Selina

wish people would stop calling proportional representation a change to the system, it's an upgrade

I also came here to laugh at this.

As we all said, Labour didn't win in '24: the Tories lost. People consistently voted for whoever would beat the Tory candidate and Labour were the overall beneficiaries. When there's an actual alternative, we see how colossally unpopular Starmer's fash-curious management consultants truly are.

So the candidate who left school at 16 with no A-Levels and who's spent her whole adult life vocational, manual jobs beat the ivory tower academic turned cushy media pundit, but you can be sure we'll still get plenty more casual description of the latter as "white working class".

Stop Palantir taking over our public services! Our public services aren’t for a secretive profit-hungry US tech firm. Sign the petition to tell the Government to scrap all contracts with secretive US tech firm Palantir.

Our public services aren’t for a secretive profit-hungry US tech firm. Sign the petition to tell the Government to scrap all contracts with secretive US tech firm Palantir. you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/st...

Ohmygod thank you! I’ve been desperately searching for a useable alternative for iPad. I don’t know you but think I love you.

Another reason we should all be up in arms about AI, as it destroys critical thinking, plurality of thought, language, culture etc.

Really? Bloody hell. How did it negatively impact out of interest?

And I’m going to bet they could easily save the money needed by simply employing people directly instead of outsourcing this work to other companies.

Every one of our governments around the world who have committed to vastly expanding data centre construction funding has probably contributed to this insane economic partition in who can afford to buy computation.

Google with AI buttons

Google without AI buttons

I made a filterlist for uBlock Origin to remove Generative AI features on websites. Includes blocks for
* Google AI Summaries
* YouTube Ask button & chat summaries
* GitHub Copilot
* Facebook AI chat
* X's Grok buttons
* Deviantart DreamUp
* Booru AI images
* And more

github.com/Stevoisiak/S...

100%!

Yeah I’m hopeful they won’t but I’ve still just emailed Folio - ’to register my deep aversion to them using him in the forewords of any further books… because even the mention of that man’s name makes my skin crawl’. I figured it can’t hurt!

Literally every bloody book up I pick up has his grubby little fingerprints over it. I was so riled by the news of his comeback that I considered writing a pre-emptive ‘please don’t use Gaiman in your forewords again’ email to folio. I especially *hate* that he’s there in my Gormenghast editions.

I really despise that Stephen Bartlett guy, but he had an interview with this guy called Tristan Harris that I think everyone needs to view about the dangers of AI. I’ve never seen such a comprehensive takedown of it, so well argued, from someone who’s probably best placed to understand the issues.

Thanks so much for your response & I do see your point! But If its not too cheeky can I ask you to consider my MS even so please? Im a huge fan of your writing & so see many positives regardless -Id love the opportunity to be considered- however unlikely the likelihood! 😅 Huge thanks either way!

Sorry to only now be asking - I only discovered & applied to WriteHive this morning! Would you ever consider mentoring an upper middle grade manuscript if it was also horror related? I’m sure that’ll be a firm ‘no‘ as you write adult - but thought it worth asking even the silliest of questions! 😅

The Unbelievable Scale of AI’s Pirated-Books Problem Meta pirated millions of books to train its AI. Search through them here.

NEW: LibGen contains millions of pirated books and research papers, built over nearly two decades. From court documents, we know that Meta torrented a version of it to build its AI. Today, @theatlantic.com presents an analysis of the data set by @alexreisner.bsky.social. Search through it yourself:

One of the most common arguments you hear from fans of generative ‘AI’ is that it’s not plagiarizing people’s work, it’s just learning like a human learns. So I’m going to break down why that’s just not true, and why it can never be true, with the existing systems. 1/

A reminder of the ever growing list of Indie Publishers on Bluesky

Add it to your feeds to see what they’re up to

Give me a shout if you want added

bsky.app/profile/did:...

People often ask me why I’m outspoken about trans rights. I’m not trans so “why do you care?”

I care because what the government is doing to trans people is wrong. I care because we are being conditioned to accept atrocities. 🧵

I’m afraid it’s because the media has become very good at ignoring pandemics, public health, and large aspects of reality.

ERs staffed by private equity firms aim to cut costs by hiring fewer doctors Increasingly, private equity firms shape staffing decisions at hospital emergency rooms, research shows. One apparent effect: Hiring fewer doctors and more health care practitioners who earn far less.

Most people are unaware of the fact. I was, until saw the sign on the doors! Private equity companies have bought many of the country’s ERs. www.npr.org/sections/hea...

I think about this quote fairly regularly (usually around the time I’m shaking my head as some ghoul capes for AI)

Is there anywhere online I can get these gorgeous items? Thanks!

Oh Louie Im incredibly sorry. It’s never enough time. Xx

CLPE Reflecting Realities - Survey of Ethnic Representation within UK Children’s Literature (November 2024) | Centre for Literacy in Primary Education The 7th annual Reflecting Realities Survey of Ethnic Representation within UK Children’s Literature, funded by the Arts Council England, shows that 17% of chi...

The percentage of children’s books with a racially minoritised main character has halved since 2022. A third of primary school children in the UK are Black and brown. The publishing industry needs to do so much better. It’s failing this generation of readers. Full report at clpe.org.uk

Totally agree. There’s no doubt that the pandemic has accelerated fascism. Society has moved from any position of social responsibility and protecting the vulnerable to deciding those lives are now irrelevant and disposable. This normalised health supremacy is heartbreaking.

I can’t comprehend how mask policies in medical settings was ever up for debate.

Me too! It makes me very happy. 😁

I too had an Italo Calvino revelation.. 💖