iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

David Durant @bowsy.co.uk · 01/10/2026

I thought this was slightly cool until I zoomed in enough to see the sweeps happening in real time. Absolutely amazing.

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Reposted by David Durant

steve the skeptic @policyskeptic.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Here is the metric that signals most clearly why: the history of 12hr waits (remember long waits probably kill perhaps more than 20k patients every year): ...

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Reposted by David Durant

Gender Liberation Movement @genderlib.com · 01/10/2026

As hospitals across the country cave to the Trump administration’s threats to cut federal funding and abandon trans youth, actor Elliot Page speaks out. In New York City, NYU Langone, Mount Sinai, and NewYork-Presbyterian abruptly ended care for trans kids in response to these threats.

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Reposted by David Durant

Ann Kempster @annkempster.com · 01/10/2026

Oh god, that throws me back to being in Cab office pre-2010 and getting ENDLESS questions from Maude in opposition about how many people worked in comms in government. Impossible to answer. What is a person. What is comms. What is working. What is government.

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David Durant @bowsy.co.uk · 29/09/2026

Hey @jamestplunkett.bsky.social was the "digital era devolution" work you and @richardpope.org did referenced in this published somewhere? Thanks. medium.com/@jamestplunk...

medium.com

Could the NHS leapfrog the rest on public sector digital work?

Start small, think big

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Reposted by David Durant

Sam Freedman @samfr.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

We can all argue about Burnham's speech but it meant girl twin asking me what the triple lock was and boy twin asking me what my preferred form of PR is. So it's done its work.

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David Durant @bowsy.co.uk · 29/09/2026

Jesus Christ there's a reason why comments are turned off on this. #FutureVisionXPRIZE www.youtube.com/watch?v=yivX...

youtube.com

The Gifted. #FutureVisionXPRIZE

YouTube video by Jeff Synthesized

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David Durant @bowsy.co.uk · 29/09/2026

My dad worked nearly 50 years for the CEGB. He'd be over the moon to see the electric grid being renationalised.

David Durant @bowsy.co.uk · 28/09/2026

In the very unlikely event you're short of something to including in the next @enfielddispatch.bsky.social - @jollyjourno.bsky.social . This from @jamestplunkett.bsky.social is great. I can already think of at last one prime example. medium.com/@jamestplunk...

medium.com

Communities Against Delinquent Ownership

Putting Britain’s empty and neglected buildings on the map

David Durant @bowsy.co.uk · 28/09/2026

Just caught myself saying "I'm spending too many tokens" out loud and now must commit ritual seppuku. Seriously though, I really have no idea what to think of myself right about now.

A bear @asinglebear.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

Reposted by David Durant

It is time for leaves. I am a bear.

Bear comic, 4 panels.

1: bear at Sun, “thank you, Sun”
2: bear by tree “it has been nice to be too warm”
3: bear at tree, dead leaves “but it is time for leaves”
4: bear at Sun, Sun is leaves “I am a bear.”

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Reposted by David Durant

In Otter News @in-otter-news.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

After a long day at the aquarium, the otters help tidy their toys away. Payment is made promptly and entirely in ice cubes.

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Brief reminder that I mostly post about gov tech and comms over at @ukgovcomms.bsky.social and that one of my bots RTs the Prime Ministers TikToks and Instagrams here on Bluesky at @unofficialandy.bsky.social .

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Although at obviously a very different scale this is why I pay for local journalism like @enfielddispatch.bsky.social .

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Creating something is often the easy part. Supporting people to use it is the hard and messy bit the current system doesn't want to face.

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That "it's easier to fund refreshing a community centre than pay for skills to run it" reflects the ever-present "funding projects vs. teams" issues inside of government.

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I like this on in particular because so many of the new community roles in it are mirrors of the work people like me have been attempting to do within government for decades. PMs, DMs, URs and Designers have DDaT roles but "wranglers, stewards and connectors" aren't supported in the same way.

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As someone with a limited knowledge of political theory I probably shouldn't be speculating if replacing elections with another model is a good idea. This is why I'm wondering whether, following on from Policy Camp this year, whether "Redesign the Government Camp" is a good idea in 2027.

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People like me, faced with the same problems for long enough, tend to climb ever higher up the "meta ladder" looking for a solution. If the service doesn't work blame the funding model, the organisational structure, the whole idea of government departments and now, inevitably, the political layer.

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The big take-away though for me from this post wasn't that or the end section putting Burnham in context. Instead it was the whole concept of "announceables" culture.

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Yes, the flexibility to be adaptive at the edges but using common sets of small tools (digital and other) so government and communities don't need to keep paying to build or buy them over and over again.

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James' "six main agendas for reforming the state" cover very accurately almost everything that needs doing but I feel "building platforms" needs to be recognised as the same highest level.

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Can a new style of political leadership unlock the energy at the edges?

Finally managing to find some time to start to go through the giant backlog of @jamestplunkett.bsky.social essays that I've been putting aside. Each one makes me think so much I feel I need a serious chunk of time to approach it properly and this one is no exception. medium.com/@jamestplunk...

medium.com

As Andy Burnham rises to the Premiership, this essay explores the value of a more enabling style of political leadership. What is enabling…

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Reposted by David Durant

Rachel Maddow @maddow.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

"A woman leaving the facility 'dropped to her knees. She did the sign of the cross in extreme relief. As if coming out of a nightmare,' he said... “May we never become so accustomed to suffering that we stop seeing the humanity of those experiencing it.” www.miamiherald.com/news/local/i...

miamiherald.com

Amid whistleblower claims, advocates ask lawmakers to visit ICE office in Miramar

Community leaders demand Florida lawmakers investigate Miramar ICE facility amid whistleblower allegations of severe overcrowding and filthy facilities

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David Durant @bowsy.co.uk · 26/09/2026

We're going to have to wait until the budget to find out whether this is actual new money from government or just moving around and renaming existing things. Still, @andyburnham.bsky.social has in spades that key thing we've been missing for ages. Not just a good PM but good at playing one on TV.

New UK agency to fight ‘information warfare’ from likes of Russia, Burnham tells UN

I don't know what this really is (and I'm 100% sure they've announced it without knowing themselves) but it sure sounds like nationalising @fullfact.org . www.theguardian.com/technology/2...

theguardian.com

PM aims to ‘stem poisonous tide’ of disinformation and deepfakes with National Centre for Information Defence

State of the Future @sotf.org.uk · 24/09/2026

Reposted by David Durant

We're delighted to announce that DATA BITES IS BACK! We're thrilled to be working with @thinkdigitalptns.bsky.social on three events to the end of the year (NEW START TIME OF 5.30PM): - Weds 21 October thinkdigitalpartner.zohobackstage.eu/DataBitesOct... - Weds 11 November - Weds 2 December

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Of course, some will say that everyone will be wealthy because everyone will have access to it. But we know how that kind of thing works in the real world.

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I like to think I approach AI in a nuanced way - some of it is good, some bad - but thinking about it as another, possibly the final, method of resource extraction is really making me think.

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My usual two years behind everyone else I've just encountered the Joseph Browning quote "The underlying purpose of AI is to allow wealth to access skill while removing from the skilled the ability to access wealth" and it's really stopped me in my tracks.

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Oh, and @annadent.bsky.social 's newsletter is still great. You should subscribe.

I'm increasingly of the opinion that we need a group of anthropologists looking into the specific incentives of why senior government decisions makers (politicians and civil servants) make decisions on, for example, AI decision making in order to be properly able to engage them about their choices.