iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

They were a bit surprised I think to find that I didn't accept that answer and they're going to look at it again. Glad I can make prevent these small erosions with the little bit of power I have as a local councillor #ElectTheDolls

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I pushed back on officers and got a "well we're going to collect both sex and gender so everyone can be happy" both sidesing answer, which wasn't sufficient, as asking trans people to out themselves on a survey where it's not relevant isn't right...

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We were analysing the city's cultural report and there was a throw away comment on how data collection would be changing based on the SC ruling (which it doesn't need to, because that ruling only narrowly applies to the definition of sex when being used to positively discriminate)...

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Chris Northwood @chrisn.xyz · 29/06/2026

Had a scrutiny meeting where the importance of trans people being in the rooms of power matter (#ElectTheDolls), and I was able to push back against a small change that would have accepted a transphobic framing of sex.

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Lucy Powell has today replied to this letter, in which she agrees with all the concerns, but stops short of actually committing to any action which will make any sort of difference, and seems content to let the current situation continue to play out. The trans community needs more than words.

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Reposted by Chris Northwood

LGBT+ Liberal Democrats 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️ @pluslibdems.bsky.social · 25/06/2026

Exempting broadly-defined "health" services from this bill would be a bit like exempting "fuel" services from a bill about CO2 reduction. There must be no carve-outs or loop holes for abusive practices, in healthcare or otherwise, for this to be anything like what has been promised, for years.

gov.uk

Conversion practices draft bill

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Chris Northwood @chrisn.xyz · 25/06/2026

Rich is one of the best councillors I know and I'm proud to be supporting his campaign. Let us know if you intend to vote for Rich or otherwise at www.mcrlibdems.uk/votepledge

Chris Northwood and Richard Kilpatrick stand at a road junction in front of a Liberal Democrats branded billboard with a laughing photo of Nigel Farage holding lots of money that says "Ten Years On... Do You Feel Better Off?"

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Christine Jardine @cajardinemp.bsky.social · 23/06/2026

Protecting trans young people means listening, understanding and acting with compassion so that every child has the support they need to face the future with confidence and care. www.facebook.com/share/v/193R...

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Chris Northwood @chrisn.xyz · 23/06/2026

Ten years since the Brexit referendum. It's caused chaos with us about to get a 7th Prime Minister in a decade, it's made everything more expensive and made our lives worse, taking away things we took for granted. We @libdems.org.uk want to fix this and build a closer relationship to Europe

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Chris Northwood @chrisn.xyz · 16/06/2026

...algorithms and incentives that intentionally or not resemble the same rush as gambling. This does not just affect children, and a ban is the wrong answer to this problem.

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Chris Northwood @chrisn.xyz · 16/06/2026

I know modern social media is not the same as it was then, but a lot of that is down to less active moderation than you had in these smaller communities as a result of centralisation by Silicon Valley tech firms combined with...

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Chris Northwood @chrisn.xyz · 16/06/2026

When I was young, I was an active user of what would now be called social media. vBulletin and phpBB boards, IRC channels, LiveJournal... When I get married in a few months time, two friends I met on IRC and still switch between thinking of them as their handles or "real" names will be my bridesmen.

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Lib Dem Peers @libdempeers.bsky.social · 07/06/2026

A government pledge to end IVF discrimination against lesbian couples has reached just four of England's 42 health boards. This Pride Month, @carolinepidgeon.bsky.social, Lib Dem Health and Social Care spokesperson, says equality can't stop at the fertility clinic door.

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Reposted by Chris Northwood

Chris Northwood @chrisn.xyz · 05/06/2026

Last week I was on a podcast which was a little bit out of my comfort zone, talking to a church about my experience of being trans. It was a really interesting conversation, uncomfortable at times but one to try and help people understand, especially people who don't hear from trans people often

youtube.com

Church on Wheels: Being transgender, an honest conversation

YouTube video by Church on the Street Ministries

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Chris Northwood @chrisn.xyz · 05/06/2026

youtube.com

Church on Wheels: Being transgender, an honest conversation

YouTube video by Church on the Street Ministries

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It might also be the behaviours in the culture you want to build aren't effective at producing the outcomes you want so you need to review if the behaviours in your culture are working. #LDX3

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A culture needs intention and the environment needs to make adhering to those principles easy by removing barriers to do so and putting guardrails to stop going onto well worn but negative paths. #LDX3

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The next talk #LDX3 is how to stop engineering principles/culture failing under pressure. If you set up a culture, define it, get buy in, but the environment doesn't support it, then the culture will fail and bend according to what the environment demands of it.

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It was mentioned in the talk that emotional distance is basically a self defence mechanism

To get effective results you do need to invest in tooling and integrating agents into your development experience. AI adoption needs to happen in a very deliberate way, you can't just throw tools at it. #LDX3

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Also it's important to have a lot of documentation and comments in the code which will give the agent the context to get best results. This is because there's a lot of tacit knowledge and shared team culture. It's probably a good idea for maintenance anyway, and AI can help actually create this.

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Interestingly they've identified three types of AI tool usage some are more productive than others, if you want to spread AI one of these is more effective than others to encourage peers. Worth watching the whole talk for detail. #LDX3

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As a personal comment, honestly I don't think I've ever worked anywhere that wasn't basically in austerity mode (public sector, early stage startup and now charity) and actually had this kind of budget to spend on this kind of tooling speculatively. #LDX3

AI adoption first had a lot of resistance until leadership pushed (including a token usage leaderboard) and first used, then enthusiastically embraced when people saw their peers using it effectively. #LDX3

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suggests about 35% increase by this metric, but looking at detail shows about half don't really increase but others do more. 16% of staff salary spent on AI tools so suggests positive ROI (interesting to see if this changes with pricing changes). #LDX3

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Okay now another #LDX3 talk, this one on sustainable use of AI. Starts by asking the important question, is AI actually effective? It uses PRs per dev per week as the measure for this (measuring productivity is hard)...

There are things individually we can do though to resist things speeding up by forcing ourselves to slow down (eg, physically have a slow walk). Important to overcome burnout as the people most likely to experience it are those who care deeply, but the best systems/orgs embed those who care deeply.

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This requires us to optimise for sustainability not speed, which is often in relation with what orgs want.

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To systematically solve burnout we first need to understand the demands and the resources available. Providing better/more effective resources can be part of it, but reducing the demands itself is also something often overlooked.

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AI often makes work faster, not easier but increases cognitive load to use, and using it increases expectations. This can contribute to burnout.

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Demands and resources are in a cycle and need to balance, but can be complex as some resources actually increase demand as they take effort to use even if it helps (in practice AI fits into this category).

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Another dimension is feeling like you're not being effective, and there's a gap between how you identify and what you do. Using AI can contribute to the last one. Burnout isn't an individual resilience issue, but a symptom of a broken system.

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Now a framework for avoiding burnout. Burnout isn't just about stress, stress isn't completely avoidable, it's about how it's managed. Burnout comes when you can't recharge enough (demands outstrip resources to deal with them) and feel emotionally distant from things you used to care about #LDX3

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Not in a talk now but I think one of the things that @leaddev.com team have really nailed is scheduling, the talks are all the right length to be really well paced and there is enough breathing room around each one to actually absorb it #LDX3

Juniors using AI isn't slowing down seniors by having them deal with slop (a risk) or doing more reviews. It is important to encode your engineering standards into your AI tools to match your internal standards. #LDX3

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