iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 4h

If a human came up with this, then maybe we should give this AI thing a try instead.

Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 8h

That's a good point about those movie soundtracks. I don't want to get into a fight about what constitutes a musical. But there used a be a pipeline of Musical number>Standard>chart hit (often not by the originator) that just doesn't exist any more.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 8h

When was the last time a musical original cast recording had such a big cultural impact? Grease? Cats? War of the Worlds? (I don't mean big-selling movie soundtracks, as those tend to be pop songs packaged or written for the movie. I mean a musical cast recording).

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 8h

Coming back to your original point, it's incredible now just how popular the Sound of Music soundtrack was. 70 (non-consecutive) weeks at number 1, starting in 1965 and last hitting the top in November 1968.) We talk now about Beatles and Stones LPs, but people then were buying Julie Andrews.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

When my kids were little, every time I lifted one onto my shoulders I’d say “I had a parrot but it bit me.”

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

And the journey of the bucket, from iron ore to the steel mill and the hardware store.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Sure, it starts off sounding exciting and new and a great deal for the workers, and everyone is cheering the charismatic leader, but it ends up with student nights at the Hacienda and the Happy Mondays recording in Barbados.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Manchester? (Because this is BlueSky, I'm now obliged to make clear that I understand the point Notebooks was making. Sigh.)

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Too many in politics have taken the Reagan (via The West Wing) quote "If you're explaining, you're losing" to mean that they should just act without saying why. Maybe we don't need Burnham doing a fireside chat, but we would gain if the public understand "the facts are X, so we choose to do Y."

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

It's classic insider lingua franca. And since every film trade outlet aspires to be as influential as Variety, and every trade journalist wants to work there... (It works for Variety because they use it consistently and have since the silent era, so fair do. It doesn't work for others.)

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Blame Variety, the trade mag. They came up with a lot of this movie journalism slang and use it relentlessly. I used to write for a licensed Variety spin-off and we had a poster listing all of the approved slang and how to use it properly. It helps you be brief and sound knowledgeable.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

With hindsight, "and we shall twat them" is more in keeping with the original. Oh well.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

Philip the Bastard: "Come the three corners of the world in arms, And we shall fuck them."

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

From this day to the ending of the world, But we in it shall be remember’d; We few, we happy few, we fucking band of brothers;

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

One of the great things about going to gigs aimed at my age group is that there's a space outside the auditorium set aside for people with stiff knees to go and wait for the ibuprofen to kick in.

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Reposted by Andor the Relentless

Michael Andersen @andersem.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

I have a confession to make. The townhomes I & others spent most of a decade trying to legalize are popping up all over Oregon & elsewhere...and I love that...but they're a problem in one big way. (get ready for a twisty thread about the housing report @sightline.org just published)

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Oooh, the BlueSky bat signal just appeared

A BlueSky thread count saying first of forty two posts.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

I can't even remember ever having a dream that featured a landline when that was all we had.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

The public are angry that things don't improve, MPs annoyed that the issue isn't fixed, and we are grumpy that the member of the body that votes to set our funding is now asking why we haven't fixed it. The endless dance goes on...

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

This comes back to the original question. Backbench MPs in practice have little influence over departmental spending. But we see them voting for the Budget, and waving their papers during the Autumn Statement, so who else do we blame for us not having enough resources to do our job?

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

We want to help the public - it's why we do this. But it is very frustrating when the people we perceive as the ones holding the purse strings ask "why haven't you done this?" when the answer is always "because then we'd need more money that you have voted for us."

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Responses, yes. The action the member of the public wants? Less so. I work for one of the organisations you listed, and we are flooded with MP enquiries on behalf of constituents. In reality, it makes little difference, and our honest answer would be "vote us more money if you want more done."

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

I will not stand for this Stevenage erasure maps.app.goo.gl/ppKUPgndaHrQ...

maps.app.goo.gl

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Not as many who were stumped by "Turkish Delight."

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

I feel this deeply underestimates the nerdistry of the average amateur photographer. You just don't get the same level of creative control dropping them off at Boots, and it's so much cheaper. Now, early adopters of home video cameras, on the other hand...

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

There's a separate, sort-of-interesting question about why, decades after the rise of alternative comedy and political correctness, any comics still thought any sort of blackface was a good idea, even ironically, but they were far from the only ones. Just pretending it didn't happen doesn't help.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

Come back in six months to see the muddy desire path to the right... We need to call these what they are: anti-wheelchair gates. Back news for anyone with a pram or buggy too. Imagine bragging that you'd installed these.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

Yep - that really nails it. What's Latin for "don't mess with success" because we need to have that stencilled above the entrance to certain buildings in Whitehall.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

And once more, for the struggling students in Westminster: Maths, English, Science, IT, art & design *are* vocational skills tailored to the local economy. Have you seen the safety training we want electricians and gas fitters to take? The skills you need to be a local trader? To run a farm?

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

Last week: England up in reading, maths and science rankings www.bbc.co.uk/news/article... This week: we need a revolution in schools. [Bangs head on desk]

bbc.co.uk

England up in reading, maths and science rankings as Scotland and Wales dip

The latest Pisa report also warned of a global decline in teenagers' reading skills.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

Wodehouse now is a sort of aspirational satire - we'd love to live the sort of life that he is satirising (or at least have that sort of easy wealth).

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

I missed this yesterday, but it's always a good time to point out that Me and Magdalena is one of the best tracks released this century www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbPf...

youtube.com

The Monkees - Me & Magdalena (Official Video)

YouTube video by The Monkees

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

It isn't that unfair an article. We've been ground down to the point where it's a miracle anybody turns up, let alone creates an atmosphere. We don't ask for much, but it's still less than we're getting.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 06/09/2026

iPad as a spin on iPod, when hardly anyone has an iPod anymore?

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Looking forward to this so so so much.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

Oh, surely it can't be that complex: let's check the chords online.... oh.

Lots of guitar chords. Possibly all of them.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

And don't get me started on the Harrowing of the North. No, not that Harrow.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

This basically is what Eurosport was back in the day - anything they could get cheap, 24 hours a day. I'd watch it just to see what was on. Loads of interesting sports and smaller leagues. It worked for them for a long time.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

One more: I was in a hotel bar in Aviemore called the Woodcutter Tavern - which looked exactly as it sounds - when MTV played Wear Your Love Like Heaven by Definition of Sound. It was the most witty, joyous and danceable thing I'd heard and I clung to the memory for months until I found a copy.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

This bigger question is: how much more successful would Dickens have been if all of his books had been based on existing IP? It's sad he wasted his life coming up with original ideas.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

Another: I was in the office when a colleague ran in, said "I've just heard this incredible song by a band named Slurp!" and ran off to HMV on Oxford Street. Half an hour later they returned with the cassette single of Babies, and that's how I first heard Pulp.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

I could do hundreds of these but: in the glory days of MP3 blogs, I'd download about 20 new songs each Saturday in a bid to deny I was in my 30s. One week my haul included Bottle Rocket by The Go Team! and I played it so many times in a row my wife had to come and check on me.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

Whereas I can't remember how I found out. I think my flatmate told me. I certainly knew before I turned the TV on.

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

My sister had got a TV the day before and went to tune it, first thing, sound off. Finds BBC1, sees it's the news, keeps going. Finds BBC2, also the news - odd - looks for ITV, finds the news, same picture of Di. Hmm. Keeps looking for C4: also news about Diana. Finally turns the sound up...

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Andor the Relentless @outstack.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

Once a month, take time to clean out the reverberator for maximum efficiency. (This joke may be misunderstood by The Europeans - watch and ward.)

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