deaths by February

New report predicts a heavy toll from Nigeria to the US – and comes on top of existing impacts of the climate crisis

29627

Reposted by Ben Barclay

Jack Bailey @jack-bailey.co.uk · 26/09/2026

I disagree with much of this by @modernlockey.bsky.social, but I think the points he makes tell us something interesting about the shortcomings of the Starmer project and the problems that Labour faces today.

futureoftheleft.substack.com

What is politics for?

Do we still live in a material world?

26017