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Sam Learner

@samlearner.bsky.social
10K followers 1.5K following 362 posts

graphics/data journalist on the @financialtimes.com visual storytelling team work: www.ft.com/sam-learner projects: samlearner.com/projects signal: samlearner.79

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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
😭 I love these guys
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Kyle Walker @kylewalker.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
The classic Racial Dot Map inspired me and a whole generation of mapmakers. Today, I'm publishing a modern take on this map, built with the geospatial tools I've been developing over the past decade. Interact with the map here: walker-data.com/maps/census-...
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
just now learning that Nova Scotia is shaped like sanded-down New Zealand
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Amy Borrett @amyborrett.ft.com · 08/09/2026
Britain’s state-owned electricity system operator has awarded Palantir a £21mn contract without inviting rival bids, arguing critical processes are too reliant on its tech to run a competitive procurement process Latest for @financialtimes.com: as.ft.com/r/7fe6c0b7-2...
as.ft.com
Britain’s grid operator gave Palantir contract without inviting rival bids
Neso cited a legal exemption that removes the requirement to consider other suppliers if dependencies leave no alternative
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daniel:// stenberg:// @bagder.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 14/08/2026
AI slop isn't dead! hackerone.com/reports/3938185
hackerone.com
curl disclosed on HackerOne: Windows SSPI connection-pool probe can...
** Summary **: A fresh transfer can reuse a keep-alive connection authenticated under another Windows user because the SSPI isolation check trusts a connection ID that a health probe can set. ** ...
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
if I had $2.5mn sitting around, I would buy this place in a heartbeat. I learned so much over the years just looking at old things in here. seems pretty unlikely that the business survives the sale, but really hope it does
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Financial Times @financialtimes.com · 12/08/2026
Israel’s campaign to make southern Lebanon ‘unliveable’ ft.trib.al/O7a4C0Q
ft.trib.al
Israel’s campaign to make southern Lebanon ‘unliveable’
Israeli forces have systematically destroyed homes, roads, farmland and forests despite ceasefire with Hizbollah
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Oliver Roeder @okr.bsky.social · 08/08/2026
grab an FT Weekend this weekend, for it is full of games, and stories about games: www.ft.com/content/e90d...
ft.com
Games special: puzzles, quizzes, Plato and wizards
A special summer issue of FT Weekend Magazine — it’s playtime!
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 17/07/2026
you can blow a European person's mind by telling them that North Carolina has more people than Sweden. they really look down on the directional states
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Centre for Economic Policy Research @cepr.org · 15/07/2026
CEPR Fellows Miklós Koren & @gaborbekes.bsky.social explore their CEPR Discussion Paper "Vibe Coding Kills Open Source" for the FT Magazine. The paper was also featured on the Practical AI podcast practicalai.show/351 and in The Register earlier this year: www.theregister.com/software/202....
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 15/07/2026
so happy for Miguel man
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 13/07/2026
I've seen some people respond to this by noting recent (or inevitable future) improvements in the quality of code that AI tools can produce. this is interesting because I tried to not take much of a stance on that in the story
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daniel:// stenberg:// @bagder.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 12/07/2026
The current top story on the FT Magazine is pay-walled but features some mentions of #curl and yours truly... (the picture shows the start of it) www.ft.com/content/cec8df9e-b43b-4c…
If you are reading the digital version of
this story, you have just used a small
piece of software from a project called
cURL. If you are reading it in print, but
you have used a smartphone, laptop
or tablet today, you have used cURL.
If, somehow, you haven’t touched a
browser or app, but you’ve used a modern car,
printer, TV or gaming device, you’ve used cURL.
You and the majority of humans on Earth use it

several times every day, though only a tiny fraction of its users are aware of its existence.

While online, you are constantly requesting
packets of information from other machines. But
these requests need to follow specific protocols
over destination, routing, format, permission;
cURL administers these details. First released in
1996, it is now a piece of the invisible plumbing
of the internet, small but prevalent, part of the
many thousands of lines of code that run constantly

in the background of our digital lives. Its maintainers estimate that its component, libcurl, has

been installed more than 20 billion times. Even
its admirers are rarely conscious of it as they use

it, just as it would be impossible always to consider the pumps that make water flow when we

open a sink tap.
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rich harris @rich-harris.dev · 11/07/2026
this is a great piece, and i'm not just saying that because i'm quoted in it
“Until very recently,” Rich Harris told me, “the idea that you would effectively pay rent to a Silicon Valley company for the privilege of being able to write software would have been considered completely absurd.”
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 11/07/2026
wrote for the magazine about the open source software that underpins our digital lives, how it is being upended by AI code tools, and about maintainers as.ft.com/r/b7f62212-9...
ft.com
Who cleans up after the vibe-coding party?
Our obsession with AI code-writing tools is overwhelming the web’s unsung human caretakers
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 09/07/2026
NEW: a look at how surging power demands from data centers are helping to drive a shortage of electrical transformers ig.ft.com/transformers/
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Cordelia Jenkins @cordeliajenkins.bsky.social · 04/07/2026
The FT Mag's America at 250 edition is out today, featuring the thoughts of Stephen Breyer, Nicole Krauss, Yiyun Li @frankfukuyama.bsky.social Simon Schama, @okr.bsky.social Harlan Bozeman @jayrayner1.bsky.social @nigella.bsky.social Jancis Robinson & more www.ft.com/content/3265... @ftweekend.com
ft.com
My fellow American: who should be remembered for the next 250 years?
Artists, thinkers and leaders from the US and beyond pick the person they think deserves to be honoured: from Abraham Lincoln to Dorothy Parker
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 30/06/2026
need to learn more about how/why we spent 40 years canning things before we invented the can opener
text from a NYT article: "1810s Canned Food
Another leap for feeding a growing nation: The first American food-canning factory opens in New York City, using a technique developed in France. It allows food to be harvested in rural areas and transported by boat or rail hundreds of miles away without spoiling, and lays the foundation for the industrial food-supply chain. (Until the can opener was invented, in the 1850s, people used hammers and chisels, axes or just threw the can in the fire to melt the lead soldering.)"
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 11/06/2026
sorry, but I absolutely will not let the NY media convince me that Wemby is a villain
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 09/06/2026
DJ Khaled spending the whole game courtside on his phone is really testing my resolve on "not telling other people how to live their lives"
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Sky Marchini @sky.skymarchini.net · 04/06/2026
has any man ever been more vindicated? x.com/stuartbuck1/...
Conversation
Crémieux
@cremieuxrecueil
·
Feb 15, 2025
DOGE has a very obvious feedback mechanism for its cuts.

If DOGE makes a big, broad cut against a million programs, people get upset about a few specific, very good ones like PEPFAR, and then that program comes back because DOGE's members are, thus, informed it was good.
Crémieux
@cremieuxrecueil
·
Feb 15, 2025
I can only hope people realizing this won't damage the mechanism, because it's still useful to have professionals getting mad about some very good thing getting cut before it's brought back online as a result.

In a word, DOGE is responsive, which is unusual for the government!
Stuart Buck
@stuartbuck1
·
Feb 15, 2025
I agree, but it would be more efficient to spend one hour ahead of time talking to experts or just reading up on the history of a program for [disease, student testing, nuclear safety, etc.]

Plus, some programs don't have famous proponents with time to dig into the weeds.
Crémieux
@cremieuxrecueil
·
Feb 15, 2025
I'm highly sympathetic, but there really are thousands and thousands of programs and grants to cut, so I'm not sure the small team doing the cuts has the ability to go through them all one-by-one on their short timeline.

Maybe a system can be developed to assist with feedback.
This Post was deleted by the Post author. Learn more
Stuart Buck
@stuartbuck1
Despite some bogus grants, a lot of government is like this cartoon. I bet this "small team" would find a line item for "screwworm sterilization" and delete it, not knowing that they just devastated American farming: https://theatlantic.com/science/archiv
e/2020/05/flesh-eating-worms-disease-containment-america-panama/611026/
Image
5:03 PM · Feb 15, 2025
·
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View quotes
Sky Marchini

Stuart Buck
@stuartbuck1
·
Feb 15, 2025
I can see the DOGE tweet: "We canceled a contract for Panamanian screwworms, saving $165 million dollars!!!" [https://aphis.usda.gov/news/agency-an
nouncements/usda-approves-emergency-funding-protect-us…
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Gothamist @gothamist.com · 28/05/2026
Family, activists allege Newark immigration center guards beat and used gas on detainees gothamist.com/news/family-...
gothamist.com
Family, activists allege Newark immigration center guards beat and used gas on detainees
Gothamist saw multiple people taken out on stretchers and transported away in Ambulances.
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 21/05/2026
so interesting that I feel like I can identify vibe-coded websites at a glance now. dark mode toggle in the corner, smallcap straplines everywhere, etc. not inherently a bad thing and I'm glad it makes it easy for people to build frontends, just interesting what the models consider a "slick UI"
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FT Edit @ftedit.ft.com · 27/04/2026
A US satellite in blue tracks two Chinese satellites. Prudent monitoring — or rehearsal for combat? A high-stakes arms race is taking place in orbit; the winner will "control Earth by controlling space”. But things can go very wrong, very quickly. Today's Big Read is on #FTEdit 👉 ft.trib.al/iwgFTZe
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 20/04/2026
Gen Z is so interesting...
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Oliver Roeder @okr.bsky.social · 18/04/2026
machines making machines in morningside heights: as.ft.com/r/51413355-0...
as.ft.com
Can we make robots that eat other robots?
For one group of dogged roboticists, artificial life that can reproduce itself is the future. The fact it doesn’t yet work only adds to the excitement
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 14/04/2026
Trudeau is only ten years away from legally being a senior citizen btw
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 08/04/2026
"we have the money, power and resources, so you're gonna want to be on our side" my guy, you are making that pitch to a White Sox fan?
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 28/03/2026
it's so interesting that the phrase "de hoy en ocho" in Spanish means "this time next week" because in most of the English-speaking world (I think?) that would be considered 7 days, not 8. I wonder how that divide came about
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Irene De la Torre Arenas @inari-ta.bsky.social · 25/03/2026
NEW: Just weeks ago, the shadow fleet was on the run amid a crackdown on the illicit oil trade. But the Iran conflict has given these ghost vessels a lifeline. Our latest visual story takes a deep dive into their clandestine operations. 👉 as.ft.com/r/40748722-c...
as.ft.com
How the shadow fleet is capitalising on the chaos of war
The Iran conflict has offered the illicit oil trade a lifeline — while the easing of US sanctions widens a transatlantic rift
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 19/03/2026
if you're just in it to make money, then I think you probably don't want to be huddled around a shared "weather predictions" screen displayed on a column? feels like the part they're ignoring is that people like to watch sports at bars because the games are fun to watch
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Jack Sapoch @jacksapoch.bsky.social · 08/10/2025
NEW: Since October 2023, the IDF Spokesperson's Unit has released dozens of 3D animations illustrating alleged Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iranian sites The style is now unmistakable: satellite zoom-ins, black & white wireframes, and red-textured houses - a new visual language of war
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 13/03/2026
some interesting stuff happening lately with the truth machines as.ft.com/r/40518eb1-4...
as.ft.com
Ultra-short-term bets add ‘even more mania’ to crypto trading
[FREE TO READ] Five and 15-minute contracts have surged in popularity as cryptocurrencies have fallen from recent peaks
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Janine Gibson @janinegibson.ft.com · 13/03/2026
Almost exactly ten years ago @henrymance.ft.com had lunch with Nigel Farage www.ft.com/content/864c.... It remains legend. Quite a lot has happened over the subsequent decade so we sent him back in. as.ft.com/r/edeac2c6-0...
as.ft.com
The irrepressible Nigel Farage
[FREE TO READ] Ten years after they first had lunch together, ‘the Brexit guy’ tells Henry Mance why the country needs his help once again
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 13/03/2026
has there ever been a technology that's as widely-used/poorly-understood as the internet/web? it's wild that the vast majority of people don't even have the most basic mental model of what happens when they visit a website in their browser or open an app on a phone (obv not saying it's their fault)
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Steven Bernard @sdbernard.bsky.social · 01/03/2026
Tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz has all but stopped since yesterday. Read the @financialtimes.com Economics editor, Sam Fleming's analysis of what the impact the war in Iran will have on the global economy www.ft.com/content/31bf...
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Robin Wigglesworth @robinwigglesworth.ft.com · 26/02/2026
ICYMI, FT Alphaville now has a Substack, which doesn’t cost a thing. Yes, there are a LOT of newsletters these days. But if you appreciate stupidly detailed explorations of finance and economics, judicious shitposting and killer charts, then please sign up? ftav.substack.com
ftav.substack.com
FT Alphaville | Substack
We're the FT's finance blog. If it's dumb, delightful or just weird and involves money we're probably interested in it. Click to read FT Alphaville, a Substack publication.
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 23/02/2026
file this one away for a few months from now, lol
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 22/02/2026
wanted to share a little about a 3D printing/electronics project that I finished recently as a gift: this light-up relief map of Rhode Island and its Salt Ponds
A frame with two 3D printed relief maps of Rhode Island and the Rhode Island Salt Ponds, which are being backlit from within the frameA closeup of the backlit Rhode Island/surrounding ocean relief mapA closeup of the backlit Salt Ponds relief map
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Elizabeth Lopatto @lopatto.bsky.social · 20/02/2026
I have some suspicions about why prediction markets are striking deals with newsrooms. www.theverge.com/business/881...
theverge.com
Prediction markets want to eat the news
The fix is in.
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Chris Cook @chriscook.news · 20/02/2026
one of the world's largest smuggling networks has accidentally exposed itself because of a stupid e-mail configuration blunder, which has revealed around 50 apparently unconnected companies are all sharing back-office functions: www.ft.com/content/4310...
ft.com
Email blunder exposes $90bn Russian oil smuggling ring
Apparent network of companies using same server includes little-known group that has become country’s largest oil exporter
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Mrs. Detective Pikajew, Esq. @clapifyoulikeme.favrd.social · 19/02/2026
Mitigating factor: bro kind of sucked at insurrecting
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 19/02/2026
something that I wish people would understand is that the kinds of apps that are easiest to "vibe code" a working version of—kanbans, news aggregators, blogs—are also the kinds of tools that there are countless open source, free, forkable versions of on GitHub/elsewhere, and that's not a coincidence
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Jana Tauschinski @janatausch.bsky.social · 14/02/2026
A special FT magazine issue all about maps is out today, w great pieces by @okr.bsky.social and @theboysmithy.ft.com, plus maps by me on how glacial melt is redrawing Alpine borders, the battle to redraw America and more Read it online here (though best enjoyed in print!) www.ft.com/content/efab...
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Arin Arcady @rnrkd.bsky.social · 07/02/2026
I'm sorry the guy changing the rules on the fly is named what
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It's ME(Jaime) @exceedhergrasp1.bsky.social · 05/02/2026
as ever: archive.org/donate?origi... The Internet Archive is probably the org I've supported/urged ppl to fundraise for the most, after my own org, #MEAction. Seriously, if you won't miss $5/month, it's always a good time to support the Archive.
archive.org
Internet Archive: Digital Library of Free & Borrowable Texts, Movies, Music & Wayback Machine
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FT Edit @ftedit.ft.com · 03/02/2026
Critics fear these tactics have a “chilling effect”, discouraging people from filming. The result? “These agents get to effectively be as unaccountable as any group in the history of our country,” says David Bier, of the Cato Institute. Read the full story in today’s #FTEdit 👉 ft.trib.al/yAKlCgR
ft.trib.al
ICE agents hate being filmed
Trump administration accused of trampling First Amendment by targeting Americans recording immigration raids
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FT Edit @ftedit.ft.com · 03/02/2026
ICE agents are also invoking a federal criminal statute, 18 U.S.C. § 111, which makes it a crime to interfere with federal officers while performing their duties. Civil rights experts say the statute is being misapplied, as recording agents does not constrain their ability to carry out operations.
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FT Edit @ftedit.ft.com · 03/02/2026
Over the past few months, hundreds of Americans have been pepper sprayed, threatened and detained for attempting to film on their phones the largest crackdown on undocumented migrants in recent American history. An #FTEdit video 🧵 on why ICE agents are so camera shy 👇
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Sam Learner @samlearner.bsky.social · 02/02/2026
ICE agents hate being filmed [🎁 gift link] as.ft.com/r/4348e0f1-4...
as.ft.com
ICE agents hate being filmed
[FREE TO READ] Trump administration accused of trampling First Amendment by targeting Americans recording immigration raids
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