iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 22/01/2026

... what their own eyes tell them seems to be highly party-dependent. www.nytimes.com/2026/01/22/u...

Stacked bar chart from The New York Times/Siena Poll (Jan. 12–17) asking: “Do you think the country is generally better off than it was a year ago, about the same, or worse off?” Overall results: 32% better off, 19% about the same, 49% worse off. By party: Democrats — 3% better, 11% same, 86% worse; Independents — 24% better, 22% same, 52% worse (with a tiny remainder not labeled); Republicans — 73% better, 16% same, 11% worse. Green indicates “better off,” gray “about the same,” and orange “worse off.”

Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 20/01/2026

Someone should get Donald to have a play with thetruesize website. (As if objective reality plays any part in that man's mind...) thetruesize.com#?borders=1~!... #greenland

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 19/01/2026

The Obamas in Selma, Alabama, March 2015. More on the Obama Whitehouse archived page. obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/blog/2015/03...

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 12/01/2026

To be fair to DHS, they're doing the same thing quite openly on the front page of their website. www.dhs.gov

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 09/01/2026

The actual front page of the actual US Homeland Security dept. www.dhs.gov

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 03/12/2025

🧪#R code-sharing experiment🧪: this plot shows sector economic output as blocks: jobs * output-per-job (West Yorkshire ITL3s). It’s made in a self-contained R file that you can run yourself, changing geographies, times etc. Online slides explain how here: danolner.github.io/RegionalEcon... 1/3

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 19/11/2025

Still very fond of this paragraph. Seven years old now, good lord. Via www.danolner.net/2018/09/hone...

Screenshot of text: "That word, ‘creativity’. In academia as elsewhere, it’s lionised, recognised as absolutely essential, featured heavily in aspirational leadership quotes. But in practice it’s treated like an eccentric purple-wearing relative, liable to drink brandy and spit in meetings. Productive society would prefer creativity was a battery, something you can transmit from people’s brains at a predictable wattage over power cables, strategically direct from a control room."

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 23/09/2025

OK, better from the Guardian.

Guardian headline: "pay no attention: global health agencies dismiss false trump claim on everyday painkillers."

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 23/09/2025

Wes Streeting actually pitching this right. Guardian/NYT fluffing it. Streeting: "There is no evidence to link the use of paracetamol by pregnant women to autism in their children. None." Guardian: "Highly contentious conclusions" (nope, false conclusions). NYT: "Unproven link." Sigh...

Wes Streeting quote: "I’ve just got to be really clear about this: there is no evidence to link the use of paracetamol by pregnant women to autism in their children. None. In fact, a major study was done back in 2024 in Sweden, involving 2.4 million children, and it did not uphold those claims. So I would just say to people watching, don’t pay any attention whatsoever to what Donald Trump says about medicine. In fact, don’t take even take my word for it, as a politician – listen to British doctors, British scientists, the NHS."

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 12/05/2025

Starmer today. I can't tell which is worse - the fact he's saying it, or the fact it reveals he's just an empty human weathervane, flapping in whatever direction reactionary winds happen to be blowing. What a year. I've gone from hope to disappointment to outright horror with this govt.

Keir Starmer quote, 12th May 2025: "In 2023, under the previous government, inward migration exploded to over a million people a year – four times the level compared with 2019. This was a political choice that was never put before the British people. In fact, quite the opposite – the previous government repeatedly promised inward migration would be brought under control. Instead, Britain became a one-nation experiment in open borders.

The damage this has done to our country is incalculable. Public services and housing access have been placed under too much pressure. Our economy has been distorted by perverse incentives to import workers rather than invest in our own skills. In sectors like engineering, for example, apprenticeships have almost halved while visas doubled.

But arguably even worse is the wound this failure has opened when it comes to trust in politics. It is a wound, as I said on my first day as prime minister, that can only be healed by actions not words. This white paper is just that."

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 14/04/2025

And here's some data for that. Via www.ft.com/content/8459...

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 26/03/2025

*Really* don't want to be defending tories here but... their austerity plan (drop deficit to begin to lower debt) *did* start doing that (args that tot wrong way to do that; should have done opposite of austerity, but...) It's COVID that stuffed that, borrowing to stop economy collapsing. Isn't it?

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 19/03/2025

#map of the day: every GB postcode location, with a bit of alpha, nicely revealing population density / where to go if you want to do any undisturbed primal screaming...

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 25/02/2025

#Map of the day: in all non-grey places, manufacturing output (GVA) grew 2015/17-2020/22 (i.e. almost everywhere). But 𝐨𝐧𝐥𝐲 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐛𝐥𝐮𝐞 zones 𝐝𝐢𝐝 𝐣𝐨𝐛𝐬 𝑎𝑙𝑠𝑜 𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐞. Yorkshire is the 𝑜𝑛𝑙𝑦 𝑙𝑎𝑟𝑔𝑒 𝑟𝑒𝑔𝑖𝑜𝑛𝑎𝑙 𝑐𝑙𝑢𝑠𝑡𝑒𝑟 where output & jobs grew together. (Red places: output grew, job numbers dropped) ...

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 18/02/2025

One of world's richest men continually punches poor people, blames the poor people for being punched. This guy's just a really shit Batman.

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 31/01/2025

What an opening sentence. (From "British Political History, Pearce + Stewart.)

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 23/01/2025

Eowyn rainfall pattern is rather beautiful, in the abstract... via @metoffice.bsky.social

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 22/01/2025

What does that wage gap look like once housing and other cost differences in London accounted for? Cf. price index differences between regions (old source but illustrates regional diffs, not inc. housing I don't think). www.ons.gov.uk/economy/infl...

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 03/12/2024

South Yorkshire's Real Yorkshire Pudding Company (~200 employees) has a marvelous pudding map, so you can check your nearest location and filter down by all types of pudding. With puddings for map markers. Niiiice. Tho may have said the word "pudding" too many times now. realyorks.co.uk/stockists/

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 26/11/2024

p.s. the UK does have some small scale demog data - Northern Irish Census data also does 100m^2. E.g. this is Belfast Catholic % (interactive map here: bit.ly/nigrid) but Dutch data service allows access to indivs/households - can trace movement over time, do so much more lovely lovely geography!

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 26/11/2024

... & here's the paper from that Rotterdam work. Image is 100m^2 grid of Dutch-equivalent-of-country-of-birth. Red lines are 'social frontiers' (sharp differences in composition of adjacent communities). Paper examines frontiers' affects on household movements. journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 26/11/2024

Welcome to @maartenvanham.bsky.social ! Urban geog prof at TU Delft. With @gwilympryce.bsky.social we got to work w AMAZING Dutch microdata to analyse movement in Rotterdam. I recently used migration metrics from that & applied to business births/deaths for SYMCA: danolner.github.io/FirmAnalysis...

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 21/11/2024

Small #R joys: the purrr::map function has a progress bar argument I hadn't seen before, can see how long a big bunch of function calls will take. Lovely! purrr.tidyverse.org/reference/ma...

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 19/11/2024

Going for cotton too - cotton's in the middle of a causal chain between ~150M year old Cretaceous geological feature that led to this fertile ring, right through to US counties leaning democratic in C21st. Incredible. Via stevedutch.net/research/ele... @wyoweeds.bsky.social

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 11/11/2024

It's quite possible same ratios of truth/bullshit always existed but the internet's been like iodine administered to make x-rays more visible: previously unconnected worldview-pockets could suddenly all see each other. I'm reminded of Douglas Adams' Belcerebons, sentenced to telepathy... 2/2

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 29/10/2024

Tues #mapping! UK local authority business births + deaths, two periods 3 yr av. "Efficiency" is between -100 (all deaths no births) & +100 (all births no deaths). 0 = they balance. Look at big tilt towards more deaths than births in the South, yoinks. ONS firm demography data harmonised from 17-22.

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 25/10/2024

Friday #mapping! UK local authority business births + deaths, two time periods. "Efficiency" is between -1 (all deaths no births) & +1 (all births no deaths). 0 = they balance. Look at that big tilt towards more deaths than births in the South, yoinks. ONS firm demography data harmonised from 17-22.

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 16/10/2024

Map of job losses / gains interesting - band in Midlands gaining, not so much a north south split. (2/2). I'll be getting interactive versions of this up at some point to play with. (Need to fix missing Northumberland data error also!)

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 16/10/2024

Doesn't look like it. Quick/dirty plot - all but one northern ITL2 lost jobs (many south gained) + northern ITL2s lost more than average GVA... (1/2)

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 16/10/2024

A plot that came out of work on SYMCA's growth plan - Arts/Entertainment/Recreation jobs v GVA across COVID appears v hard-hit. Most places lost jobs (arrows point down), most lost productivity (arrows in the lighter grey diagonal), ALL lost GVA. @markrt.bsky.social does this chime w what you know?

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 11/10/2024

Aurora north of Higgar Tor on the edge of #Sheffield around 3am. When it got going, it was huuuuge and shifting and spectacular, though subtle.

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Dan Olner @danolner.bsky.social · 10/10/2024

First post, hello!! Let's kick off with a #map shall we? All current/live/geocode-able #SouthYorkshire businesses in the FAME database, larger orange points are those with > 25 employees. 50% of employees in this data work for less than 1% of the firms (about matching other data sources).

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