iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

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Jesi🃏♠️🔥 @luciferjesit.bsky.social · 13/10/2026

This was such a great answer from Abdul El-Sayed about his previous criticisms of President Obama.

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 17h

We can use the money that is supposed to be for new sewer and storm water systems

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 17h

These rich people don't need their houses, let's mine it all out bsky.app/profile/shme...

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 13/10/2026

I didn't know Staten Island has cotton candy sands ⚒️

Pink and tan layered sands in an opened split spoon sampler

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 13/10/2026

I feel like I should get a pdh if I watch History of Concrete

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 12/10/2026

Oh I think this whole album is just nods to different kinds of horror movies

Screenshot of the tracklist for The Pretty Wild's album Zero point Genesis on spotify

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Sarah McAnulty, Ph.D. @sarahmackattack.bsky.social · 10/10/2026

Mural unveiling was a wild success

A dog with a comical underbite in front or a mural with a Luna moth dip and Polyphemus moth

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Jake Grumbach @jakemgrumbach.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

New working paper: the Norwegian wealth tax was a huge success. The "exodus" of wealthy people never happened (less than 100 individuals left). Tax revenue increased by 71.5%. No changes in business activity or investment. www.nber.org/papers/w35854

Taxing Entrepreneurial Wealth: Evidence from
Norway, 2021-2025
Marius A. K. Ring
WORKING PAPER 35854|
DOl 10.3386/w35854
ISSUE DATE October 2026
Whether imposing higher taxes on business owners adversely affects business activity by constraining investment and inducing capitalist flight is a central question in the ongoing debate on how to tax the ultra wealthy. To shed new light, I exploit a series of related Norwegian reforms during 2021-2024 that increased dividend tax rates, removed migration-related capital gains tax loopholes, and nearly doubled the effective marginal tax rate on business wealth. These reforms spurred international debate and, allegedly, an "exodus" of Norwegian billionaires (Financial Times,
2023). While I document clear effects on migration, these responses are concentrated among the top 0.1% of the wealth distribution and mostly confined to 2022 and 2023. My results indicate that at most 100 individuals left due to the reforms. I find no evidence of significant outmigration or reduced inflows of startup founders or inventors. I estimate that absent any outmigration, wealth tax revenues would have increased by 75% from 2021 to 2024. Reform-driven outmigration lowers the revenue gain to 71.5%. My findings further show that outmigrating owners' firms remain economically active and do not reduce investment. In a broader set of analyses, I examine whether business outcomes are affected, regardless of whether owners outmigrate, since firms may reduce investment both due to liquidity constraints or distortions to owners' savings decisions. I compare firms owned by Norwegian individuals subject to the wealth tax with firms owned by foreigners and other tax-exempt entities. By merging historical ownership data from Orbis with the Norwegian shareholder register, I perform these analyses on both Norwegian and foreign-domiciled firms.
Across settings, I find no evidence that Norwegian-owned firms pay out more dividends or invest less after the reforms,…

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

As was foretold in Out Cold, the streets are running with latte

Mud in the street next to the curb as the driller goes through some lighter material, the white sediment is in the middle of browner sediment, like how milk looks in latte art

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RN Mahli @rafiamahli.com · 07/10/2026

No matter what you hear, remember this: It did not start on October 7. Not a single fucking thing you’ve seen over the last three years started on October fucking 7th, 2023. The brutality, the kidnapping, the murder, the torture, the abuse, the terror. None of it is new.

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Fossillocator @fossillocator.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Congrats Quartz! With the support of @mineralcup.bsky.social I'm running a raffle for some quartz specimens! There will be 3 winners with the 1st winner getting first choice and so on. Make a donation to AGU's student travel fund (instructions on next post) and gain one entry per $15. 1/2

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

Look at this higher order rainbow I think double reflecting through the water pitcher

A water pitcher on a glass table. The reflection of the water pitcher shows a series of colors from teal to purple to yellow to green, all a bit pastel

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Jane Doe Barbie @ljohn44.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

This should be a war crime:

Following Bremer’s declaration that Iraq was “open for business,” Western agribusiness giants like Monsanto, Cargill, and Dow Chemicals saw Iraq’s agricultural sector, already weakened by droughts and Western sanctions in the 1990s, as a promising business opportunity. With Order 81 in place, Iraqi farmers had no choice but to buy into Western agribusinesses and their patented seed technology.
Unlike open-pollinated seeds, which are naturally pollinated through wind and insects, patented seeds must be repurchased or relicensed from their manufacturer every single year. Some are bred to yield a diminishing crop season after season, guaranteeing that a farmer repurchases them from the manufacturer. Farmers failing to relicense patented seeds can be sued by the manufacturing company. The patented seeds need specific inputs like fertilizer and pesticides that must also be purchased from the same manufacturer.
This business model effectively trapped Iraqi farmers …

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Alex Ip 葉清霖 @alexip718.com · 02/10/2026

The kicker is *chef's kiss*

“You think we’re getting a little too close to Meta?” [John Georges, co-owner of Georges Media Group, the state’s largest media organization and parent company of the state’s largest newspaper, The Times-Picayune | The New Orleans Advocate], asked. “I’m not afraid of the sun. You know — Icarus? I’ll get as close to the sun as I can.”

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Rebecca Solnit @rebeccasolnit.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Time for this classic again.

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

I have one guess who's paying for this and who's benefiting

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

I can only assume he likes being trolled if he blocks me when I'm ignoring his stupid shit

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Oops all cubes I bet pyrite and Galena would like a word though

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

The only thing to do apparently is to create your own troll list of shitty people

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Ben Collins @bencollins.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

I think some Dems might sneak by in a wave year election running these anti-trans ads that abandon an entire section of the population, but they won't be able to outrun it with Democratic voters longterm. The more time goes on, the more likely they are to know a trans person. A permanent duncecap.

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Sarah Kendzior @sarahkendzior.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

"Paywalls are toll roads to a gated community, one that the average American cannot afford to enter in an era of inflated prices and deflated expectations. Democracy relies on an informed citizenry. Pay-to-play democracy is no democracy at all." sarahkendzior.substack.com/p/gutting-th...

sarahkendzior.substack.com

Gutting the Fourth Estate

The US media were willing cogs in Trump’s machine. Now he’s tearing it down.

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Lmao I've been seeing Cait Conley ads for a bit and I've been ignoring because she's running in NY somewhere but a hit ad came on today and halfway through they're like, "she supports radical Medicare for all and the same socialists that brought you Mamdani are backing Conley..." Best pitch ever

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Alejandra Caraballo @esqueer.net · 28/09/2026

Andy Beshear is proof that you can win a red state without abandoning trans people.

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c0nc0rdance @c0nc0rdance.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

Nature photographer 'pendra100legs' does these amazing macro shots of tiny bugs. This one is delightful (I'll link below to the full thing). It's a globular springtail in genus Sminthurides. These insect-relatives can launch themselves 60 times their height in 1.6 MILLISECONDS. *Voomp*. Gone.

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

This looks like really bad deepfakes

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Sarah McAnulty, Ph.D. @sarahmackattack.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Um. The William Penn foundation offered bridge funding to keep the academy of natural sciences open for a year, and the people in charge said “no one is helping things by offering Band-Aids”. Jesus Christ. share.inquirer.com/KXxZTj

share.inquirer.com

William Penn Foundation offers funding to keep Academy of Natural Sciences museum open

A Drexel spokesperson did not say whether the school had declined the offer, but said, “No proposal has been presented that would provide a permanent, sustainable path forward" for the museum.

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Sarah McAnulty, Ph.D. @sarahmackattack.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

If you care about keeping the Academy of Natural Sciences open to the public in Philadelphia, I need you to read and share this thread. Trish Wellenbach was sent from the mayor's office to oversee the Academy of Natural sciences situation. She needs to hear from us. Here comes the action item:

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Is that Chester's holograms in Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

This is basically what my Hebrew school teachers said when I was a kid in NJ

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Ooh found a little block of charcoal today and not just trace

An opened split spoon sampler with some silt of different colors that I split apart to see better and there's a rectangular block of charcoal in the middle that also split in twice pieces with the soil

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Tof Eklund @tofeklund.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

I'm not worried about "AI superintelligence" I'm worried about Artificial Super Ignorance. I recommend the work of @olivia.science and @irisvanrooij.bsky.social for rigorous debunking of AI hype, but stories like this make it easy to see the folly of trusting "AI." arstechnica.com/ai/2026/09/r...

arstechnica.com

AI hallucination of Chinese nuclear components almost led to US military attack

But the military's overall use of AI seems to be accelerating.

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

I should have mentioned that Bowie found a mouse yesterday but let it go

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

You can't accummulate a country's GDP in your personal fortune without being evil and that includes getting it through divorce.

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Just a claw or does it also have a bucket attached on the opposite side?

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Scott Merms 🏞️ @shmermel.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

One of the guys on my work team said in our meeting yesterday that it sounds like we'll have more work in West PA next year so my boss says, "oh I know Scott's gonna be excited about that"

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