iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

Yeah, Stonehenge for one. They've had 5,000 years to put a roof on it and not bothered

Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

This sums up so much that is wrong with modern Britain. It's the same in education; loads of laws/rules, from building safety standards to special educational needs, but insufficient funding or other resources to actually fulfil them. See also: Policing, courts, prisons, health, social care, etc..

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

Indeed! And of course the irony with Eltham Palace is that it's now more notable for the Art Deco wing than it is for the the Tudor great hall.

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 17/07/2026

Absolutely. It's the expectation of being caught/prosecuted that stops people committing a crime, not the relative severity of the punishment. If you know you won't be caught, the sentence isn't a consideration.

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 14/07/2026

Actually I've just checked and it turns out they were competing brands. The kids in my playground just called a Jubilee a Jubbly!

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 14/07/2026

As an aside, I am pretty certain "Jubbly" drinks started out named "Jubilee". But everyone pronounced it as 'jubbly' (in my playground, approx 1979, certainly), so the producers changed the name to match

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 08/06/2026

And you can be pretty certain that the adults saying this - on social media no less - think that it's 'other' adults who need their social media use restricted, certainly not them

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

Gimme Shelter -Rolling Stones The Asphalt World -Suede Kindling (Fickle Flame) -Elbow/John Grant Lucky -Radiohead Citizen Erased -Muse Mother of Pearl -Roxy Music Turn! Turn! Turn! - Byrds Intervention -Arcade Fire Fake Tales of San Francisco -Arctic Monkeys How Soon Is Now -The Smiths

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 14/04/2026

And no government of any colour will have the balls to confront this because to do so will reduce the equity of older members of the electorate, who are more likely to vote. In the meantime things that are still as cheap vs. incomes as they were 50 years ago (eg food/eating out) will get the blame

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 14/04/2026

Especially when most politicians and members of the public think that the cost of living issue is caused by things like food and energy costs, when actually it's caused by housing costs. Any sensible analysis will show that's what has eaten up ever-increasing shares of household income for years.

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

And of course who can forget the Mitchell and Webb sketch "Touching Cloth". Magical

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

Just googled it and there's also a prototyping firm in Cambridgeshire with the same name. Glorious

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

A little off topic but the best company name I ever saw was a south London building firm called "Complete Fabrication". Until this day I am not convinced the firm themselves even realised there was a second meaning

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 24/03/2026

Absolutely. And as for everyone these days saying "The proof will be in the pudding" instead of "The proof of the pudding will be in the eating". It doesn't even make any sense

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 22/03/2026

You've gotta feel for Iraq, with both a red dot and a blue dot. It takes something to be attacked by both sides in a war

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 03/03/2026

Generally I can't stand them, particularly the self-checkout experience where you have to say "no" to at least 5 "offers" before you're allowed to pay. But I will say the WH Smith (now branded TG Jones) in Bromley is the best greetings card shop in the area, by a margin. I would miss that.

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 01/03/2026

It's the pejorative tone that gets me: "stuck behind" rather than "driving patiently and appropriately behind", as if the cyclist has no right to be where they are. From someone teaching the law of the road, no less

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 07/02/2026

I reckon just turn the lights on and then you'll know for sure

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 30/01/2026

The Man with the Golden Sausage

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 13/01/2026

Not exactly the same thing but I get very irritated by so many people on radio and TV these days saying "the proof will be in the pudding". No! It doesn't even make sense. It's "the proof of the pudding will be in the eating", you ignoramus. And no-one picks them up on it! Grrrr

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 13/01/2026

(I do appreciate that many people no longer consider Labour to be a progressive party! But I suspect the vast majority of their supporters fit the definition)

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 13/01/2026

What I find most encouraging about these very recent polls is that the sum of the progressive parties is once again higher than the sum of the right wing parties. This was the case almost throughout the 14 years of Tory rule, but (ironically) stopped almost the very moment Labour won the election

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 12/01/2026

Indeed. An while we're at it, why is it a photograph of a crumpled piece of paper? Did they find it on a train and not bother checking it's veracity?!

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 12/01/2026

I suspect that the case, although I'd call it an error or shortcoming. But how appalling that neither the LOTO nor anyone in her press team has noticed that the second largest city in the country isn't on the map and realised it's not complete. Shocking ignorance, complacency (or both).

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 12/01/2026

It also appears that there's no crime in Manchester at all. I'm sure Kemi will go on to extend her congratulations to Andy Burnham

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 18/12/2025

Yeah, but that's because they arrested all the terrorists, stupid

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 22/11/2025

There's a sign in the village of Chaldon, Surrey, that says "Save the Field, Save Chaldon". It has been erected by the people of Chaldon in front of the last remaining small field on the main road of dwellings built - on what were previously fields - between the 1920's and 1990's. Oh the irony.

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 22/11/2025

It's a pattern repeated everywhere. Every NIMBY is living in a property erected in what was, once upon a time, someone else's 'back yard'. It is so easy to see the current state of play as how it has always been, and always should be.

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 22/11/2025

Trying to solve the problem by raising incomes at a rate higher than other expenses is tinkering at the margins, at best. Not least because raising incomes will by definition raise prices, given they are a major element of manufacturer/supply chain/retailer etc costs. It's broadly a zero sum game

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 22/11/2025

But it's housing costs that suck up most of people's income (and a far, far higher proportion than a generation or two ago), and they are also something that can be reduced far more significantly than most other costs, if a government has the will, and the correct land/property policy & taxation mix

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 20/11/2025

No I wouldn't. Putting to one side for one moment the ethical and technical issues of bringing back an extinct species, if the species you're bringing back is at risk of being made extinct again by domestic cats alone, you're doing something wrong; wrong place or wrong species.

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 19/11/2025

It is the massive elephant in the room and no-one wants to talk about it because of all the vested interests. But rent/mortgage at 20-30%of take home income rather than 50-60% is where we have to get back to if we want everything else - food, tax,energy, pensions, social life - to feel affordable.

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 19/11/2025

Until this country gets the cost of residential property back down to genuinely affordable levels, whether that be through massive housebuilding, tax on empty/second/overseas owned properties, social housing creation or whatever, we will not turn it around. Everything else is tinkering at the edges.

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 17/11/2025

How can we be confident, especially given the sycophants heading the DOJ and FBI, that the 'files' are still a) complete and b) whatever the answer to (a), will be released in full?

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 14/11/2025

A clear path ahead, with no barriers in your way? Nice

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 10/11/2025

Yes I agree. In an ideal world you wouldn't have stamp duty in the first place. And I agree with property (or land value) taxes but there would have to be a very phased (or offset as you suggest) introduction, it's a pretty blunt instrument otherwise

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 10/11/2025

And stamp duty cuts help no-one other than sellers of property. If someone buying today for £500k suddenly doesn't have to pay £15k stamp duty they can now afford £515k. So the entire market rises commensurately. Nothing becomes more affordable and the government income just passes to the seller.

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 10/11/2025

100% this. In most cases it's housing costs that leaves people finding the prices of food, utilities, fuel etc are unaffordable. It takes up such a huge share of people's outgoings now that a relatively small drop would unlock significant cash for other spending, including tax rises.

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 03/11/2025

It's a long term process, I accept, the reductions in cost will feed through slowly, but until house prices reduce significantly we will continue to have this issue of everything else seeming unaffordable.

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 03/11/2025

100%. If house prices dropped by, say, 40% and we saw a commensurate reduction in rent/mortgage costs there would be plenty of money left for both improved personal standards of living and increased personal taxation for better public services. And indeed for improved pension saving as well.

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 19/07/2025

There'd be a pretty strong correlation, I'd guess, stratified by societies with certain religious or social commonalities which have driven a long term tradition of larger or smaller family size.

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 19/07/2025

It's very easy to simplify it as "just an individualistic choice", but all of our choices are made in our unique complex contexts. I'd be very interested to see a plot of national birth rates versus the inverse of a property affordability metric.

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 17/07/2025

And all that money going on rent or mortgage or payments is far less productive than if it were being spent in the wider economy instead. Where & how does it end? What happens when everyone is maxxed out? ( I think I know the answer to that question, but it's rather depressing).

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 17/07/2025

Yet the media only ever portray house price increases as a good thing, and governments of all colours continue to implement policies "to make it easier to get on the housing ladder" which only have the net effect of pushing prices up further, simply making the problem worse.

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 17/07/2025

Minimum wage increases (objectively a good thing) push up the costs of these services. The cost of living (esp. housing) means people delay having (or decide not to have) children, further unbalancing the demographic profile. A shortage of young workers pushes up wages and prices. Rinse and repeat.

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Mike Fall @mikefall.bsky.social · 17/07/2025

Whenever I read a thread like this it always makes me think about how our economy is a giant Ponzi scheme driven by housing costs. The high costs of housing mean that families have to employ childcare and social care for young and elderly family members because both adults are working full time.

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