iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 2h

There's some excellent "hoist them by their own petard" writing in this article but

Dave’s vision for iPlayer included an AI agent called Iggy, which helps recommend and summarize iPlayer content, and can speak to audiences in different languages. Other ideas Dave presented to staff included a personalized “hero” picture at the top of iPlayer’s home screen, which picks out algorithm-led content recommendations based on past viewing habits. He also demonstrated “Vegas mode,” allowing viewers to “roll the dice” and see what iPlayer selects for them.

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 2h

Thank God for AI - how else would we ever have got account avatars, recommendations, and a "random" button?!

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

What is happening with this tiny man or homunculus

Close up of a tiny tiny man on his knees in front of "kemi" etc

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

I must have passed the mosaic in Central a thousand times and somehow I never noticed the flying train on fire before

Mosaic - viaduct, crane, stone building, background mountains, foreground flying train on fire

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Inclusion is one of Warner Bros Disney's guiding principles apparently

Champion Inclusion
Empower others, have courage, and pursue inclusion.

Amplify the voices of global storytellers to reflect audiences around the world.
Intentionally seek out diversity, remove barriers, and create space for all to share ideas and be heard.
Actively listen and lead with empathy, integrity, and transparency.

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Tim Curry tribute in Glasgow! I shall wander the city till I find the other half

Stencil graffiti of frank n furter saying "I see you shiver with antici..."

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

I need that and I really want this one too

Only connect tee, heavy metal festival style

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

I want to come back to this to say: this is not a linguistic complaint, it's just a class thing again. The idea is that respectable educated people always write in formal "correct" written English style, and if you don't it's because you're too uneducated/stupid/lazy to manage it

Jack Tindale - Minor point but I really hate this performative “y’all” people do to try and appear more folksy. I don’t type in a Yorkshire accent and I did people would rightly tell me to shut up.

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

At a book fair and cackling that they've put every book out on the stalls except this one

A stack of mostly empty plastic crates that were used to transport books. The only book left in the crates is a Robert Galbraith one

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

I did get this pic today and I like it

Photo: top left third, a grey road. Bottom right two-thirds, the shaky reflection of a red sandstone building in a large puddle being rippled by the wind

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Normal mode, my phone detects me taking a photo of the moon and thinks, "I will help out by making this look as daylighty as possible!"

Same pic as before but everything is bright and white

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Pro mode gives me a pretty picture but you can't actually see any of that colour with the naked eye

Full moon above clouds, with a coloured corona

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Striking how many of the top ten here are about terrible people being awful - I don't know if it's a cause or an effect of our current society but I'm sure it's connected

NY Times top 100 TV shows of the 21st century. Top 10 Breaking Bad, The Wire, Mad Men, Succession, Fleabag, Game of Thrones, Veep, 30 Rock, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Atlanta

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

If I was writing a Police Scotland statement about a 34% rise in racist crime, I probably wouldn't use a framing that suggests "our communities" and "migrants" are two separate groups of people

A Police Scotland report reads: “There is a sense from our community engagement that there is an increase in local tensions impacting both our communities and migrants.”

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Nobody told me there was a great secondhand bookshop down the end of Trongate!

Pile of books -

The Girl Savage by Katherine Rundell
Healing for no one but me - jennae cecelia
Disclosures rewriting the narrative about hiv - angie spotto
McDougall's E and B dictionary
The Academic Rudiments Primer
At Least This I Know - andres n ordorica

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

I thought maybe I was doing him a disservice, because he's also the guy that kept shouting at people that the Sunday Times was TOTALLY DIFFERENT to the Times, YOU IDIOT, but no, both things were him

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

I shouldn't have trusted the How The Light Gets In blurb about them, obv!

Penny is a contributing editor at the New Statesman and regular contributor to The Guardian, The Spectator, and The New York Time

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Does anyone know Dr Gerald Edwards from Glasgow cos I would REALLY like a word

What hope is there for any compromise, if even a diplomatic solution is thrown away? There should be no politics in sport, music or any of the arts. Silence really is golden.

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

I put on the Edinburgh Zoo penguin webcam and it's just this guy staring into a corner I love him

Webcam shot of a damp bit of ground with sheer rocky sides. There is one penguin in shot, standing right in a corner, facing the corner.

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

Brave of the council to install a canal in Argyle street

Argyle street Glasgow with a lane down the centre dug up, which has filled with water

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

Quite liked this photo I took coming into Glasgow the other night. The soft fuzzy effect was achieved by taking the photo through a Scotrail train window...

A view from the railway bridge west across the Clyde, with a ray of the setting sun reflected in the river and some nice altostratus and cirrus clouds

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

I know this is just racism (it's about the Greens campaigning in Urdu), but once again they've forgotten Welsh and Gaelic and Ulster Irish and Scots and BSL etc etc etc Their world is so limited

Tory shadow communities secretary Katie Lam went even further by describing Polanski’s video as “poisonous” and should be banned.

She said: “Attempting to appeal to group-based grievances by campaigning in foreign languages is poisonous.

“We must ban this practice for good. Politics in our country should be conducted in the language of public life.”

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

Unfortunate timing for this Observer article to be published 😂

Music

Richard Curtis

The Proclaimers are the soundtrack to my life

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

Had to go to iplayer for this pic because they immediately cut to a lot of wide shots for some reason 👀

Same outfit but he's opened the kilt flap to reveal a sequined rainbow flag

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

I think I'm a Nicky Spence fangirl now, this is the outfit he came on in for Rule, Britannia!

Nicky Spence in a flouncy black shirt, a kilt, and Nessie on his shoulders

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

my parents just asked me if Nicky Spence is gay 😂

Nicky Spence on stage at the Proms in a t-shirt with gold bedazzled sleeves, rainbow tartan trews, doing a wee dance with a hot guy in a short kilt and singlet

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

I was pretty sure from this headline yesterday that the story was "terfs harass a small queer exhibition for being trans-inclusive" but it would be pretty difficult to realise that from the story if you didn't already know the dogwhistles

Exclusive
City of Edinburgh Council
Edinburgh exhibit at centre of debate over language and lesbianism

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

The Proclaimers in 2013 vs the Proclaimers today

Speaking from rehearsals for the tour Charlie Reid explained: “I support equality, and equality in marriage is part of that. It’s vital that gay people be given the same rights as straight people.”

Craig Reid added: “If you believe in equality, and you know that something is unequal, then you want to do something about it. It’s not doing anybody harm, it’s not lessening rights; it’s extending rights and that’s why we support it. We’re progressive people; we think that Scotland has to move forward, and equal marriage for gay and transgender people is part of that

The Proclaimers: The trans lobby are truth-phobic
Ahead of a provocative new album, Craig and Charlie Reid on their anger at the SNP, Western warmongering and the imperilment of free speech

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

Just took this out the window of my room at my parents house - this is the golf course that was my playground since I was about 6! So many dens, so much guddling in the burn, etc

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

Hmm interesting. They use Benbecula to do missile testing stuff nearby apparently so maybe that's what's been going on today.

US Navy flight from Rejkavik to Benbecula, diverted to Prestwick

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

That UK govt plane I was talking about has been on a fun trip

Flightradar screenshot showing a plane taking off from Prestwick, going up to Shetland and doing a few loops, across the north of England, down the west of Wales, across Cornwall and backup to Prestwick

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

Somebody at the BBC is getting spicy

It seems to have been well-planned in advance, after weeks of plotting over the summer. Kent Police referred to it as a "spontaneous protest".

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

To be fair, she was also the villain in the worst ep of Tennant's first season on doctor who

A bad cgi effect of a see through Lipman with Ten behind her

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

More seriously this is the purest DARVO I've ever seen - Alleged National Treasure Maureen Lipman using a bully pulpit in the Telegraph to try and publicly humiliate a much less powerful actor who made the decision they didn't want to work with her on account of the genocide support

Maureen Lipman
I’m an alleged National Treasure. I won’t be bullied by actors over my views on Israel
Gerard McCarthy pulled out of appearing in a West End play because I joined the cast

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

"Don't you know who I am?! I am an Alleged National Treasure!!"

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

OH YOU WANTED MY OPINION OKAY THEN

Hello, since you asked for people's thoughts on the Herald's out of office campaign, I'll give mine.

Your obsession with in-office working is regressive, irrelevant to the quality of the job being done, bad for the inclusion of women, disabled people, parents and carers, and frankly weird.

None of the numbers in your most recent article mean anything, they're just there to horrify your more gullible readers, who dislike that things cost money. The civil service will have to spend more time and money dealing with your lobbying on this subject than it ever has on computer monitors. You're costing the country and the government money, and you're making ordinary workers' lives worse in the process.

I would prefer the Herald to be on the side of workers' rights than to join the Conservatives and Jackie Baillie in throwing normal people under the bus in the name of political games.

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the pickwicker man @pickwick.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

Also delighted that the journalese measure of size in Canada is "a Canadian football field"

B.C. Hydro said Monday that the forested land mass, bigger than a Canadian football field, landed ashore after drifting some 30 kilometres northwest of its last known location in the middle of Williston Reservoir.

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