iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Jay Swan

Ian Swan @ianswan.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

I wrote a short article about two of yesterday's WNBA playoff games, Minnesota Lynx vs. New York Liberty and Indiana Fever vs. Las Vegas Aces: iancswan.substack.com/p/mini-artic...

iancswan.substack.com

Mini Article: A Tale of Two Blowouts

Thoughts on WNBA Playoffs Game 1 of Fever vs. Aces and Lynx vs. Liberty

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

Having a rest day because my legs are thrashed, and finding my attention hopelessly split between wanting to read about H.D., Francoist Spain, Turkmenistan, and early 20th century martial arts. There has to be a novel in there somewhere.

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

My son started a Substack combining computer science and basketball and is currently working on WNBA shot visualizations. @katestarbird.bsky.social this might interest you. substack.com/home/post/p-...

substack.com

Improving the Aggregated Shot Chart

Visualizing Two WNBA Superstars’ 2026 Season Shot Data

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

A cute pika today in the San Juans.

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juliacurlee.bsky.social @juliacurlee.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

BERLIN, 1945. An OSS officer named Carmel Offie ran daring operations pulling German scientists out of the Soviet zone. He was among the first recruited into the new CIA. Then he was fired — for being gay. Sound familiar? www.lawfaremedia.org/article/a-hi...

lawfaremedia.org

A History of LGBT Officers & the Central Intelligence Agency

The CIA spent seven decades moving from purging LGBT officers to embracing them—until the second Trump administration began undoing that work.

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

Homemade sports drinks are 10-20% the price of commercial ones for the same stuff and usually better taste. Only drawback is convenience.

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

There is almost zero real science in the Star Wars universe. Almost everyone follows instructions vomited by a LLM, with different degrees of resourcing, or uses them for repairs.. This explains the prevalence of unexpected failure modes and the necessity of scavenging technology and junk trading.

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Julian Sanchez @normative.bsky.social · 28/07/2026

“I was expecting more moving castles and fewer angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night…”

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Adam @adam35.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

“Intelligence is useful only if it tells policymakers what they need to know, not what they want to hear.”

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 15/07/2026

Finished What Moves the Dead by @tkingfisher.com, in response to a discussion w/ an English prof friend about the nature of horror. I was glad for the author's endnote, as having just read the Poe version, I was left wondering if I was missing a vast conspiracy of in-jokes. But no it's just weird!

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 10/07/2026

The exact moment I knew we were living in the end times came when my early-20s passenger was navigating us with Mapquest printed turn-by-turn directions, and we encountered major construction delays. I handed him a road atlas and asked him to find a way around it and he just stared at me in terror.

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

Can any #birds people differentiate whether this is a Cooper’s hawk or a sharp shinned hawk?

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Greg Barnhisel @gbarnhisel.bsky.social · 29/06/2026

I had a great conversation with Justin Black for his “Spycraft 101” podcast, talking about Norman Pearson. The podcast is available on Apple Podcasts, Audible, and Spotify. Perfect listening for your summer travels! #espionage #modernism #coldwar open.spotify.com/episode/32rC...

open.spotify.com

254. Code Name Puritan: The Legacy of Norman Holmes Pearson with Dr. Greg Barnhisel

SPYCRAFT 101 · Episode

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Dr. Kim Hannula @stressrelated.bsky.social · 11/06/2026

Well, damn. I can't vote against THE kimberlite (for probably obvious non-geologic reasons).

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 10/06/2026

The world needs someone with a) historical chops, b) saintly patience, and c) a sense of humor to trace the history of and figure out what is the dealio with the merger of the MAGA right and alien/UFO conspiracy culture.

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dr. rich traditions, JD @helldude.bsky.social · 03/06/2026

"shop til it makes sense." ive been trying. ive been trying my whole life

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 01/06/2026

Baby turkey! Closest I’ve ever seen these little guys. #birds

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 26/05/2026

In the late 80s I worked graveyard shift at a gas station for a summer. There was a guy who used to come in daily around 4am who seriously thought the WWN was real news. He had a huge crush on the day shift manager and gave her his highest admiration: “I’d kick the dog out of the truck for her.”

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Reconstructionist @unavaleable.bsky.social · 25/05/2026

Vatican III will issue the Orange Catholic Bible

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 25/05/2026

The Grateful Dead Phish Gillian Welch Michael Ray and the Kosmic Krewe Morris Day and the Time Medeski, Martin, and Wood Stanley Jordan JJ Cale Allison Krauss and Union Station Suzanne Vega

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Arkady Martine | Dr. AnnaLinden Weller @byzantienne.bsky.social · 16/05/2026

Justinianic, Heraclian, Macedonian, Komnenian, Laskarid, Palaiologian

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Quickdraw @quickdraw.bsky.social · 15/05/2026

SIGINT, HUMINT, IMINT, GEOINT, OSINT, and MASINT.

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Jack Murphy @jackmurphyrgr.bsky.social · 09/05/2026

The realist shit to ever appear in a gov memo.

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 07/05/2026

Now that ShinyHunters is getting some attention, maybe some intrepid French-speaking investigative journalist can call their moms.

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

Feeling redeemed in my cluttered maximalism when I needed a piece of foam and went straight to the random unlabeled box of foam that I put aside 20 years ago for this moment.

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James Barr @jamesbarr.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

We should teach history because it's interesting. That's it. That's my hot take.

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Henry Farrell @himself.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

this point is very sharp and absolutely applies to fields outside philosophy.

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 29/04/2026

Lots of news today about GitHub's various failings. I left the company 2.5 years ago, so the part of this article (github.blog/news-insight...) that really caught my eye was the bit about the Elasticsearch outage being maybe caused by a "botnet attack". It reminded me of 2019. 🧵

github.blog

An update on GitHub availability

Here’s what we’ve done—and what we’re still doing—to improve our availability and reliability.

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 22/04/2026

Quick, somebody write a grant to the smoking pit remnant of NSF to invent an arithmetic consistent under weak constraints that agrees with this result. Make sure to include LOTS of indirect costs.

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Reposted by Jay Swan

Adam @adam35.bsky.social · 22/04/2026

SPLC knows ball?

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 19/04/2026

Nice article about the time that missionaries tried to make Christianity more appealing to 9th century Germanic Saxons by retelling the gospels as a war epic, while making them theologically accurate: moltensulfur.com/post/rewriti...

moltensulfur.com

Rewriting the Gospels for Germanic Barbarians – Molten Sulfur Blog

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 16/04/2026

When I clicked on the "Bluesky Issues" trending link earlier today, every account in the first few scrolldowns was reposting the exact same text blaming the problem on AI. Each account was clearly inauthentic and was advertising video game material in its profile.

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Reposted by Jay Swan

Nicholas Grossman @nicholasgrossman.bsky.social · 13/04/2026

Pro-Trump media bias: frame world events as a reality show with Trump as protagonist. As @larryglickman.bsky.social explains, it’s absurd to cast the Pope saying war is bad as a “punch” Trump is responding to. But also, he didn’t take any action. He just said words nonsensically insulting the Pope.

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 12/04/2026

Paging @markstout.bsky.social and other intel history folks: I'm seeking reading recs about intelligence and espionage in Britain and continental Europe during the between-the-wars period, say 1920-1938. Colonial area stuff outside Europe is OK if particularly good.

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Jay Swan @sanjuanswan.bsky.social · 10/04/2026

Finished the Iliad last week, for the first time since 1987. I liked it a lot more this time than when I was 18. I especially enjoyed Wilson’s occasionally dry endnotes, like “It is unlikely that horses would enjoy wine.”

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Quinta Jurecic @qjurecic.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

if think tanks acknowledge what trumpism is (incoherent and vibes-based), they have to face their own crisis of relevance as institutions that pump out policy papers and provide advice to movers and shakers. pretending there's some policy process that makes sense is a way to avoid grappling w this

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