iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 6h

Just got an update from my son's nursery. Was playing with a boat. Then told his teacher, 'When the mutiny starts the blood will run into the sea.' He will be four at the end of this month, and presumably a pirate not long after.

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James Austin @jamesdaustin.bsky.social · 12h

As always the right miss the importance of a functioning state and services to enabling growth and the private sector. A nation with crumbling infrastructure and a sick, ill educated population isnt an attractive proposition for investment

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 14h

Which will, of course, be AI slop. Has to be.

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James Austin @jamesdaustin.bsky.social · 14h

Simple solution: just don't do it. The US desire to find 'clean' ways of killing people is ultimately to try and absolve themselves of what they're doing: killing people. There is no clean and morally pure way of taking a life - and particularly not of someone whose entirely within your power

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The Author, Séamas O'Reilly @seamas.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

We've had the ability to watch, say, Counterstrike marathons, Street Fighter tournaments, or chess matches between computers since the 90s. Spectacles which, by their very definition, would be at a "higher standard" than human play. And nobody wants it. It's entirely meaningless. It has no appeal.

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Phil Tinline @philtinline.bsky.social · 20h

Doctor Who has described the BBC's new AI-generated director general as "pretty good", and suggested that the technology now enabled the creation of content "at the standard of an unimaginative man who spent years working at McKinsey then Google".

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 30/09/2026

Ask a machine for what you want and if you actually get that, you'll be bored and miserable. Maybe not immediately, but soon. Hear something new, unfamiliar and you may not like it, but you might learn to, and that friction is part of the pleasure. Stasis isn't enjoyment.

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 30/09/2026

We're all simultaneously neophilic and neophobic. We gain pleasure from both familiarity and novelty - hence the familiar cultural cycles of trashing, reference and reformulation. Because of this we want stuff we don't know we want.

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 30/09/2026

This goes in tons of directions of course: human interaction, seeking and finding, and not quite finding...etc. But it also seems like just a basic question of how enjoyment works:

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 30/09/2026

Obvs this is horrible, and honestly there are consumers who will eat it up. But what's clearer and clearer to me is the way in which tech bros fundamentally fail to grasp the role of friction and difficulty in cultural pleasure.

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Gwen C. Katz @gwenckatz.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Fuck ChatGPT flyers. The future is broadsheets.

A crowded broadsheet with way too many fonts. It says:
Forget ChatGPT Flyers
Say it with
Broadsheets
Unlimited fonts
Stretch them
Or cram a really long sentence into one line for no good reason
No whitespace
Mix capital and lowercase
Pointing hands
(They're called manicules!)
Don't be left behind
Broadsheets are the future

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 25/09/2026

Not pro-natalist or anything but I think people with kids should be getting an extra weekend every week. Kids themselves should have only one weekend. Or maybe none. Yeah.

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Alex von Tunzelmann @alexvont.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

If only we had a culture secretary, etc

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 24/09/2026

I have thought about this strip - I tell no lie - almost every day since I first saw it. Every time I feel, as a journalist, that I know my topic, it pops into my head.

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Chris Bertram @crookedfootball.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Heard at café: “toi tu es au tele-travail, moi je suis à la tele-retraite.”

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John Harris @johnharris1969.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

1)how to create an illicit fags & booze economy run by spivs that'll deprive the Treasury of tax revenue 2)you don't get people "back to work" by making their lives impossible (note cut of a third to long-term benefits). It makes the problem worse 3)you bastards

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Jay Zedbee @jayzedbee.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

genuinely is shabana mahmood alive? do we have a home secretary? are there laws? is this the purge from the movie the purge? is crime now legal? can we shit on the street? can we ransack an m&s? is this just a fucking free for all?

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 23/09/2026

Personal record of taking two hours to do the 12 minute journey from Norwood Junction to London Bridge.

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 23/09/2026

I speak from personal experience when I say that itv detective shows *really* come into their own when you have a new born baby. Comfort at exactly the right cognitive threshold.

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 23/09/2026

Tbh our driver's announcements are probably the only reason people on this train aren't killing each other right now.

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 23/09/2026

If you're wondering about the state of British trains our driver this morning has used the phrases 'Keep the faith' and 'You can trust me', and 'Come back aboard, you know it makes sense.'

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 23/09/2026

Very flattered to have been invited to judge the Edgar Wind Essay Prize this year in the illustrious company of Martin Kemp and Jennifer Higgie. edgarwindsociety.co.uk

edgarwindsociety.co.uk

Edgar Wind Society

Oxford University Student Art History Society

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 23/09/2026

I mean I'm up for it, of course.

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 23/09/2026

Don't even mention the Tetons.

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 23/09/2026

Which...would also not be Old English.

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 23/09/2026

Lots of people on here this morning smugly pointing out Shakespeare didn't speak Old English, but thinking Chaucer did. Like telling people the plural of octopus is octopi. *shakes head with infinite sadness*

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Pete Fraser @petefrasermusic.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

I mean, for the millionth time, if the UK home office can proscribe pro Palestine activists for criminal damage, why can it not proscribe this fake cockney guy’s organised street fascism movement? The lack of action looks, at worst, like endorsement.

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Tom Hunter @onelifestand87.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

I’d ask if the Home Secretary was waiting for the murders to start except I’m not convinced even that would make her do the basics of her fucking job

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The Empty City @davidallengreen.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Just as well those committing wrongs against the RNLI are not holding placards supporting a proscribed organisation, else they would really be in trouble.

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James Chalmers @jameschalmers.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

It would be absurd, but entirely fitting with the UK response so far, if Thomas ended up being prosecuted by the French authorities while the UK continues to look on meekly.

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Ursula K. Le Guin Bot @leguinbot.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

The danger in trying to do good is that the mind comes to confuse the intent of goodness with the act of doing things well.

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Caroline Dodds Pennock @carolinepennock.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Ditto 30,000 roles in universities in the past three years.

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Jay Zedbee @jayzedbee.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

i genuinely think about this every time theres any mention of narnia. one of the funniest things that have ever happened

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Helen Barnard @helenbarnard.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

All of this feels totally dissonant with political and media narratives. It feels incredibly difficult to have a serious conversation about resourcing the state, reforming tax etc when so many of the assumptions underpinning current discussions are just not true.

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Smooth Dunk @smoothdunk2.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

when ai leaves u behind

7 panel comic.

Panel 1:
A Red Guy with AI across his chest looks like he’s about to run away. A Yellow Guy stands next to him. Red Guy says “I’m the future, buddy. You comin’?”
Yellow Guy replies “Nah”

Panel 2:
Red Guy is almost out of the panel. He leans in and says “Enjoy getting left behind, pal”
Yellow Guy replies “ok”

Panel 3:
Yellow Guy stands alone.

Panel 4:
Close up on Yellow Guy, there is a quiet “huff-huff-huff” noise coming from behind him

Panel 5:
Yellow Guy turns to look behind him

Panel 6:
Close up on Yellow Guy’s face as if from the point of view of an attacker.
Yellow Guy yells “Jesus Christ”

Panel 7:
AI Red Guy is now chasing the Yellow Guy.
Red Guy: “Use me”
Yellow Guy “No”
Red Guy “USE ME”

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Tom Reagan’s Hat @rufustsuperfly.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

My fave Kubrick anecdote - David Prowse on acting in A Clockwork Orange: 'So you want me to carry Patrick Magee, who weighs 17Olbs, plus the wheelchair, another 30lbs, so 200lbs, down the stairs & then do a dialogue scene?' 'Yeah, you can do it.' 'I know but your name isn't One Take Kubrick, is it?'

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Benjamin Dreyer @bcdreyer.social · 19/09/2026

“I use Claude only to check the grammar” is truly the “just the tip, I promise” of writing.

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REwadent Evil @ewacat.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Ultra-Rich Person Who Needs You To Respect His Special Interest So He Can Play With It More is not a good information resource sorry

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Josh Shepperd @joshshepperd.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

The professors and instructors who turn classrooms back into spaces for reading and discussion, are going to leave the biggest legacies in this world. Everyone one else will disappear into LLM wallpaper proxies and derivatives.

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Thomas I-G @thomasig.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

Still can't get over this. Imagine genuinely believing Donald Trump possesses such geopolitical genius, then imagine your job is to keep abreast of current affairs for a national broadcaster *including hosting a podcast about American politics*

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 14/09/2026

I'm sorry, Vole. Miserable stuff. Good luck.

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Tim Smith-Laing @timsmith-laing.com · 14/09/2026

The Tories have selected Roger Gale to fight Herne Bay and Sandwich. He’s due to parlay Wednesday with a whale but who knows in what language?

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Anya @heyanyahere.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

It always Ukraine who needs to do something, to withdraw somewhere, to give something up, to accept the situation and so on and so on. Russians don't need to do anything. Those damn Ukrainian warmongers, who don't want to die quietly!

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