So basically National are floundering in the polls and are resorting to their default tactic of bashing beneficiaries even though the employer can test during National's mandated employment trial period, and our labs are already struggling. www.rnz.co.nz/news/politic...

National promises random drug testing for jobseeker beneficiaries

National is promising to introduce random drug testing for those on the jobseeker benefit to ensure they're "ready for work".

rnz.co.nz

Yikes, I didn't realise NZ had a t*rf party in the election.

I struggle to articulate how much I despise them, and even if I was a centre-right neoliberal I still wouldn't vote National simply because these dropkicks would be in coalition with them. www.rnz.co.nz/news/politic...

ACT wants to freeze minimum wage and reduce youth training rate

The ACT Party would freeze the adult minimum wage for three years and reduce the training minimum wage for workers under 20 years old to 60 percent, if re-elected.

rnz.co.nz

Ewww, I really don't want my voicemail filling up with bullshit from political parties, thanks.

I think the chief takeaway from that bizarre Tucker Carlson / Jacob Rees‑Mogg interview is that while the Tories are fucking awful, they fall within an understood spectrum of fucking awful, but heaven only knows what's going on with the Americans.

The only possible reason you could want an LLM recognised as having moral agency is because you want to use it in autonomous weapons systems.

Are you a business, Susan? Specifically what goods and services are you providing?

RNZ News Feeds@rnzrss.bsky.social · 6d ago

Why can businesses claim back GST but I can’t? – Ask Susan

Pick me girl says "pick me".

RNZ News Feeds@rnzrss.bsky.social · last wk.

Opportunity party leader Qiulae Wong on recognising the good and the bad of AI

The door is over there. Please don't let it hit you in the ass on your way out the way this skeet did.

Hallucigenia Diablo@hallucigeniadiablo.bsky.social · last wk.

I moved to New Zealand (from Portland!) over 20 years ago and the signage had me thinking Kiwi's are incredibly inept/stupid. Fortunately I know have 20 years experience confirming it.

When I see well-known brands that should know better using AI slop advertising, it sends me straight to their competition.

Sweary Chris Hipkins isn't a successful substitute for charisma. Some consultant or other must have told him to butch it up, but chippy Chippy is not the tea. It just seems forced. #NZPol

Odd. They don't look like the Victorian religious and cultural movement that argued that Christian virtue was best expressed through physical strength, athletic discipline, moral courage, and public duty. They do, however, look like they are legally obliged to stay 300 feet from schools.

Radley Balko@radleybalko.bsky.social · 2w ago

“Muscular Christianity” means that when when you’re glazing the serial predator president who deports refugee children, executes fishermen, and builds idols to himself, you TYPE REALLY HARD.

Festival of Design Aotearoa announces 50-plus Whanganui and Palmerston North events. Whanganui will be the heart of the new 10-day Festival of Design Aotearoa on October 16-25, offering exhibitions, talks, workshops, public activations and markets. www.nzherald.co.nz/whanganui-ch...

Whanganui to anchor first design festival in Aotearoa with 50 events

The 10-day festival will bring design events to the region from October 16.

nzherald.co.nz

www.theguardian.com/global/comme...

Weird fact, Kate McKinnon used to date Bari Weiss in college.

I think its weird people obsessing over Gerwig casting Streep as Aslan's voice (it's annoying at best and will probably sound different, if still American, in post), when she moved the entire timeline forward half a decade and made Jadis a normal height club kid.

Earth Sciences collects a lot of data for many organisations, including environmental ones. Typical Greenpeace going after the bottom of the food chain when the real villains are the mining companies and politicians like Shane Jones.

RNZ News Feeds@rnzrss.bsky.social · 2w ago

Greenpeace activists board NZ research vessel Tangaroa

When sleezy creep A goes after sleezy creep B for being a sleezy creep (though I'm fairly sure sleezy creep B is closeted and being performative), it doesn't make sleezy creep A any less of a sleezy creep themselves.

Ideological purists won't like it, but it would certainly be more effective than carbon credits. I could see something similar working for water too. That's not to say they should carve up national parks or anything like that. www.1news.co.nz/2026/09/25/b...

Benedict Cumberbatch backs NZ's push to put a price on nature

Exclusive: The Hollywood A-lister on the urgent need to restore nature, and how it chimes with a recent move by the NZ government.

1news.co.nz

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death...

The Spinoff@thespinoff.bsky.social · 2w ago

Where to eat in North East Valley and North Dunedin – an insider’s guide

I suppose my chief disappointments in Nicky Hager's "Dirty Work" are that it's quite thin for having been this long in the works, and at least a third of it is stuff the wonk and hack community already knew, but it does pull it together nicely.

The Facial Expressions of Tethys by artist Julius von Bismarck. A suspended high-sea buoy that moves in real time. Sensors on a twin buoy out in the Atlantic Ocean send live satellite data to motors inside the museum. This makes the indoor buoy copy the exact, real-time movements of the ocean waves.

Today I learned about the weird connection between Lord of the Rings, Giorgia Meloni and Italian Neo-Fascism.

"Do you feel lucky, punk?"