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Matthew Balaam

@matthewbalaam.co.uk
297 followers 620 following 217 posts

Frontend developer. DJ by night. Brighton. www.matthewbalaam.co.uk I DJ with www.totallyradio.com/shows/special-treatment www.instagram.com/theflexdisko/ inter~mission show on 1BTN: soundcloud.com/glocknspiel/reposts

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Reposted by Matthew Balaam
Elizabeth Anne, PhD @lacksauthority.bsky.social · 13h
never the wrong time for this classic
Screenshot of a tweet by @RobbtKraft reading “scientist: "does everyone here know what Watson and Crick discovered?" 
me from back of room: "Rosalind Franklin's notes"”
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Reposted by Matthew Balaam
Spelling Mistakes Cost Lives @darrencullen.bsky.social · 14h
Had some road signs made to reflect the new average age of UK terror suspects under a Labour government
Photo of a UK red triangle road sign warning about elderly people with a supplementary sign beneath it that says "Terrorists"
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 12h
Burn the heretic 😀
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 05/10/2026
Wow I don’t look at Reddit for web dev but I just did a search for the thread there and it seems to be full of the worst people. Why bother posting to somewhere so toxic?
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Reposted by Matthew Balaam
Atrios @eschatonblog.com · 01/10/2026
Entire generation of tech nerds never realized that talking to the computer on star trek was a narrative device and it is very rare that anyone wants to so this except necessary hands free situations
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 30/09/2026
Very nice! Owned one for a bit and it certainly has a lot of character.
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Reposted by Matthew Balaam
Dan/iel Mudford @danmud.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
HERE IS A LOVELY STORY: a friend lost his wallet on his way home from work the other day. (that's not the lovely bit) 1/2
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 26/09/2026
Haha, wow, amazing.
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 24/09/2026
Finally a way to remember the name of this tag!
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Reposted by Matthew Balaam
shaunt @shaunvids.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
it is incredibly fucked up that the UK government and police consider it a much worse crime to wear a t-shirt or wave a placard with 'palestine action' on it than to block ports and attack lifeboats
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 21/09/2026
We are currently in the present, so I have high hopes we get this in the future.
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Reposted by Matthew Balaam
Jane Ori 💚 CSS Runner 👩‍💻 @janeori.propjockey.io · 19/09/2026
This is as close to a cry for help that you'd see from me. I need work. I need money for shelter and food in the meantime. I've run out.
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 16/09/2026
You monster 😆
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Reposted by Matthew Balaam
Alejandra Caraballo @esqueer.net · 12/09/2026
A trans man in the UK has been banned in the workplace restrooms after he was forced to use the women's restrooms to comply with the new EHRC guidance. The women complained because he is visibly male and so they told him he can't use any bathroom.
A screenshot of a Reddit post from the r/LegalAdviceUK subreddit by user Dijstraanon, titled "FtM transgender facing two different issues at work? England."
The post text reads:
"Brother in law is trans FtM and presents fully as a man. He's now facing an impossible situation at work with his employer telling him that due to recent legislation he must use the toilet of his birth gender. BUT several female colleagues have raised a grievance about him using their gendered toilet.
His employer has told him that he cannot use the toilet while he is at work until they sort it out and cannot give him a timeframe to do so. They do [cut off] have disabled separate toilets.
In the mean time one of his female colleagues has accused him of sexual harassment because he was used their gendered toilet. His menstrual cycle meant he needed to use the toilet.
He's been with the employer for just over 5 years but only in this location for 18 months. The location is mainly male with just a handful of females, and his workshop only has male toilets.
I do not know how to support him and as he's not in a union there is no one to turn too right now."
The post has an orange "Comments Moderated" tag, 169 upvotes, and 134 comments.
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 08/09/2026
Alpha numeric
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Reposted by Matthew Balaam
Stephen Collins @stephencollins.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Remember: it could be someone you know.
[Scene is a parody of a 1970s Public Information Film. A young girl is going home from school.] 

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[She leaves the school gates]. 

VOICEOVER:

The world today
is full of people.

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You meet lots of them every day. 

[The girl crosses the road with the help of a LOLLIPOP MAN]

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LOLLIPOP MAN says ’to camera’ [girl’s POV]:

Mind ‘ow you go, love.

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But every time you meet one,

[She gets on a bus]

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BUS DRIVER [also talking to camera]:

That’ll be 40p, please

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[She enters a sweet shop]

You must always think to yourself:

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[The kindly looking woman behind the counter hands her a bag of pick n mix]
 
KINDLY WOMAN:
There y’are, sweet’art...

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[Voiceover again]:

Could *they* be a person who leaves one-star reviews for things when they get sent the wrong item?

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[The woman picks up a smartphone to write something]

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[Cut to a view of her phone screen, it is an Amazon review page for Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro]: 
 
Never Let Me Go
by Kazuo Ishiguro
[one star]
THIS ISN’T A PRIT STICK

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[Woman looks ‘to camera’ at the girl, sinisterly]

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[Girl’s terrified face behind the ad’s final text line]:

Always have one-star-reviewers-of-things-for-not-being-other-things sense.

[Ends]
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 02/09/2026
Jokes on them I would rather be 2000 and late than 2008.
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Reposted by Matthew Balaam
ppk 🇪🇺 @quirksmode.org · 02/09/2026
Fifteen years ago I helped popularise the meta viewport width=device-width,initial-scale=1. Today I found out the second bit is no longer necessary. A retrospective. quirksmode.org/quirksblog/2...
quirksmode.org
initial-scale no longer needed
Fifteen years ago I helped popularise the meta viewport width=device-width,initial-scale=1. Today I found out the second bit is no longer necessary. A retrospective.
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Reposted by Matthew Balaam
Vale @vale.rocks · 02/09/2026
Respected friends and acquaintances, initial-scale is dead! We are freed of its tyranny. You no longer need to include it in your HTML head. It is an obsolete part of your head's meta viewport declaration. The details: vale.rocks/micros/20260... #WebDev #HTML
vale.rocks
You Don't Need Initial-Scale In Your HTML - 2 Sept 2026 13:50 UTC
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 01/09/2026
I feel like it does like making abstractions, but just the totally wrong ones and then just using them once!
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 28/08/2026
The OG and best
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 28/08/2026
Wrong version of the track though
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 21/08/2026
100% if you have ADHD like me. In fact this sounds like you are getting it done a bit early.
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Reposted by Matthew Balaam
TheBossRoss 🧶 @thebossross.bsky.social · 18/08/2026
This must be the third video of wonderful voices singing global scales I have seen, and each is mesmerising and has taught me things I didn't know. Such as: That these scales exist and how they, the bare backbone of tunes, reflect and unlock whole world regions' music. This is amazing.
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 16/08/2026
I was thinking the same thing 😁
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 16/08/2026
Come on mate
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 12/08/2026
Goose-step UK Farridge
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Smooth Dunk @smoothdunk2.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
AI Guy Asks AI To Help Him Read Difficult Books
4 panel comic

Panel 1: Orange Guy holds up book and says “I’m gonna read a book”

Panel 2: Orange Guy looks at book cover and says “hmmmmm”

Panel 3: Orange Guy types a query into his phone

Panel 4: Close up on phone screen reveals AI responding with “a chocolate factory is a factory made of chocolate”
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Reposted by Matthew Balaam
davemakes🔶 @mixolumia.com · 10/08/2026
paging through Adrian Frutiger's book Signs and Symbols (1978) and noticed he predicts these icons you now see variations of everywhere for save, load, share, external link, etc., explicitly calling out how bad they are
Box with an arrow pointing into it marked "In", box with an arrow pointing out of it marked "out", the note "Too hard to work out"
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 07/08/2026
Yeah. Ah well 🥹
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 07/08/2026
Schaffel vibes
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 07/08/2026
Oh no it’s a clash
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Reposted by Matthew Balaam
Sarah Taber @sarahtaber.bsky.social · 04/08/2026
Absolutely unbelievable how solar power has taken off worldwide during the Hormuz oil crisis. You don't have to hand it to him, but Trump may have done more to finally kick off a global civilization of effete librul solar users than anyone else in the West
Chart showing solar panel exports from China (the main solar panel maker by a long shot) growing steadily & mightily from 2018 through 2026, then spiking by almost 2x in March 2026.
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Reposted by Matthew Balaam
Smooth Dunk @smoothdunk2.bsky.social · 04/11/2025
rip 😔
2 panel comic

Panel 1: Purple Guy dressed in a black suit giving a eulogy at a funeral. We see the coffin and flowers behind him.

Purple Guy: Sometimes when a person dies, others will say “if you can’t say something nice, don’t say nothing at all”

Panel 2: Purple Guy: But that’s bullshit and this guy was a fucking cunt
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Reposted by Matthew Balaam
Netpol @netpol.org · 03/08/2026
Glastonbury will return in 2027. Rod Liddle, won't
Spectator headline on an article by the recently deceased Rod Liddle: "And now let's bomb Glastonbury"
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 02/08/2026
Ah I missed it - but my biggest issue is that I think there should be a way to define the size of individual gaps in flex or grid. At the moment you either need to nest items or do something like define extra grid rows/columns just for spacing.
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 02/08/2026
Sounds promising! First one is a banger though, does it live up to that?
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 31/07/2026
Much better than many of the Disney efforts
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 30/07/2026
Seems like “nature adores” to me
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 29/07/2026
I’m sure I read about them doing this for scraping a couple of years ago as well, I dread to think how many books have been destroyed in that period.
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 29/07/2026
I used to hope preloading would help slow loading times in the dashboard-type CRUD apps I find myself working on but getting fresh data from a backend is always the bottleneck I find because there’s too many possibilities to fetch from.
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 27/07/2026
Was the Bandulu remix of U.F.Orb on that one? Banger and a half.
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 25/07/2026
100 Geks
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 23/07/2026
static.klipy.com
Sygourney Weaver: Nuke From Orbit
Alt: Sygourney Weaver: Nuke the site from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure.
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 23/07/2026
Curl for the browser
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 23/07/2026
I still don’t know what this means in practical terms 😅. As a frontend developer mocking APIs for example will I see a benefit?
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 23/07/2026
I love the enthusiasm without understanding the ramifications - what does this change mean?
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Reposted by Matthew Balaam
Gore Vidal Sassoon @jimmyjazz1968.bsky.social · 18/07/2026
Michael McDonald FACT: he cannot sing the letter G
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Reposted by Matthew Balaam
Sleepless @paulsdmcr.bsky.social · 18/07/2026
Another extremely dodgy new record store has popped up. Second one this week
WAX // 40004 12” for £3.77 (which seems very suspect, given it’s been out of print for years and fetches high prices on the 2nd hand market)
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Matthew Balaam @matthewbalaam.co.uk · 18/07/2026
Sounds like a diligent maintainer
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