iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

Another eclipse, another pinhole camera:

A woman sits cross-legged looking into a home-made pinhole camera made from a cardboard box decorated in colourful wrapping paper

Inside the pinhole camera, the eclipsed sun appears as a tiny crescent of light against a shadowed background

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Dr Hannah J. Elizabeth @sexhistorian.bsky.social · 06/08/2026

The cool thing about this PhD (beyond the funding) is you'll get to design your own project but also be part of a small team. It's associated with my project on the history of activism around AIDS denial wellcome.org/research-fun... & in September 2027 a postdoc will also join the project! #HistMed

wellcome.org

A Transnational History of HIV/AIDS Denial: Origins, manifestations, and persistence, 1981 to the present - Grants Awarded | Wellcome

A Transnational History of HIV/AIDS Denial: Origins, manifestations, and persistence, 1981 to the present

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 06/08/2026

❗Deadline approaching❗ Reconfiguring the citizen-patient through health and care data - two-day interdisciplinary workshop in Edinburgh in December: dare.ed.ac.uk/events/2026/... #STS #CriticalDataStudies #MedAntro

Image shows multicoloured icons representing citizens and their health data (e.g. baby, adult, person with walking stick; thermometer, computer, checklist)

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Mar Hicks @histoftech.bsky.social · 22/07/2026

The Society for the History of Technology conference extended its call to late August, & this year’s conference will be all online. Details below if you’d like to submit. Also, I’m putting together a panel that has 1 or 2 more slots on it, so lmk if (1/2) www.historyoftechnology.org/annual-meeti...

historyoftechnology.org

2026 SHOT Annual Meeting (Virtual)

Visit the post for more.

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 08/07/2026

Very very late, but this was my 2025 in fiction. Highlights: Piranesi and Babel (obviously); The Gods Below; Lake of Souls. Biggest Disappointment: The Book of Dust (I have OPINIONS™️😡). Most horrifying (complimentary) (won't be re-reading): Clay's Ark.

Picture shows the covers of twelve books: Norse Myths; Bloodchild; The Book of Dust; How Long 'til Black Future Month; The CHildren of Jocasta; Mythology; Medea; Pattern Master; Clay's Ark; The God's Below; Erewhon; The Mask Falling.

Picture showing twelve book covers: The Song Rising; A Conjuring of Light; A Gathering of Shadows; The Ladies of Grace Adieu; He, She, and It; A Darker Shade of Magic; The Grace of Kings; Babel; Before the Coffee Gets Cold; The Mime Order; Piranesi

Picture showing twelve book covers: The Iliad; The Odyssey; Goddess of the River; Call of the Bone Ships; Atalanta; The Bone Ships Wake; The Buried Giant; Echo of Worlds; Broken Stars; The Raven Tower; Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell

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Shoumita Dasgupta, PhD @profdasgupta.bsky.social · 08/07/2026

“I don’t think people hoping to benefit public health by sharing their genetic data [All of Us] were really thinking that that’s the kind of company [Palantir] that would be handling their information.” -KHasson of @geneticsandsociety.bsky.social www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

motherjones.com

Palantir has a hand in NIH's most ambitious health initiative

The defense tech firm's work with public health data has largely flown under the radar.

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WIRED @wired.com · 06/07/2026

“We created this platform, the Palestine Museum Digital Archive, which is an unlootable archive,” says Amer Shomali the museum’s general director. The mission is to safeguard Palestinian history and make it available to those unable to visit Palestine.

wired.com

How Palestinians Are Building a Digital Archive That Can’t Be Erased

Distributed backups, cyber resilience, and a half-million records are preserving Palestinian history beyond any single building or border.

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

📣Call for Papers📣Workshop: Reconfiguring the citizen-patient through health and care data Join us on 3rd-4th December to think about how citizenship and patienthood are being reforged together in an era of intense datafication. Full CFP & further info: dare.ed.ac.uk/events/2026/... #STS #MedAnthro

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Michael Barany @mjb.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 02/06/2026

Since September I've been working with an international group to develop what we hope can be a response from the mathematics community to artificial intelligence in maths. The Leiden Declaration is now posted and open for signatures: leidendeclaration.ai #LeidenDeclaration

leidendeclaration.ai

Leiden Declaration on Artificial Intelligence and Mathematics

This declaration calls for action to address the challenges posed by the use of artificial intelligence within mathematics research.

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 12/05/2026

I'd like to introduce everyone to my new colleague, Trixie. She is very small and has a marshmallow instead of a brain.

Photograph shows a small calico cat, mostly white with some orange and black markings, laying down.

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Matt Houlbrook @tricksterprince.bsky.social · 05/05/2026

Our new exhibition Remembering Humberside is up-and-running @hullhistorycentre.bsky.social and @northlincsmuseum.bsky.social. If you're lucky enough to be on Humberside it's well worth a visit. For everyone else, there's a nice write-up in The Hull Story. www.thehullstory.com/allarticles/...

thehullstory.com

The rise and fall of Humberside — The Hull Story

By Martin Taylor , city archivist - based on the text of the exhibition, Remembering Humberside April 1 this year was the thirtieth anniversary of the abolition of Humberside County Council. Its l...

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 10/03/2026

Couldn't help quoting Charles West: "bear in mind that the heart may break, or the reason fail, under causes that seem to us quite insufficient; the griefs of childhood may be, in proportion to the child’s power of bearing them, as overwhelming as those which break the strong man down."

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 10/03/2026

"‘A Category for the Not-Yet-Known’: How Rheumatism Made Room for Winnicott’s Child Psychoanalysis'" is out now in Social History of Medicine: doi.org/10.1093/shm/.... First drafted as part of a PhD chapter c.8 years ago. It's never too late!

doi.org

‘A Category for the Not-Yet-Known’: How Rheumatism Made Room for Winnicott’s Child Psychoanalysis

Summary. Influential psychoanalyst and children’s doctor Donald Woods Winnicott (1896–1971) began his career in children’s hospitals and continued to work

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 05/03/2026

There's still time to submit to the our panel 'Caring for the Possible: In the Meantime of Healthcare’s Data-Driven Futures' at @easst.bsky.social 2026! (Extended CFP closes 9th March)

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Joseph Cox @josephcox.bsky.social · 02/02/2026

New: our zine about ICE surveillance is here! People who bought a custom printed copy will get in the mail soon. We're also releasing the PDF for free for anyone to download. Also releasing a version in Spanish so more people can read about the tech ICE is using. Get here: www.404media.co/icezine/

404media.co

Our Zine About ICE Surveillance Is Here

Download a PDF of our first ever zine here.

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Joseph Cox @josephcox.bsky.social · 30/01/2026

New from 404 Media: here is the user guide for ELITE, the tool Palantir made for ICE. A map shows people on a map; ICE clicks them, brings up their dossier. ICE uses to find which neighborhoods to target. We obtained it, you can now read the document for yourself: www.404media.co/here-is-the-...

404media.co

Here is the User Guide for ELITE, the Tool Palantir Made for ICE

404 Media is publishing a version of the user guide for ELITE, which lets ICE bring up dossiers on individual people and provides a “confidence score” of their address.

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 14/01/2026

What happens to the promissory utopias of data-driven healthcare “in the meantime”? Join our panel at @easst.bsky.social 2026 to discuss 'Caring for the Possible: In the Meantime of Healthcare’s Data-Driven Futures': dare.ed.ac.uk/events/2025/...

dare.ed.ac.uk

Call for Abstracts: Open Panel at EASST 2026 | Dare | Data and the Healthcare ‘Revolution’ – DARE for short – explores the intersection of data, care and learning in the era of data-driven transformat...

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Royal Historical Society @royalhistsoc.org · 07/01/2026

If you're looking for #history networks on BlueSky in 2026, our Starter Pack - recently updated - has details of 150 leading societies, organisations and groups active in the UK and Ireland bit.ly/4ptl0On #Skystorians

bit.ly

Societies & groups for historians, UK and Ireland

Join the conversation

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 26/11/2025

I'll be sharing some thoughts on chatbots, therapy, and the mental health crisis next week:

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Gil Durán @gilduran.com · 24/09/2025

2/ In 2001, Borsook said tech "libertarianism" reflected an adolescent mindset, with a craving for unchecked independence & resistance to constraint. She warned that tech libertarians wanted an anti-human world that worked more like a computer. From "Cyberselfish," a book based on her 90s writing:

from cyberselfish by paulina borsook: It's an inability to reconcile the demands of being individual with
the demands of participating in society, which coincides beautifully
with a preference for, and glorification of, being the solo comman-
der of one's computer in lieu of any other economically viable be-
havior. Computers are so much more rule-based, controllable,
fixable, and comprehensible than any human will ever be. As many
political schools of thought do, these technolibertarians make a
philosophy out of a personality defect.

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 23/09/2025

In case you were wondering, two of the thirteen projects funded by the NIH's $50m Autism Data Science Initiative (ADSI) talk about prevention in their project abstracts: dpcpsi.nih.gov/autism-data-...

dpcpsi.nih.gov

Autism Data Science Initiative Funded Research | DPCPSI

Funded Projects #allabstracttableClick on the link for the project title below to see the full award abstract.

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University and College Union (UCU) @ucu.org.uk · 12/06/2025

“Universities are in crisis and this inquiry couldn’t come soon enough.” @drjogrady.bsky.social After sustained pressure from UCU, The Education Committee has launched an inquiry into university finances. We’ll be submitting evidence. Full statement here: www.ucu.org.uk/article/1405...

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Maddy Rose @maddyirose.bsky.social · 28/05/2025

The Pathways to Work Green Paper sets out plans to cut billions from health and disability benefits. Instead of getting people into work, these cuts will push hundreds of thousands into poverty. Our new report looks at the impact of cuts to PIP, UC health & scrapping the WCA (🧵)

citizensadvice.org.uk

Pathways to Poverty: How planned cuts to disability benefits will impact the people we support

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 02/04/2025

Most of the people I worked with in my 1st postdoc just got fired. They worked to promote public understanding of genetics and genomics and to make research and its benefits more relevant and equitable. For reasons why that work is important, see: modern history. www.genomeweb.com/policy-legis...

genomeweb.com

NHGRI Fires Dozens of Employees, Puts Acting Director Vence Bonham on Administrative Leave

Employees of at least four branches of the National Human Genome Research Institute received layoff notices on Tuesday morning.

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Anna Rogers @jollyette.bsky.social · 04/03/2025

I quit my job at the NIH last month, in large part because it seemed like I could no longer honestly write about topics like health equity. so I wrote about it for Slate instead 🧪 slate.com/technology/2...

slate.com

I Just Quit My Job at the NIH. Slashing DEI Is Going to Haunt the Future of Medicine.

We’d only started to correct a major gap in understanding.

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The Ethical Data Initiative @edinitiative.bsky.social · 20/12/2024

🌍💡Join us for our first annual multi-stakeholder town hall meeting, "Shaping the Future of Data Ethics"! 📆 March 31, 2025 Keynote speakers: - RDA SecGen Hilary Hanahoe - The Harvard Data Review's Xiao-Li Meng Don't miss out! Find out more and register: ethicaldatainitiative.org/2024/12/20/e...

ethicaldatainitiative.org

Ethical Data Initiative Annual Townhall Event - The Ethical Data Initiative

Dear Colleagues, On behalf of the Ethical Data Initiative (EDI) at the TUM Think Tank and the University of Exeter, we would like to invite you to participate in our first annual multi-stakeholder tow...

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 04/03/2025

Since Married at First Sight Australia S12 premiered in the UK last night its important to note how MAFS helps us understand the important difference between data and information.

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Dr Kevin Guyan @kevinguyan.bsky.social · 21/02/2025

Edinburgh is hosting a QUEER DATA SHOWCASE! ✨ We’re inviting artists, academics, activists and anyone who works with – or is interested in – queer data to share their ideas. 📢 The Call for Presenters is live! www.ai-ethics.org/queer-data-s... #data #AI #tech #LGBTQ #queer #edinburgh

A poster for the upcoming Queer Data Showcase. The event is hosted by Mystika Glamoor and is happening at Cabaret Bar, Pleasance in Edinburgh on 5 June 2025.

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 20/02/2025

I don't get sick, I *stay* sick 💅💃

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Laura Hercher @laurahercher.bsky.social · 13/01/2025

Absolutely fantastic discussion of the case against polygenic embryo editing from @wiringthebrain.bsky.social A few related thoughts…

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 08/01/2025

2024 in fiction. An unusual year in that I read two entire books set in the present real world with no spaceships or magic. I track my reading on Bookworm, the only book app that lets you clothe a silly worm avatar: www.bookwormreads.co/home

Image showing the front covers of 16 books: Uplift; Ithaca; The Bone Shard Daughter; Creative Surgery; Chapterhouse: Dune; The Gilded Ones; Binti; Lavinia; Galatea; Ariadne; Phaedra; Wake Siren; Transition; Stone Blind; The Penelopiad; and Elektra

Image showing the front covers of 15 books: The Three Musketeers; Autonomous; Transcendent Kingdom; The Bone Ships; House of Odysseus; The Bone Shard War; The Bone Shard Emperor; The Priory of the Orange Tree; A Day of Fallen Night; The Future of Another Timeline; Translation State; Infinity Gate; The Stardust Thief; and Think Again

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 14/12/2024

I saw the 'Fantasy Diabetes Card Fighting Game' Dia Fight on Kickstarter (www.kickstarter.com/projects/rya...) and then I found out there are in fact numerous diabetes-themed games including Diabetor & The Sugar Monsters! and Battlebetes. MEDICAL ANTHROPOLOGISTS ASSEMBLE

kickstarter.com

Dia Fight

The Fantasy Diabetes Card Fighting Game.

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 13/12/2024

tfw you're writing about the history of the relationship between mental illness and rheumatic conditions whilst yourself experiencing mental illness and rheumatic conditions

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 13/12/2024

I'm back. Apologies in advance to all my new followers.

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Dr Nicola Sugden @nicolasugden.bsky.social · 18/07/2024

Logging in for the first time in a while to update my bio now that I'm in Edinburgh 😎

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