iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Didn’t even mention the referee payments affair! Ha!

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Charlotte Lydia Riley @lottelydia.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Members of fraternities are three times more likely to be rapists than male college students who aren’t members of fraternities

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John Muller @johnspacemuller.com · 29/09/2026

How can we get Nathan Fielder into a rental home with Man City execs for the next 34 days

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flyingrodent @flyingrodent.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Thanks Lewis. At least ten years too late like, but better late than never.

Lewis Goodall • @lewis_goodall • 1h I do wonder if politicians on the right understand just how flat the "he's taking us back to the 70s" sounds.
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Much of the electorate has no memory at all of the politics of that era. They do have sharp memories of what we have had recently. And many conclude anything might be better.

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

It’s an interesting question, where City’s malfeasance ranks. I’d put it above both — especially the Sox, which, while massive in baseball and the US consciousness, is ultimately a fairly niche concern, whereas City have fundamentally undermined the biggest league in the world’s number one sport.

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The Empty City @davidallengreen.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Have now slowly re-read the ruling, and it is even more damning than at first reading. The ruling pretty much sets out Manchester City was fraudulent on a systemic long-term basis. Not just mere non-compliance, but ‘concealments’ and ‘disguises’. Also some MCFC witnesses were ‘dishonest’.

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

* Doping ban as a player * Close association with the doctor at the heart of the Spanish multi-sport blood-doping scandal while managing Barcelona * Managing City through a period of unprecedented sporting financial fraud Guardiola sure is “unlucky” in who he hitches his wagon to, isn’t he…?

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

They *should* be furious. But it would be be easier to feel sorry for them facing down the potential dissolution of their club, if sanctions go way they should, if they had in numbers looked out of the window and described the very obvious rain we all saw, rather than telling us it was sunny.

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

In a member-governed organisation, individual members acting in the utmost good faith towards each other is fundamental; it’s a key tenet of the Premier League’s founding charter. The scale of City’s disregard for that principle means surely any sanction short of expulsion is insufficient.

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flyingrodent @flyingrodent.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Yeah, some good stuff here and some frankly dubious bits. I’d wait and see what happens, because if you generally assume you are being cynically bullshat in Britain, then you are seldom pleasantly surprised.

lan Dunt o
@iandunt.bsky.social • 30m
Burnham speech: An astonishing moment of radicalism and commitment
iandunt.substack.com/p/burnham-sp...
Burnham speech: An astonishing moment of radicalism and commitment
It's easy to be cynical, but it would be false.
Something extraordinary is happening here.
• iandunt.substack.com
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lan DuntO @iandunt.bsky.social • 28m
No ifs and no buts, no caveats or provisos.
Things are happening here which we haven't ever really seen before. Burnham is saying the things that are considered unsayable and doing the things which are considered undoable.

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

An idle thought I had while catching up on @jamesomalley.co.uk’s most recent Odds and Ends email just now — Andy Burnham’s ability to show up on podcasts or No 10 social clips talking with authentic passion about stuff he cares about (music, football) *is* great…

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Gregk Foley @gregk.co.uk · 09/09/2026

I'm of the view that if stuff like this weren't a big deal, then the Israelis wouldn't be throwing an apoplectic fit about it, but it is funny that the substance of Andy Burnham's Guardian oped is effectively, "My government is taking bold steps: Recognising international law and following it."

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Phil McDuff @mcduff.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

The way Miliband and Polanski are treated should put to bed any idea that this is about the secret controlling power of Jews. Jewishness is sacrosanct to the British establishment only inasmuch it can be instrumentalised to their ends, and not a single millimetre further than that.

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

Discovered from @cricinfo.com that Josh Blake is out of contract at Surrey at the end of the season. Would fully understand if he wanted to go somewhere he’d get more of a consistent run in Championship cricket as well as the white ball stuff, but his career so far is a great story, stay or go.

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Blake has quietly compiled a nice little List A career out of pitching up in the middle of every summer to post good Blast numbers for a Hundred-ravaged side, has looked capable in the scraps of first-class cricket he’s had, and now has a vital, perhaps season-saving, defining red ball performance.

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David Stafford @djstaffs1.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

Liverpool are a work in progress and it's going to take a lot of hard work and signings yes signings to get us looking like a functional side. It was rubbish today in all honesty. Iraola has a big job on his hands. Some of these guys are coasting, some not good enough. I wish him all the best #lfc

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

Where was Szoboszlai while Gravenberch made that run into the box and lost the ball with a poor pass to spark an easy counterattack? Chalk a big one up early for “this double pivot doesn’t work”.

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

Convinced since his first first-team appearances that Danns has got *it*. Proper striker’s instincts, finishing skills, great link-up, strength on the ball and in duels, and seemingly more pace in this latest return than I remember from before. Still only 20. Hope he gets a good loan and soars.

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

Some calling this i/v groundwork for a return. Don’t see it for sporting reasons — miles on the clock, injuries, attitude — but also can’t see him being accepted when he seemingly *still* doesn’t understand, or won’t say, that it wasn’t just *that* he left, but *how*, that turned people against him

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

THE REHEARSAL is astonishing, and has got me thinking a lot about the very good novel REMAINDER by Tom McCarthy, and wondering whether I should explore the rest of his work. Am I followed by any Tom McCarthy heads on here?

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

The obvious answer was, of course, to start watching THE REHEARSAL and bring another awkward nerdy genius into my life

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Okay so now I’ve watched all the HOW TO WITH JOHN WILSON that there is to watch, and frankly what am I supposed to do now? Watch it again, I guess?

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Honestly, fucking save me from the doom-mongers

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

The state of discourse around LFC’s transfer business this summer, I’m increasingly of the view that there should be a complete blackout on media coverage or club communication of signings until the evening before the first match of the season, with the transfer window closing at embargo lift time.

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Lee Hurley @hleehurley.com · 17/08/2026

Saying the press were feeding public demand is such a naïve take to have in public

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Hardeep Matharu @hardeepmatharu.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

What is in the media's *own* interests versus the public interest is often a vastly different story. The defensive position of the majority of the established press – that the press isn't free if it can't do anything it likes without consequences – is defensive for a reason. Power protecting itself.

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James Ball @jamesrball.com · 16/08/2026

A former director of BBC News speaks:

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Sam Freedman @samfr.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

Yes and if you push them they're often quite open they want a kafala system with no route to citizenship. Which is why they're all so obsessed with the "Boriswave".

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

Literally every time I get on/off the Tube at Battersea Power Station, I think about the fact that these two concourse-level commercial units have been empty since the day the station opened, despite the surface-level one’s long since having been filled. So much more “most sought-after”!

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

Embarrassingly late to this, but HOW TO WITH JOHN WILSON is absolutely phenomenal gear. Somewhere between Weird Weekends and Bobby Fingers. Seamlessly both very silly and oddly meditative and profound. The risotto episode takes a turn that really moved me. Art.

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

The back of my and @stephaniefaye.bsky.social’s heads feature in a Joel Golby Instagram story from the Jack Rooke show (about his dead dad), and she reminds me of the *total coincidence* that I read Joel’s book (feat. the most moving essay about losing both his parents), then both my parents died.

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Musa Okwonga @okwonga.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

From this review- “Think of all the diligent, decent black academics who have been lumbered with the embarrassment of having Arday as a figurehead” - no, think of *why* black academics are held collectively responsible in ways that white academics are not

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Mic Wright @brokenbottleboy.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

I saw a post from Lewis Goodall saying the British media has questions to answer about the disproportionate coverage of Jason Arday — the hounding — but he could be more specific. LBC, where he has his own show, and whose owner, Global, publishes The News Agents, dedicated hours to the story.

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

I think this brand of response misses just as it purports the “bubble” reactions do. Calling “witch hunt” doesn’t mean you don’t think he did wrong and was worth reporting on. The problem is the excess, sustained post-accountability coverage, and lack of focal shift to institutions over one man.

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Stephen Bush @stephenkb.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

Indeed. O’Reilly is not a sociologist but we do have a near perfect control group and the answer to “what if he weren’t black?” is visibly “would get reported by the student paper and the FT”.

varsity.co.uk

Copycat don caught again

William O'Reilly claims the allegations form part of a homophobic bullying campaign

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Stephen Bush @stephenkb.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

The problem can be summed up with one question: how many people who can name Jason Arday can name the plagiarising professor at the same institution who is still in post? How many people can name the VC criticised by name in an employment tribunal this week?

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Stephen Bush @stephenkb.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

I think functionally all of the post-resignation coverage that was about him rather than Cambridge was excessive (e.g. this poisonous review of a book nobody is going to buy - why)

thetimes.com

Jason Arday’s memoir is mawkish, self-aggrandising and hard to believe

The embattled former Cambridge professor’s autobiography, Great and Unfortunate Things, feels precision-tooled to flatter the biases of the sappiest white liberals

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AJ McTERROR @robertgalbraith.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

Can't help but note that the same British press that hounded Arday is forever trying to rehabilitate the reputation of Johann Hari

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HK @hkesvani.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

I think it’s just worth remembering that as the media handwring to justify publicly humiliating and hounding a man to death, just two weeks ago they gave glowing eulogies to another man with a history of domestic violence and brushed off his own statements about having pedophillic impulses

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

See the Telegraph is pushing a new four-part podcast series diving into the life, career, and worldview of Geoffrey Boycott. Wonder if/how it will touch on his domestic violence conviction — upheld after appeal — around which he has never shown the faintest hint of contrition nor self-reflection?

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

Got to see @jackrooke.bsky.social revive & reflect on his excellent GOOD GRIEF tonight; as a bonus, got to remind my seat-neighbour Siobhan McSweeney that the name she’d forgotten of the Only Fools & Horses star who definitely has a super-injunction (allegedly) is David Jason. “Oh, dirty fecker!”

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

There was good journalism done alongside more ethically/motivationally dubious reporting, but beyond a certain point — this point, maybe earlier — there was no gain from staying on Arday himself. Where was the investigative piece dragging Cambridge leadership similarly over the coals, for example?

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Sean Hecht @seanbhecht.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

Ugh. And check out the kicker—of course, the AI agent isn’t working from the actual text of the book. Its training data surely is dominated by online reviews and summaries—including, apparently, of film adaptations.

Text from link in OP:
Reality check: Al is working from its training data, not the actual text. The vibes can be right while the details are wrong.
• After I read James Jones' "The Thin Red Line," AI confused Captain Stein with Captain Staros, the corresponding character in the movie adaptation.
Pro tip: If the book is old enough to be in the public domain, tell AI to find the online text so it can be more accurate with its answers. "The Last of the Mohicans," for example, is available through Project Gutenberg.

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Brandon Friedman @brandonfriedman.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

Axios writer: I melted my brain with AI. Not only can I no longer read, but I don't even understand the purpose of reading anymore. Here's how you can also do this. www.axios.com/2026/08/11/r...

Axios: AI has become my reading buddy as I've plowed through my summer book list, helping me keep track of plots and characters, unpack themes, and make sense of wordy, old prose.

Why it matters: The way many of us actually read books — a few pages before bed, a chapter at the beach, another on a plane — makes it easy to lose the thread. AI can help you pick it back up without starting over.
📖 I really got into using AI while reading James Fenimore Cooper's "The Last of the Mohicans." The text was far too dense for casual vacation reading. My first prompt asked:

"I'd like a guide as I read The Last of the Mohicans who can help me understand what I've read and where the story is, without giving spoilers or getting ahead of my progress. Can you do this, chapter by chapter?"
The robot agreed: "Cooper's sentences are long and his diction is archaic."

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Iain Alexander @iaingalexander.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

So you decided to piously lecture about not speaking ill of the dead without knowing anything about what they were speaking ill of him *for*? Just assumed they must be wrong or unreasonable?

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AndOrNorLyn @norlyn.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

It's this kind of ever-so-polite "respectfulness" and "civility" which is used to inform the disabled, minorities, women, & everyone who has been harmed by people who actively work to make the world more hostile and dangerous to them, that their lives aren't as important as "but I liked the guy."

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