iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

At a certain point maybe it will be so ubiquitous that it will tip over into being like this and just come to mean “building”:

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

I wonder what his Homeric epithet would be. “Extractive”?

Sir Jim's critique of the UK is not limited to energy and tax policy. He said the country had at one time been "a fantastic place".
"We had the greatest empire in the world. We were a great people. We won two world wars," he said.
But he said immigration and welfare spending were both currently too high and that politicians had proved reluctant to tackle either.
"Nobody's tough enough to deal with the immigration problem. Nobody's tough enough to deal with the benefits problem. But somebody needs to do it," he said.
Earlier this year he caused controversy by saying the UK had been "colonised by immigrants".

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

Sorry to hear that. That technique sounds suspiciously close to the Castellers...

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 17/07/2026

In some weird kind of metaphor, I just had to liberate this evidently quite frustrated butterfly from my back door.

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 16/07/2026

“Yogurt”? You’re losing your heads, people...

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 15/07/2026

For fans of Nat Segnit's Beautiful Dreamers, and specifically The Traitor of the Zazalcara...

Spain’s anaconda grip strangles France’s World Cup dream
Relentless pressing, flawless possession and clinical finishing powered Spain past France 2-0, moving the European champions one step from World Cup glory

From the opening whistle, the Spaniards wrapped themselves around France like an anaconda, tightening their grip with every ⁠wave of pressing and every spell of possession until the life had been squeezed from a French attack that had looked irresistible throughout the tournament. "A dream come true … to be honest, I never even imagined anything like this, not even in my wildest dreams," Porro said. "We did ‌everything right – everything we needed to do – against a team that was having a brilliant World Cup."

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 15/07/2026

The erstwhile Ofwat identified #informationinequality as a constraint on people understanding how to get access to the Priority Services Register - for a long time the only public body I could find using that term. youtu.be/iHK1LWyFMGo?is=tlq-cmh006t…

Ofwat is starting a conversation with the water sector and beyond to #ListenCareShare. We want to understand the challenges and
experiences that water customers are facing, as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, so we can all provide help and support in the right way, at the right time.
To begin with we will Listen Care Share around three themes: financial vulnerability; mental
wellbeing; information inequality.
Research commissioned by Ofwat as part of #ListenCareShare, a piece of work to understand customers' experiences duringCovid-19, found that information about the types of customer support available is not reaching those who need it. Only 15% of customers are aware that financial sunnort for…

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

Portugal version from @publico.pt - Conde Cara de Caixote do Lixo:

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 04/07/2026

#Corinthians have a new sponsor (seemingly a content-creator platform) whose logo will be replaced on @sccpfutfeminino.bsky.social shorts with a message to end violence against women & girls. Given the questions RDZ faced on appointment, #THFC should maybe consider a similar move?

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

I think they get along just fine

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 27/06/2026

aaaaaaaaaaaaargh (for the nth year in a row)

application deadline that i just thought about, four days after it passed, because, well, i have been super busy doing work

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 13/06/2026

I literally wrote a report defending the BBC in January, so it pains me to say this - its editorial decision-making is in a worrying state at the moment. #belfast

shado-mag.com
Hours before the worst violence
occurred, The World At One - BBC
Radio 4's long-running lunchtime
news and current affairs radio
programme - decided to read out
Rupert Lowe's posts at the start of
their bulletin. This despite the fact
that Lowe's fascist party, Restore
Britain, polls at about 3% today.
Someone at the BBC made the
decision to centre one of the most
extreme figures in British politics at
a time when racists were openly
calling for blood. This, like with the
case of The Mirror, was an editorial

shado-mag.com
Later, Lowe called for prosecuting
politicians who "knowingly placed
dangerous third world savages in
our community" on X, a post that
was shared by Elon Musk who
added "this is the way." Just like that,
a minor political figure was boosted
by both the BBC and the world's
richest man who has been using his
ownership of X to spread White
nationalist politics. And yet, the UK
government under Labour
continues to use Musk's platform
for crucial communication, giving a
White nationalist platform

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 08/06/2026

More #Palantir updates in @theguardian.com story on Clegg, including this marvellous correction: www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

“An earlier version incorrectly described Palantir as a spyware company; it is a spy-tech company.”

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 04/06/2026

If I were to open a bike shop, this is what I would call it:

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 01/06/2026

Some fellow concert-goers asked the ¿roadie? for the set list (I didn’t know that was a thing), and one let me a take a picture - so now you know what Aldous Harding and (super tight and on it) band played (it says Saturday but this was Sunday too):

Set list for Aldous Harding on 31 May 2026 at Barbican in London, UK.

TRAIN ON THE ISLAND
I ATE THE MOST
ONE STOP
TREASURE
VENUS IN THE ZINNIA
IF LADY DOES IT
WORMS
PASSION BABE
LEATHERY WHIP
SAN FRANCISCO
WHAT AM I GONNA DO?
FEVER
WARM CHRIS
COATS
RIDING THAT SYMBOL IMAGINING MY MAN
DESIGNER

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

Absolutely exceptional concert by Aldous Harding tonight at the Barbican. (Took precisely one photo, as she came out for the encore.)

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 30/05/2026

Meanwhile, I was going to mention that the late Mario Tascon once gave a talk to the board of the Journalism programme at OSF in which he showed Hokusai’s the Great Wave & how the boat was navigating *into* & not away from the wave. I googled to see if there were other references for this, and…

i’m not going to transcribe the slop generated by this AI overview

nor the plausible-sounding meta slop if you go deeper

hmm - it points to tom trewinnard’s post as the key source for this claim. i wonder what tom has written about this… wait - there’s no reference to Tascon or Hokusai here…?

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 22/05/2026

I thought I was hallucinating when i saw this at 7am, but no.

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 19/05/2026

From the Trust for Civic Life's new briefing on "What local communities are telling us about digital tools, AI, and novel civic tech": trustforciviclife.org/wp-content/u...

DIGITAL CIVIC LIFE THROUGH THE DECADES

1990 – 2000
The early web sparked the first civic digital experiments: municipal
data projects, e-democracy platforms, and campaigns to open public data. Tools like Craigslist and community listservs set the template
for local online connection.

2000 – 2010
Web 2.0 put users in the driver’s seat with Wikipedia, YouTube, and open APIs. Local civic platforms launched, open-source code spread ideas
globally, and blogs plus Twitter gave activists and journalists new organizing power.

2010 – 2020
Smartphones and tech giants reshaped daily life. Civic tech attracted hundreds of millions in funding, then petered out as funders grew discouraged by resulting impact.

2020 – 2025
COVID dramatically changed in-person interaction and virtual tools went mainstream. By 2025, the generative AI boom created both opportunity and uncertainty for public interest work.

2026+
A post platform future driven by wide adoption of AI tools that lower the cost and barriers for creating niche or hyper-local applications.

Source: https://trustforciviclife.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/TCL_2026DigitalReport_for-web.pdf

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 18/05/2026

The last week has been absolutely

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 10/05/2026

Literally pinned above my desk - and if i were ever to get a tattoo, it should be this.

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 08/05/2026

just back from the most wonderful intimate concert by #DeryaYildirim in the beautiful #ChurchOfSound. Genuinely exceptional.

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 06/05/2026

Interesting that the @theguardian.com is looking for a Dep Ed of Community Journalism: www.linkedin.com/jobs/view/44...

About the job
Join our team at the Guardian and be a part of a diverse and inclusive global organisation that delivers fearless, investigative journalism, and holds power to account. Our team of award-winning journalists, cutting-edge commercial professionals, and industry-leading digital experts are committed to making a difference and represent a wide range of backgrounds and perspectives. We offer a challenging and exciting environment for career development, with a focus on training, growth and fostering an inclusive culture.

We are now looking for a deputy editor, community journalism.

Community journalism plays a central role in the Guardian's newsroom. The team collaborates with our global audiences to ensure that people’s views and experiences are represented in our journalism. These can be stories that have been informed by views and experiences of people around the world in response to Guardian callouts across news, politics, business, society and culture.

This is a permanent NUJ contract.

About the role
Generate and deliver agenda-setting UK and international community journalism projects
Commission, write and edit community journalism callouts and articles.
Deputise for and represent the community journalism editor when required
Liaise and collaborate with other Guardian desks and global offices to facilitate community journalism callouts and articles
Build editorial relationships with staff at all levels in the UK and other global offices
Help shape thinking about the most effective ways to evolve community journalism at the Guardian
Think creatively about the future of Guardian community journalism on video and social media platforms

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 05/05/2026

As someone who shares a birthday with #KarlMarx and who loves John Boorman’s Zardoz, I’ve often wondered about this, and finally bothered to google it today:

John Boorman:
When Zardoz opened in France, the communist newspaper asked me to go to their office, and they were very nervous and agitated…

John Boorman:
They said they wanted to give it a good review, but they were concerned that I had based the flying head on Karl Marx…

John Boorman:
and that I was making fun of Karl Marx with this head…

John Boorman:
And that had absolutely never occurred to me. The sculptor who made the head based it on me. I sat there for him and he cast it…

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

Really enjoyed doing this - not least the private message from a fellow Spurs fan remarking on my choice of mug. #COYS

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

Owner of Brent Cross shopping centre sues John Lewis for cut of online sales/click and collect: www.ft.com/content/ec9e...

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 29/04/2026

Bloody hell - I initially assumed it was a hoax designed to spread uncertainty... @404media.co now reporting it: www.404media.co/rightscon-hu... Thabo Kawana's other FB statements are ageing badly: www.facebook.com/thabokawan/

Fellow citizens,
Last evening, we officiated at Crown TV Zambia’s 5th anniversary celebration under the theme “Five Years of Excellence.”
We reaffirmed Government’s commitment to media freedom and to the growth of a professional, independent media sector.
We commended Crown TV for its rapid growth and contribution to our evolving media landscape. Official records note that it is now one of Zambia’s leading television stations, available on TopStar, StarTimes, DStv, and GOtv, with plans to expand to Azam TV.
We recognised that reaching over 4.5 million households carries significant responsibility. We attribute the station’s success to strong leadership, a skilled workforce, and its commendable commitment to achieving gender parity in management.
We reiterated Government’s resolve to safeguard democratic freedoms, including freedom of expression. That right guides our public service and we have taken deliberate steps to create a more open and supportive environment for the media.
We assured the nation that Government will continue to foster a media landscape that is free, fair and conducive to national development.
We urged Crown TV to keep innovating and upholding high journalistic standards as our media sector grows.
Thabo Kawana
Permanent Secretary
Ministry of Information and Media

Fellow citizens,
We are honoured to officiate at the relaunch of Musanza TV, Zambia’s first local language-focused broadcaster. This progressive step expands access to information and strengthens media diversity and plurality, ensuring broader citizen engagement in national discourse.
As a private commercial entity operating in partnership with Diamond Media Group, we expect Musanza TV to uphold the high production standards and editorial excellence that define Diamond TV.
The initiative aligns directly with our Government’s agenda of inclusivity and national development, deepening community participation and safeguarding our cultural heritage.
As we commend this milestone, we also recognise the weight of responsibility it carries. We urge all media practitioners to reaffirm their commitment to professionalism and accuracy, particularly given growing concerns over misinformation, propaganda and divisive content in some sections of the media.
In our multi-ethnic and multi-lingual nation, failure to maintain ethical standards risks eroding public trust and undermining national unity and stability, especially as we approach an election period. We look forward to Musanza TV serving our people with integrity, quality, balance and respect for the diversity that defines Zambia.
Thabo Kawana
Permanent Secretary
Ministry of Information and Media
Lusaka

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 25/04/2026

Interesting messaging on the UK’s Sovereign #AI fund.

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

and in an environment dominated by unscrupulous actors...

From Demos' Our BBC report (January 2026):

Generative AI is industrialising the production and distribution of textual and visual mis/disinformation at near-zero cost, while algorithmic content platforms are optimising for attention and engagement with polarising content, regardless of its accuracy, drowning out verified information such as journalism or scientific research. US-owned companies including Google, Meta, Amazon, and X control the critical infrastructure through which millions of UK citizens access information, from local news ecosystems to global information flows: the hardware layer (devices, operating systems), the distribution layer (app stores, browsers, search, messaging, social media, streaming platforms, real-time information, and increasingly, AI interfaces, including agents), and the economic layer (payment systems, advertising systems, data extraction infrastructure). This is a systematic restructuring of the information environment to
determine what software, content and information audiences can access through their devices, and who can be economically viable.
Public service media have to deliver ‘universality’ in an environment where the incentives are increasingly structurally tilted in the diametrically opposite direction. For the BBC in particular,
despite needing to meet universal service obligations, it has been subjected to starvation cycles, resulting in an overall real-terms budget cut of 38-40% over 15 years23 - which in some budget areas will be even higher. This requirement has been instituted while also needing to minimise its commercial impact. Such constrained funding conditions set the BBC up to fail in a media landscape where - unlike in previous Charter Renewal processes, where it was facing a range of domestic news and media competitors - it now faces a wholly new set of competitors that are new entrants, such as social media platforms, and which have few obligations and outsized resources.

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 20/04/2026

<desperately trying to mentally firewall my beloved Elvis Costello from Trump contamination> Also, I did not expect this to be so prescient:

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 10/04/2026

“What if we were to scale back the mainlining, and just skinpop AI into the UK instead?” 🫠 www.theguardian.com/technology/2...

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 01/04/2026

I picked a hell of a week to rent a car…

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 29/03/2026

The great Sébastien Tellier last week in London.

Sébastien Tellier and band on stage at Koko in Camden, London, in March 2026.

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 24/03/2026

I’ve seen Sébastien Tellier live a few times, but last night was something else - at some points it turned into a dance party (a bit like the triumphant Fever Ray comeback gig in ¿2018?):

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Sameer Padania @sdp.bsky.social · 13/03/2026

The new State of Civil Society Report is out from @civicusalliance.bsky.social, and there’s a strong message running through it: www.civicus.org/index.php/me... #civilsociety #activism #genz