iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 18/09/2026

15 months ago, I started building an archive of the UK government's Bus Open Data Service status updates. The locations of every bus in Great Britain every minute. It's gone well, but there are a few gaps. Do you have the data that could fill them in? data.datalibrary.uk/transport/BO...

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Jim Waterson @jim.londoncentric.media · 11/09/2026

Has Andy Burnham made a public statement on the mackerel swap-out scandal yet?

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 31/08/2026

I read this. It was fun. I could not have disagreed more strongly. Nationalising the means of production of data centres is a path to madness. China and the USA are beating us by taking the precise opposite approach. We must learn from them, not our unimpressive Covid response.

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 25/08/2026

I wonder if when Southern Italian economists tweet this map they get dozens of replies saying "try telling that to someone in Genoa mate!".

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 21/08/2026

The crossover happened in the 2024 data, but I didn't want to share it in case there were revisions. But now that I've checked in the 2025 data, I can be sure it's real.

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 07/08/2026

I admit to signing up and paying the £4.50 just to annoy myself before going to the pub. But I ended up agreeing with a lot of this. Certainly I agree that a big problem is employers and that devolution is the best way to fix this.

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Sam Freedman @samfr.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

The funeral for irony will be held next week.

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 28/07/2026

My thoughts on economic growth and education in one place, since it's part of the topic of the day. tomforth.co.uk/graduateprem...

tomforth.co.uk

British Growth and the Graduate Premium

Britain's economic problems will not be solved by more graduates.

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Ben Ansell @benansell.bsky.social · 19/07/2026

Was a bit much for England to deliberately lose to Argentina so they would be in Miami tonight as part of a very complicated sting, but I’ll take it.

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 13/07/2026

One of the most exciting infrastructure projects in Britain right now. If we could build tunnels like the Norwegians we could build new motorways and railways so cheaply that they could be self-funding. The biggest prize is Manchester to Sheffield. www.thetimes.com/uk/transport...

thetimes.com

Explosives could deliver northern boom via cheaper Pennines tunnel

Start-up says Scandinavian tunnelling methods could cut the cost of a proposed dual carriageway connecting Sheffield and Manchester by as much as 90 per cent

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 09/07/2026

I had great fun on the Crashed Podcast with @stokel.bsky.social and Alex talking about, 1/ My long history of advising Andy Burnham ;) 2/ Why the North South divide hurts the South as well as the North. 3/ Devolution's surprisingly good record, and challenges. share.google/kvT5GFSRwDkm...

share.google

Crashed

Podcast · Alex Hudson · In the Crashed podcast, the tech podcast about everything else, hosts Alex Hudson (@alexhuds) and Chris Stokel-Walker (@stokel) delve into the complexities of technology and it...

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 07/07/2026

In 1998 and 1999, four of Britain's regions and nations voted for devolution. Since then, all have overperformed the rest of the country economically. Even Wales. . Also a bit of a rant about how there's more than one big city in Britain. tomforth.co.uk/agglomeratio...

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Duncan Robinson @duncanrobinson.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

Wrote about the ascent of the "chippy southerner" www.economist.com/britain/2026...

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Jennifer Williams @jenwilliamsft.bsky.social · 24/06/2026

Also I look forward to a LOT of 9am Manchester meetings being pencilled into London diaries

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Jennifer Williams @jenwilliamsft.bsky.social · 24/06/2026

There’s me thinking I’d seen the back of Andy Burnham 😂 Am v pro this No 10 idea though as you might expect. Could have a lot of consequences if done right, incl for media ecosystem Also not a ££££ thing but it sends a message. (Helpfully could also allow him to be near Makerfield on a Fri)

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Andy Bruce (Reuters) @bruceandy.bsky.social · 18/06/2026

Well it’s something to do

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Nick Gray @path-dependent.bsky.social · 25/05/2026

I'd partly forgotten this but if you present yourself as the radical political force able to solve deep rooted problems, then you encounter a deep rooted problem and say actually, this is too difficult, I wish we hadn't bothered...it ought to be a tell. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

bbc.co.uk

Nigel Farage regrets running 'bankrupt' Worcestershire Council

The Reform UK leader says he wishes the party "hadn't bothered" to take control in Worcestershire.

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Mia Jankowicz @miajankowicz.bsky.social · 21/05/2026

Here's the fledgling site, with some great stories on it already: theexchange.news/welcome-to-l...

theexchange.news

Leeds' new local paper

West Yorkshire deserves great local journalism. Help us launch it.

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Mia Jankowicz @miajankowicz.bsky.social · 21/05/2026

Delighted and daunted in equal measure to be joining @millmedia.bsky.social as a staff writer as they branch out to a new city. Launching in June, The Exchange will provide quality writing, features and investigations covering Leeds and West Yorkshire. Any local tips? Reach out!

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 05/05/2026

Has anyone done an academic-type study on the emergence of the Kings Cross tech clusters? There was good work by @maxnathan.bsky.social among others of Tech City and Shoreditch Old Street Silicon Roundabout type stuff back in the day. Stuff like that.

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 01/05/2026

Bradford has a higher business start-up rate than Leeds, Oxford, or Cambridge. But those businesses do very different things and raise much less money to grow. We are very fortunate to have such a broad base of entrepreneurialism in Britain to build on. tomforth.co.uk/entrepreneur...

tomforth.co.uk

Entrepreneurial Britain

Britain has many regional economic inequalities, but entrepreneurialism isn't one of them.

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 01/05/2026

An excellent, and excellently self-aware, review of three of the latest books on Britain, a reminder of how far we've come, and of our decline (or not), and our inequalities and lost potentials by @dianecoyle1859.bsky.social. giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...

giftarticle.ft.com

Have we gone too far with British declinism?

Three new books portray a land caught in a muddle and beset by inequalities. A familiar story or is it time for a reset?

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Jim Gleeson @geographyjim.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

Late to this tomforth.co.uk/densityisdone/, which as always from @tomforth.co.uk is well worth reading, but I'm not sure about the comparison made in the highlighted paragraph, given all of the European cities mentioned are adjacent to large bodies of water but neither of the English ones are.

When I show, using my population around a point tool, that Manchester has as many people living within 8km of its city centre as far richer Copenhagen, Amsterdam, or Hamburg — or that Leeds has as many people living within 8km of its city centre as far richer Dublin or Rotterdam — I am told that it's really core density that matters. I am assured that if my warnings about the errors in the GHS dataset are ignored, my own tools will prove it to me.

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 16/04/2026

In a rare appearance on Bluesky, I shall repeat my argument against this. It's just a case of over-analysing poor data. Use the correct data, and Britain's big cities are just as dense as Northern European equivalents like Hamburg and Rotterdam that are much more productive and support great metros.

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Simon Kuestenmacher @simongerman600.bsky.social · 25/03/2026

On 21 March 2026 almost the entire US is recorded at or near record maximum temperature for this date in the 30-year record. Source: buff.ly/z2LC20Y

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 23/03/2026

Yet Another Dozen -- yet more people in London and Oxford thinking and talking about how to return Britain to prosperity is the last thing we need. tomforth.co.uk/yetanotherdo...

tomforth.co.uk

2030 Prosperity.

Yet another dozen people in London thinking about how to return Britain to prosperity is the last thing we need.

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 19/03/2026

After three decades of building, Britain's large cities have densities -- both at their cores and overall -- that are comparable to their North European equivalents like Amsterdam, Hamburg, Rotterdam, Antwerp, Cologne, and Copenhagen.

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 16/03/2026

Last chance for this. Tomorrow.

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John Handley @jwhandley.bsky.social · 15/03/2026

Scotland also has the second highest wages of any region for the bottom 75% of the hourly pay distribution, only being beat by the South East at the 80th percentile and the East at the 90th percentile

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John Handley @jwhandley.bsky.social · 15/03/2026

We don't talk enough about how Scotland went from having lower wages/productivity than the UK average to being second only to the South East and London on both

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 10/03/2026

Londonmaxxing is a good meme with a strong foundation. Business R&D in London -- especially in digital, data, tech, AI -- has exploded since 2012 on the back of decades of high public sector spending on R&D and enormous investments in great infrastructure. tomforth.co.uk/londonmaxxing/

tomforth.co.uk

Londonmaxxing

Londonmaxxing is based on huge growth in business R&D spending in London. Britain has much less to be positive about.

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 06/03/2026

Should you wish to know how the AI at @thedatacity.bsky.social works, but not so well you can copy us, please do come to Applied AI at Parallax in Leeds on 17 March at 6pm where I'll be giving a talk on exactly that! www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/applied-ai...

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 06/03/2026

Using the ONS small area GVA estimates and my population around a point tool I calculated GVA/capita for every 30 mile wide ring at increasing distance from London. The picture shows where I calculated GVA and population for to get the answer at 100 miles.

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Ben Goldacre @bengoldacre.bsky.social · 23/02/2026

OpenSAFELY is open from today! Huge thanks to all who supported this vast collaboration: whole population GP data; in a productive platform; innovative privacy protections; unprecedented support from professions, privacy campaigners; &c Now it's over to users! www.bennett.ox.ac.uk/blog/2026/02...

bennett.ox.ac.uk

OpenSAFELY news: you can apply to do non-COVID research, from today! | Bennett Institute for Applied Data Science

We are delighted to announce that - from today - you can submit applications to the OpenSAFELY service for non-COVID-19 studies.

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Owler Nook @owlernook.bsky.social · 22/02/2026

So apparently one of these is 'salt of the earth, tells it like it is, speaks to the masses' and the other is not.

A living room in a Victorian house, which happens to contain two Green Party members.

A living room in a Victoria house, which happens to contain four musicians.

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Dan Hayes @danhayesjourno.bsky.social · 16/02/2026

And then there were seven 👀 When I first spoke to @joshih.bsky.social in 2020, he'd just launched The Mill and was thinking of setting something up in Liverpool. Less than six years later, today we're launching our seventh title in Leeds (@leedsnewlocalpaper.bsky.social). Sign up 👉 leeds.ghost.io

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Joshi Herrmann @joshih.bsky.social · 16/02/2026

At long last, we’re launching in Leeds! Ever since I started The Mill, people have asked us to create a publication across the Pennines. If 500 people pledge to become members, we’re going to hire two journalists and do it. Please share with Leeds friends. leeds.ghost.io

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 13/02/2026

Fantastic piece in the @FT on London's poor record of building the homes it desperately needs. I added in another major global city* in the UK which seemed to have slipped out of the data during production 😉 giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...

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Simon Jeffrey @simonjeffrey.bsky.social · 31/01/2026

Really good discussion this. Sounds like an excellent issue for Andy Burnham to take up on the Lovelace Labs, and Tracy Brabin for the National Data Library to Leeds. Probably much easier for govt to deliver - and quicker - than a tram.

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 30/01/2026

I did a podcast about why the Lovelace Labs should be in Manchester. And other varied ramblings including National Data Library, AI Action Plan, and why Leeds wool matters. youtu.be/WQnWrJlIQRQ?...

youtu.be

The case for Lovelace Labs in Manchester

YouTube video by Hey! Presents

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 26/01/2026

In the absence of the list being published, is anyone I know on the National Data Library Expert Advisory Group? Or know anyone who is?

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 02/01/2026

"Welcome to Decline" -- still one of my favourite graphs from last year. In the late 1970s, Britain's economic fate very clearly split in two. How much you blame Thatcher will depend on your politics, but her leadership is useful to understand the timing. tomforth.co.uk/welcometodec...

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Tom Forth @tomforth.co.uk · 31/12/2025

Answers to the nine most common questions I get about the (now delayed) Leeds tram. tomforth.co.uk/tramquestions/

tomforth.co.uk

Tram questions.

Answers to the nine most common questions I've had about the Leeds tram proposals.

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