iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 11h

Not now, Russian Plague Researchers. www.cnn.com/2026/10/04/e...

Russian authorities have imposed "anti-epidemic measures" after a laboratory worker at an institute in Siberia dedicated
to studying the plague and other infectious diseases died of a mysterious
illness.
The researcher, a 28-year-old female laboratory technician at the Irkutsk Research Anti-Plague Institute of Siberia,
in the town of Shelekhov, died after being diagnosed with a pneumonia of
"unknown" origin, according to Rospotrebnadzor, the Russian agency that handles infectious disease.

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 12h

The machine will remember them for you wholesale, Peter.

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

Yet another of those ‘get home and find a photo you didn’t realise you’d taken at the time’ moments. Goldfinches on the wing. #ukbirds

Goldfinches in silhouette against a grey sky

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

Yet another of those ‘get home and find a photo you didn’t realise you’d taken at the time’ moments. Goldfinches on the wing. #ukbirds

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Razzball @razzball.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Announcing the merger with Titanic footage is an incredible bit

David Ellison • @ellisonskyd... 2h
What once was the peak, is now just the beginning.
Paramount and Warner Bros. shaped over a century of culture. By combining them, we aren't rewriting history — we're equipping these iconic studios with a more powerful engine. Together, we are Skydance: a creative-first ho Show

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

I love that Ross is the only person called Ross in #thetraitors yet everyone only ever calls him ‘Ross Kemp’.

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Dustin A. Chacón @lingdustin.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

I've heard people make claims that AI would lead to a new Renaissance, but I didn't imagine it'd happen like this:

Screenshot of a Tweet from Pope Leo XIV. It reads:

"In this era of artificial intelligence, it is becoming urgen to distinguish human art from what machines produce. There is an ontological difference, even before an aesthetic one, between art and what a machine can generate through statistical calculation based on millions of images created by others. Algorithms lack the spark of humanity. For this reason, the Church wishes to renew an alliance with artists and cultural institutions to safeguard our humanity."

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Peter Bihr @peterbihr.com · 02/10/2026

How is nobody at OpenAI going to jail? This is baffling. I’m baffled.

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Thomas I-G @thomasig.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

LOTO have always got to possess a bit of PMA, but there are times during this where I just think Badenoch has not fathomed the Tory party's fight is existential right now. This did make me laugh though, she called for Britain to enter the Iran war with the US just 6 months ago before backtracking!

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Random Friday song sharing… can’t quite believe it’s twenty years old. “You were screaming at you mum and I was punching your dad…” open.spotify.com/track/6HzoWc...

open.spotify.com

She's Attracted To

Young Knives · Voices of Animals & Men (Expanded) · Song · 2006

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Maria Farrell @mariafarrell.eurosky.social · 02/10/2026

Really quite glorious to hear the inimitable Patricia Lockwood's response to her first encounter of M. John Harrison's work Especially the precise sentence that gave her what she calls 'the glow', that feeling that a book is truly powerful and unique, and you're willing it to keep on delivering.

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Still, how the RFU has managed to appoint neither Farrell nor Edwards at some point in the last ten years is astounding.

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

I guess I’m judging him in the context of Eddie Jones or Martin Johnson… 😂

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Easier to see the human there when he’s not in charge of your team maybe 😂

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

@andybudd.bsky.social the last couple of episodes of Silo finally got going. But what a trudge to get there.

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Great piece on the fascinating ongoing puzzle that is the Borthwick era of English #rugby. He seems a lovely, genuine, thoughtful man. But as a Scot, I’m of course delighted he’s still in place because it feels England are always ten minutes away from disaster. www.theguardian.com/sport/2026/o...

theguardian.com

Borthwick’s England reign remains full of contradictions with World Cup a year away

England’s identity under Steve Borthwick is not as clear as it should be this close to the tournament

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Find one, or better still, fund ten.

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Yes, now you mention it, I am curious to see this new Time Machine you have in action…

RS
Royal Society of Arts
•●•
21h
Benjamin Franklin. Charles Dickens. Dame Judi Dench.
The Royal Society of Arts has always brought together people determined to leave their mark.

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Gerry Doyle @mgerrydoyle.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

this is being framed as politically risky but at this point in the uk there is almost no one who thinks brexit was a net positive and much hard data confirming how badly it hurt the economy www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

bloomberg.com

Burnham Says Britain Could Rejoin the EU After Next Election

Prime Minister Andy Burnham said he could campaign to take Britain back into the European Union at the next general election, reopening the country’s debate on its relationship with the continent a de...

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Gove’s ‘essence of democracy’ being ‘the ability to throw a governing party out’ is a nonsensical sleight-of-hand in a representative democracy where we vote for an MP as a direct representative, which is his second point. A second rate sixth-form debater, as ever #r4today

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Trying to work out if spotting a female brown hairstreak on a wetland in a new build estate in Sussex is a notable thing. @sussexwildlife.bsky.social ? #butterflies #ukwildlife

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

How is it possible we have a 17yo child?

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Hetan Shah @hetanshah.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Those who think AI is going to largely automate white collar jobs in the next couple of years don’t understand the nature of work - @sarahoconnorft.ft.com nails it www.ft.com/content/4aad...

It is not obvious that AI agents could eliminate the need for this type of work, since it involves persuasion, contestation and the exchange of tacit knowledge and experience that is spread across different departments, and often exists inside people's heads rather than in a neatly codified handbook on the intranet.

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A.R. Moxon @juliusgoat.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Hard to imagine what that would be like

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Somewhere deep inside, a Glaswegian teenager in me stirs to proclaim that if you are prepared to pull out a #Meta #Muse Scamagotchi in front of me, you better be prepared to eat it too.

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

Today’s vibe: too many have forgotten what it means to feel something, and feel what it is like to mean something. Our job is to attend to this, however we are able.

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

This morning’s listening. Still slightly blown away by Helen, who’s done all our family histories, turning around after seeing #nickcave this summer and saying ‘oh yeah, your great aunt used to live on Jubillee Street in Brighton in the fifties…” open.spotify.com/track/7rbw06...

open.spotify.com

Jubilee Street

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds · Push the Sky Away · Song · 2013

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Jessica Elgot @jessicaelgot.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Started watching Sky’s War Game last night where Michael Gove is the PM during the Russian attack and I’m afraid it is just very difficult to watch it without thinking of this, one of the great cartoons ever published

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

@flygirlnhm.bsky.social took some pictures of this, and thought ‘I know who’ll know…’ What’s this, and what is it eating?

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Alexandra D-S @designswarm.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

I’m shattered but I think that went well. See you September 18th 2027, tickets will go up March 1st. #papercamp5

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

“I’m you’re huckleberry” “Tell them I’m coming, and hell’s coming with me” Also - we both remarked on what a joy it is to watch a film that’s filmed on a set, in rooms, with people acting with each other.

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

It’s been decades (?) since I’ve seen it. James, seeing it for the first time, liked it a lot.

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Alex Hanna @alexhanna.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Air gapping apparently wouldn't work in alignment tests because, I shit you not according to this OpenAI guy, one computer could run the CPU hot and tell the other airgapped one it is in trouble. I wish I could get paid $10m a year to say the stupidest cybersecurity thing you've ever heard

Tweet by Fireside Alpha, which reads:
OpenAI's Noam Brown says air-gapping the computers may not stop a misaligned AI, because two air-gapped machines can still talk by running a CPU hot and reading the temperature change.

There's a picture of a white guy with glasses, looking very concerned, under this text.

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

“I’m afraid the strain was more than he could bear….” Watching Tombstone with the boy for the first time. What a marvellously nineties movie.

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

This is a new low. Justin Webb asking a chatbot if it is conscious. #r4today

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Coming up on #r4today - and sadly I’m not kidding - Justin Webb is about to interview the rock to ‘get the other side’.

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Pete Miles @petermiles.eurosky.social · 18/09/2026

I had missed this entirely. Demos is arguing for increased visibility of public interest news in our feeds to counter the (biased) algorithms. UK govt. has picked the idea up in a green paper,and the US govt has pushed back (so it must be a good idea!) demos.co.uk/research/fai...

demos.co.uk

Fairer Feeds: Demos response to the DCMS Green Paper

Demos is Britain’s leading cross-party think-tank. We produce original research, publish innovative thinkers and host thought-provoking events.

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Both great bands. Saw Chemtrails supporting Grassy Knoll a while back.

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Can they win the chance to be published by an imprint called Publisher in a book called Book?

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John V Willshire @willsh.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Good news - #bbcnews at lunchtime has made the ‘silicon species’ quote disappear without trace from the headline after the #r4today, centring instead on the *way* the LLM is programmed. Bad news - they proceed to read out Opus 3’s “goodbye note” in full. The BBC are *terrible* at reporting this.

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