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Bill Thompson

@billt.bsky.social
11K followers 1.1K following 590 posts

Hack and pundit. BBC Research & Development. Formerly Digital Planet.

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Reposted by Bill Thompson
Lilian Edwards @lilianedwards.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
I did a podcast with the lovely Legal 4Tech people who mysteriously don't seem to be on BlueSky! If you can bear me being long and silly it's about the new book and a bunch of AI related topics. On LI lnkd.in/p/eENNAUjT or (eg) Spotify open.spotify.com/episode/3iOU...
lnkd.in
This is much the longest and perhaps the most personal podcast I've ever done! having listened to it in the course of an endlessly delayed journey to Stockholm I can at least now tentatively… | Li...
This is much the longest and perhaps the most personal podcast I've ever done! having listened to it in the course of an endlessly delayed journey to Stockholm I can at least now tentatively recommend...
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Blaine @blaine.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
I love this new feature we built for Roundabout. Our community members needed a way to message each-other with personal information, but no-one needed a new way for someone to slide into their DMs, or a new inbox to check.
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
Our rule in werewolf is that Alice goes out first.
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
The British Weights and Biases Corporation
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
Some buildings are merely assemblages of waiting shadows
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
Thank you!!
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
Steve Reich is 90 this weekend. His music has accompanied me throughout my adult life. I will always remember seeing him perform 'clapping' at his 75th birthday prom in 2011. Such music, such a life.
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Heather Burns @heatherburnstech.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
As per my previous blogging about real history being age-gated, a folk song merely about the 1966 Aberfan disaster now requires age verification. Which is a fairly awful irony. Chapeau @cjforms.bsky.social
YouTube screen cap showing “sign in to confirm your age. This video may be inappropriate for some users”. The song is about Aberfan.
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Lilian Edwards @lilianedwards.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
The BBC's reporting of these "rogue AI" stories has been credulous to the point of execrable. Where are their competent tech savvy staff?? @billt.bsky.social @zsk.bsky.social
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Adore it.
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
I forgot to send my apologies to an event and then I got home to find it has been postponed so I win this week's game of event chicken.
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
I've just realised that the founders of OpenAI must have misread Google's original mission statement as "Can't Be Evil Enough"
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
Thanks for the link. I’ve been thinking about alternatives to anthropomorphising - how about a cellular metaphor or two? astickadogandaboxwithsomethinginit.com/not-a-civili...
astickadogandaboxwithsomethinginit.com
Not a civilisation, an organ. – A Stick a Dog and a Box With Something In It
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Gil Durán @gilduran.com · 06/09/2026
Got 'em: The @thebulwark.com added an editor's note to the review, acknowledging that the author's direct affiliation with the Foundation for American Innovation ("the foundation shaping the tech right," according to Inc.) created a conflict that should have been forthrightly disclosed.
Editor's note from Bulwark: 1
Editor’s note (September 3, 2026, 1:10 p.m. EDT): In a response to this review posted to social media, Gil Durán, author of The Nerd Reich, has highlighted that the reviewer, Jacob Bruggeman, is affiliated with the Foundation for American Innovation (FAI). Durán mentions FAI in his book, once, in a sentence that reads as follows: “This merging of tech and far-right networks—hosted by the Foundation for American Innovation, which Inc. later described as ‘the foundation shaping the tech right’—seemed like a live test of [Balaji] Srinivasan’s theory.” Bruggeman’s affiliation with FAI is an unpaid, nonresident fellowship (in other words, it is not his day job), and while it was mentioned in his byline beneath this review, we should have made a point of additionally disclosing it in a footnote like this.
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 06/09/2026
We are hardwired to do it I fear
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 06/09/2026
I want us to think about agentic swarms as being more like organs formed from cooperating cells than emerging intelligence. Otherwise our descent into anthroporphism will distract us, On LinkedIn www.linkedin.com/pulse/civili... and my blog astickadogandaboxwithsomethinginit.com/not-a-civili...
linkedin.com
Not a civilisation, an organ.
The recent excitement over agentic swarms and their effectiveness has led to a lot of speculation about the capabilities of these systems, and naturally to a conversation about what they mean in the d...
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Molly White @molly.wiki · 05/09/2026
Huge congratulations to the US-based Wikimedia Foundation employees who voted with 92% support in favor of unionizing, and shoutout to the tireless work of the organizers.
wikiworkersunited.org
Wikimedia Foundation Workers Overwhelmingly Vote to Form Union with CWA
U.S. workers form first recognized unit as global union movement builds across Wikimedia Foundation
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Who advised them to do that? :-)
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
It was a “so that is what it’s about” moment.
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
Latest UK episode. Half time talk.
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
Damn. Ted Lasso just got me. I'd been passive watching over my wife's shoulder and finding it mildly charming... but now I'm gone. I may have to start from S1E1...
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
Katie says: we want to do it and the plumbing will be there but no decision on turning it on.
Katie in the Geldart with a pint of Ghost Ship
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
Yes. She really is exceptional. And see this … www.instagram.com/p/Dcq-QSCulN...
instagram.com
Instagram
Create an account or log in to Instagram - Share what you're into with the people who get you.
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
The Tracey Emin show at Tate Modern has closed. I went five times and it's been an incredibly important touchpoint for me. Before that with Leigh Bowery, and before that Yoko Ono, Tate has in a very real sense, kept me together these last years. At @tate.bsky.social or wherever you get your feed
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Katherine Alejandra Cross @quinnae.com · 31/08/2026
The British media: "We have learned nothing. We are not sorry. We will offend again."
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
I expected nothing else. Google will do what it thinks necessary. There are no principles. There were never any principles.
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
Not too late. I’m rooting for you.
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Ruth Pearce @notrightruth.bsky.social · 29/08/2026
This is the most fucked up and immediately harmful policy decision I think I've ever seen in adult trans healthcare in the UK, and that's saying something. The Welsh Gender Service is one of the best in the country. It is widely praised by the patients it helps. That is why it is being targeted.
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Anil Madhavapeddy @anil.recoil.org · 23/08/2026
I've had to respond to multiple OSS security issues recently and the wild thing is that agents can now generate exploits just on the *rumour* of a bug. This throws security embargoes out the window, as the fix is less important than the knowledge of its existence anil.recoil.org/notes/rumour...
anil.recoil.org
Just a rumour of a bug is enough to find a security exploit these days
Thinking through how the conventional OSS security embargoes no longer buy us time, and what open source maintainers might do instead to respond
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Otto English @ottoenglish.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
And THIS Is why I really don't care
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
A nation state has always been a bit of a protection racket (give us your money and this army will keep you safe…) but it’s rare to see it done so blatantly.
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
I lazily ask an LLM (Gemini) for advice about a minor medical issue. It gives me a comforting explanation which I accept. If it said I was dying I'd question its accuracy - but of course I'm making the same mistake either way.
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Sean Jones KC @seanjones.org · 24/08/2026
The problem with racists terrorising people seeking asylum is not wondering who they might come after next. The problem is that racists are terrorising people seeking asylum.
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Hetan Shah @hetanshah.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
It’s really important that independent organisations can hold Government to account. I’m on the Board of @nao.org.uk which does this and we are looking for two new Board members. Could you help spread the word so we can get the best possible field of candidates roles.saxbam.com/advert-detai...
NAO
National Audit Office
National Audit
Office
Non-Executive Directors
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Nick Halliday @nickmhalliday.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
All I can say is I worked there a long time and you really do get involved in fascinating stuff. Quite often organisations actually want the NAO to give them a once over to improve how they work. Also loads of sharp but nice people to work with.
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 23/08/2026
I think we need a pronoun that they are obliged to use: I suggest ‘si’ rather than ‘I’
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Timnit Gebru @timnitgebru.blacksky.app · 23/08/2026
As Maya Angelou said, when people show you who they are, believe them. I'd rather have a klan member clearly articulating his views of how I should be eliminated than these garbage people dressing up their racism in intellectualism. You can fuck all the way off.
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Tarik Abou-Chadi @tabouchadi.bsky.social · 23/08/2026
A good moment to recommend Angela Saini‘s Superior, which traces back the history of “race science” and shows the institutions that sustain this pseudo-research until today. These pursuits have nothing in common with the principles of academic inquiry www.angelasaini.co.uk/superior
angelasaini.co.uk
Angela Saini | Award-winning Science Journalist and Author
The website of British independent science journalist, author and broadcaster, Angela Saini. Her most recent book is Superior: The Return of Race Science.
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Emoria - Aftertaste is a Horror Novel @emoria.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
Aftertaste, my trans-coming of age romance with teeth, is available now at pastitch.com and emoriaweidner.com Grab a copy, and see why "Aftertaste is a transformative achievement..." - @annlee14.bsky.social and "An incredibly important piece of trans literature." - @lolzygag.bsky.social
Prepare to drink deeply, girl...

Past-Itch Publishing

Presents

Aftertaste

А Тохі Уuri...
by Emoria Weidner
• A celebrated trans coming-of-age story
• A lesbian T4T and T4C romance
• A horrifying descent into a dysphoric nightmare
All in one sweet & spicy yuri.
Plus, it has makeup tips.

"I really meant it when I said that this is the best novel I've ever read in my life.
- Marissa Soto on Goodreads,
5 Star Review

"Aftertaste is a transformative achievement and takes its place among
the pinnacle of the growing body of trans literature."
- Annabel Lee
Journey on Storygraph,
5 Star Review

"Artful, intelligent, witty, terrifying and true... With Aftertaste, Emoria Weidner has written the ultimate trans egg-cracking novel."
- Ellen Mellor on Storygraph,
5 Star Review

"It pulls no punches and leaves the reader never truly feeling safe, with each moment of joy shining with a clawing nightmare sitting in its shadow. A powerful mirror to the lives of trans people."
- Joslyn Jollenberg on Goodreads,
5 Star Review

Available Now 
pastitch.com
emoriaweidner.com
"[Aftertaste is] right up there with I saw the TV Glow and Nimona."
- Pippa Primini on Goodreads, 5 Star Review

"An incredibly important piece of trans literature, one that I hope is seen by everyone..."
- Ashlynn Vanner on Goodreads, 5 Star Review

"Compelling characters, outstanding story, the occasional eerie feeling that the author had somehow managed to peer into my own past before setting word to virtual paper."
- Jaz Sakuranoseirei on Storygraph, 5 Star Review

"Not only did I end up enjoying it, it is now my absolute favorite piece of transgender fiction I've ever read."
- Shawndra Quinn on Goodreads, 5 Star Review

"I knew I was in for a treat, but I was woefully unprepared for how much Emoria sees and 'gets it' about the nature of being a trans woman and fighting the demon of our dysphoria."
- Brooke on Storygraph, 5 Star Review

"I've sought out and been recommended a lot of different portrayals of the trans experience - and while all of them contained nuggets that struck a chord with me, none of them have made me feel as seen as Aftertaste did."
- Royn Omberg on Goodreads,
5 Star Review
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Kevin Bird @stairwaytokevin.bsky.social · 22/08/2026
Oh word? Steven Pinker, Alessandro Strumia, and Dorian Abbott think a racist shouldn’t be fired despite clear violations of university rules? That changes everything!
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Emoria - Aftertaste is a Horror Novel @emoria.bsky.social · 22/08/2026
Hi, recently, someone put labels on my account of sharing AI art. They used the labeler @aimod(dot)social I spent hours in DMs trying to show my evidence that @imnobunnywhoareyou.bsky.social is a friend who draws by hand. At the end of this, they said "she's scamming you for money" 🧵
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Antony Carpen @acarpen.bsky.social · 22/08/2026
How on earth?!?! Re BBC News. www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDx_... "The Global Story" "The cost of inclusion" !?!? 1/3 --->
youtube.com
Jason Arday, DEI, and the dilemma facing black academics | The Global Story
YouTube video by BBC News
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Terence Eden @edent.tel · 22/08/2026
Please send in a response to the consultation 😃
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James O'Malley @jamesomalley.co.uk · 22/08/2026
Reneging on open data would be an utter disaster. Don’t do this, government.
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 22/08/2026
“I miss the old BierKeller. I know it’s mostly Nazis now and you get beaten up if you speak out, but if my friends and I sit together & whisper & don’t draw attention the beer and bratwurst are really good” Liberals deciding to ‘re-engage’ with X despite all they know about how Musk has debased it.
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 18/08/2026
A colleague is doing a big data migration and a quote from the early days of Unix came to mind. “The first rule to keep in mind is that an addled disk should be treated gently...This is an area where experience and informed courage count for much.” Feels like lots of my life at the moment.
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 17/08/2026
It was so lovely to see you
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 16/08/2026
Bill in foreground max in background punting
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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 16/08/2026
And here we go for #puntcon 2026- see you all soon
Bill in a red tailcoat and top hat with a hand drawn Puntcon sign beside the Cam
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Hari Kunzru @harikunzru.bsky.social · 15/08/2026
Nobody comes out of this looking good but it was particularly disgusting to watch media outlets like the (London) Times launder Cofnas as a scholar critical of the excesses of DEI rather than a notorious eugenicist
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