Condolences to all the lazy people who will now have burned out their brains on the chatbot and will now have to navigate basic human tasks all on their own.

The Independent@the-independent.com · 23h ago

ChatGPT down: OpenAI chatbot not working in major outage

BBC News item on driverless taxis in London. Good luck transferring a technology trained on massive American roads to the UK.

Anyone going out for Academic New Year's Eve, or are we all just watching Jools Holland's University Hootenanny again?

Bank Holiday, so let's see where the Channel 4 *Frasier* cycle is... oh, it's the Anthony LaPaglia years.

Reading Celia Fremlin's *Appointment with Yesterday*, and for the second time the Faber reissues suffer from text reading software not recognising words.

WH Smith - sorry, TJ Hooker or whatever it's called now - in Truro is closing down, just as book and CD sales are surging again. It's astonishing how badly WH Smith has been run over the last few decades.

Staying with my parents and the rescue helicopter just passed overheard on the return to Newquay Airport.

Dreadnought Holiday@dreadships.bsky.social · 6d ago

News article here:

Reminded of that thing a year or two ago which claimed that nobody had heard of Ann Radcliffe.

Rhys Kaminski-Jones@rhyskamjones.bsky.social · 6d ago

There's currently a big article in the New York Times claiming Castle Rackrent by Maria Edgeworth could only be found in weird Amazon editions ten years ago because she'd been "erased from history" and - huh?

*Quatermass 2* has just started on @talkingpicturestv.bsky.social, and this point still stands.

Christopher Pittard@christopherpittard.bsky.social · 3mo ago

Watching *The Quatermass Xperiment* on @talkingpicturestv.bsky.social. It always takes me a while to get used to Brian Donlevy; Quatermass shouldn't sound like he could end a sentence with the word "toots."

This frontispiece in my book just made me laugh a lot. Is this Buddhist reincarnation, or some other form of afterlife?

Absurd behaviour by Morrison's in Bodmin. IT'S AUGUST.

I read "The Great Bear Cult" this afternoon, and it's brilliantly funny as well as startlingly prescient about the cult of Paddington.

Christopher Pittard@christopherpittard.bsky.social · 2w ago

Back in Cornwall to visit parents, and Oxfam Books in Truro provided an Alasdair Gray I don't already own.

All that talent, and proving every day that you can be kind, funny, philanthropic and generous alongside riches and fame. The tech bros should be shamed by the example Dolly Parton set.

Dave Andress@davidandress.bsky.social · last wk.

Dolly at Glasto, loving every second. www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwBN...

Isobel Armstrong on saving English. Brilliant as ever. tribunemag.co.uk/2026/08/savi...

Saving English

The government’s drive for ‘vocational’ education is accelerating the death of the humanities, at a time when the study of literature is more vital than ever.

tribunemag.co.uk

Ooh, I got that fraudulent email pretending to be from Henley Literary Festival.

I've had this sketch stuck in my head almost all summer. Its brilliance lies in combining the unsettling with a pinpoint accurate parody of the absurdity of the original version of Masterchef.

Scarred For Life@scarredforlife.bsky.social · 2w ago

The line between horror and comedy can be a thin one. Vic and Bob's brilliant Masterchef sketch from 1995 made me laugh out loud while my skin was crawling. "HE IS SAD!"

Back in Cornwall to visit parents, and Oxfam Books in Truro provided an Alasdair Gray I don't already own.

UKHE-wide group chats expose you to just how much governance in the sector is failing. 'Consultation periods' as obvious shams; decisions made without anyone knowing where; 'agreements' blatantly ignored; trustees uninformed/uncurious. Doesn't make headlines but it's part of the spiraling crisis.

Plashing Vole@plashingvole.bsky.social · 3w ago

People my group have written to about the impact of mass redundancies on teaching quality, research and PhD supervision: VC; DVC for Education; DVC for Research; Dean; Head of School; Students’ Union President; Chair of Governors. People who have replied: 0.

Having to tap the sign that says "Don't give your novel multiple narrators if you can't write different voices for them."

The problem can be summed up with one question: how many people who can name Jason Arday can name the plagiarising professor at the same institution who is still in post? How many people can name the VC criticised by name in an employment tribunal this week?

This is the coverage of Arday **just in the Telegraph** in the UK. This is only the first four pages of results, just in one outlet.

Indeed - local paper worked tirelessly to get his story out for years because so much resistance/indifference to proving what he was up to manchestermill.co.uk/whistleblowe...

Whistleblowers and secret helpers: How our investigation into the University of Greater Manchester came together

Years of meticulously researched stories into vice chancellor George Holmes amounted to nothing. And then our reporter stumbled upon a strange-looking contract.

manchestermill.co.uk

Nick Gould@profng.bsky.social · 3w ago

The VC of the Uni of Greater Manchester has just been sacked for misuse of over £1m of university funds. Hardly a mention in the media. Not black so not newsworthy.

Can the UK government now send an emergency alert to teenagers to tell them that they don’t have to squeeze onto an overcrowded course at a Russell Group university because there are lots of other good universities around the country just waiting for their call

The UK, right now:

UK government wildfire warning just made me drop the fag I was smoking while walking across a cornfield and um

Did we all get that emergency alert thing just now?

My edition of Conan Doyle's The Land of Mist and Other Spiritualist Writings is now available for pre-order with a 30% discount! Thanks to @edinburghup.bsky.social and Douglas Kerr, @theprofrog.bsky.social, @jamesmachin.bsky.social, and @profdarryljones.bsky.social for their guidance in the project!

Solar Eclipse (1900) filmed by magician, Nevil Maskelyne the first moving image of an astronomical phenomenon

Clive Myrie ending the BBC News with "the day the moon cast its shadow on the sun." But in a solar eclipse the moon casts its shadow on the Earth, doesn't it?

I wouldn't call myself a cartoonist, but I had the vision and just needed it to be on paper to the best of my ability.