iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Colin Rowat @rowat-c.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 14/08/2026

Looking for a table to take a call at, I wondered if this sign forbade calls, laptops... Did not. Live forever Todai! #universityoftokyo

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Colin Rowat @rowat-c.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 30/07/2026

@BigJackBrass Thank you @samwho for accepting such an out of the box (literally!) PR!

Screenshot from Windows desktop version of symbol.wtf, after Unicode U+FDFD (Arabic rendering of 'bismillah') is added. The U+FDFD, uniquely, breaks its bounding box, spilling into the neighbouring glyphs.

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Colin Rowat @rowat-c.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 12/03/2026

#AGI unlocked #claude #AIeconomy #econsky

$Claude Code exchange in which the poster asks Claude for help with notation in a paper they're writing. Claude both provides advise (e.g. do not use $\varsigma$ alongside $s$ when $\sigma$ is already used) and understands bad jokes (e.g. interpreting `sigh' as $\psi$).$

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Colin Rowat @rowat-c.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 08/02/2026

In The Economic Impact of Brexit (NBER Working Paper 34459), Nicholas Bloom, Philip Bunn, Paul Mizen, Pawel Smietanka, and Gregory Thwaites estimate that by 2025, the Brexit process had reduced UK GDP per capita by 6 to 8 percent, investment by 12 to 18 […] [Original post on mastodon.social]

Time series diagram titled 'Economic Impact of Brexit'. Two series are plotted from 2016 to 2025, both starting at 0% GDP difference relative to a no-Brexit counterfactual. One, 'UK relative to other countries', falls by 8% to 2025; the other, 'UK firms with high EU exposure relative to UK firms with low exposure' falls by 6% to 2024, following a similar trend.

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Colin Rowat @rowat-c.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 29/01/2026

For some reasons, after finishing the paper, I decided to flip through the references. #sciguy #uts #universityoftorontoschools #liveforever

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Colin Rowat @rowat-c.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 24/12/2025

An unexpected gift, especially to Chieu, who left me a puzzle that summer she sat my flat. (Comments very welcome! This is a #puzzle in progress.) 1/4

[not puzzle text] a small .png file that does not seem - to the eye - to encode an image

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Colin Rowat @rowat-c.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 03/11/2025

LinkedIn notifications have a dark sense of humour. #cancer #smoking

Screenshot of a LinkedIn job alert notification for 'quantitative research'.

The first role advertised is a 'Manager Insights & Analytics' role with Philip Morris International. The second is 'Research Leads, The Australian Research Centre for Cancer Survivorship' at the University of New South Wales.

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Colin Rowat @rowat-c.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 19/06/2025

#Japan: the only country in the world where I'm told that the queue is an hour long... to access a website for #Osaka #Expo, the country's premier event this year.

Screenshot of a notice on the website for Osaka's Expo 2025: "You are now in line. The site is currently very busy. Please wait until your turn or try again later. ... Number of users in line ahead of you: 50476. Expected arrival time on the website: more than an hour JST. Your estimated wait time is: more than an hour"

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Colin Rowat @rowat-c.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 09/04/2025

Here's a plot of normalised trade deficit, (X-M)/M, versus GDP per capita. I add a linear regression line, but it's unweighted - thus, reflects small countries as much as large ones. Nevertheless, I'm surprised to see it slopes upward: I expected wealthier […] [Original post on mastodon.social]

Plot of trade deficit (goods only) as a percent, (X-M)/M, against GDP per capita in current USD. Trade data from UN Comtrade; GDP from IMF. All 2023. Upward sloping linear regression line on top.

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Colin Rowat @rowat-c.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 15/03/2025

me: Tell me something I don't know. Claude: The platypus, despite being a mammal, has no stomach.

screenshot of a LLM session with Claude. The session expands on the answer printed in the text.

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Colin Rowat @rowat-c.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 30/12/2024

I'm running my first #marathon, as a #charity runner for HOPE, the #internationaldevelopment non-profit. I am running - in my 50s - faster and stronger than I ever have in my life. I'd be grateful for your sponsorship via […] [Original post on mastodon.social]

Screenshot from a Strava page showing personal bests achieved by Colin on a 30km run on 29 December 2024.

Colin crouched down to take a selfie on his phone after his run. He looks tired, but strong. He's wearing a 2025 Osaka marathon t-shirt, black sleeves, black shorts and shoes.

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Colin Rowat @rowat-c.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 03/12/2024

NBER Digest goes hard this month: Driving Chinese workers out of the US in 1880 led to a contraction in the white workforce as well, leading to "relatively slower growth in output and labor supply was broad-based in the affected counties ... until at least […] [Original post on mastodon.social]

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Colin Rowat @rowat-c.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 20/06/2024

If you know climbers in Switzerland, we need your help to find Chieu Nguyen , who went missing Sunday: findchieu.wordpress.com #switzerland #climbing

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