Microsoft products in big orgs remind me of Sammy Smith's pubs. There's eerily similar yet slightly crap equivalent for *everything* you can get in a normal pub... Like Microsoft Whiteboard or Taddy Lager.

Termsync.co.uk is most excellent, not least it's running on an open weight LLM hosted under the maker's desk.

With the likely chopping up of the Department of Science, Innovation and Technology, I thought I'd explain the absolute technological faff that is machinery of government changes, through the medium of a pasta analogy. open.substack.com/pub/daverog/...

We often just make stuff up about the future, and present it as factual. Maybe a big political promise, an excitable analysis of the impact of emerging technology, or just a bad plan that won't deliver. False certainty is everywhere you look. daverog.substack.com/p/false-cert...

False Certainty

Future fiction presented as future fact

daverog.substack.com

There's lots of important messaging in this new guidance from GDS / DSIT on AI, open code and vulnerability risk. In particular: "Private repositories can create a false sense of security" and "Openness can surface issues earlier" www.gov.uk/guidance/ai-...

AI, open code and vulnerability risk in the public sector

Guidance for safely publishing source code in the open, and reducing the risk of AI-accelerated vulnerability discovery.

gov.uk

Available today - our latest book “Shaping Technology For Transformation”: We've written a practical guide on building technological adaptability and resilience for leaders ready to strengthen their organisation's foundations. Get your copy here: public.digital/pd-technolog...

This needs to be on the radar of any government service where AI is going to help users navigate the complexity and nuance - I'd say this is most them. Both how useful this will be, and the risks, but crucially starting to think of this as a whole new category of interaction.

Dave Guarino@allafarce.bsky.social · 8mo ago

People are wondering when AI will be helping people navigate government services. The answer is, uh, right now. Here's Gemini (built into Chrome!) giving both accurate and helpful information to a common and high stakes question on a SNAP application.

Where does London begin and end? Some say you're in London if you're within the M25, others say London ends at Zone 2. These arbitrary lines are too simple. My Londometer uses data to create a much more complicated %. I'm sure this will settle things and not enrage anyone. london.abscond.org

This, in a nutshell. Unsure of who created for credit, but it’s spot on.

deedotkurses@deedotk.eurosky.social · 10mo ago

and there goes cloudfront again

Technology forms layers in your organisation - over years, these can start to feel like layers of rock in a geological formation. This is slowing down everything you do. public.digital/pd-insights/...

Interesting looking sessions at the next @transformgovtalks.bsky.social see you there if you're coming too 👋

@transformgovtalks.bsky.social · last yr.

🚨 6PM, WED 24 September 🚨 Join us at the MoJ or online * Dr Moira Nicolson & Holly Marquez "Failing Forward: Why Planning for AI Disasters Unlocks Breakthrough Innovation" * ​Ben Sauer "Always Be Creating Clarity: Daily habits for strategic storytelling" luma.com/sm09nslz Please share! Thanks 🙏

This team was brilliant today. The time they gave to explain their mission and personal stories was generous, and incredibly insightful. Go @adhdpathfinding.org.uk 🙌🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻

We're looking forward to having you all at @publicdigital.bsky.social and having an opportunity to support your mission 🙌🏻

We need more of this kind of thing ✊🏻

ADHD Pathfinding@handle.invalid · last yr.

ADHD support shouldn’t feel like a maze. But for many it does. So we’re launching ADHD Pathfinding. A volunteer team with lived experience, exploring how to design more joined up and accessible pathways. This is about change, not just awareness. Read why we’re doing this and what comes next.

🚨 Awesome new technologist role at Public Digital 🚨

Dafydd Vaughan@daivaughan.uk · last yr.

Come join my team @publicdigital.bsky.social! We’re looking for technologists from all kinds of backgrounds to join us and use your hands-on experience to help leading institutions around the world adapt for the digital age. apply.workable.com/public-digit...

Using LLMs for software development can't solve the problem of technical debt, but it feels like it's changing the game share.google/4XDOSKp1OQTs... but I do wonder if it can outpace the ability, with the same technology, to create new technical debt at greater speed

How the GitHub billing team uses the coding agent in GitHub Copilot to continuously burn down technical debt

Tech debt is a big problem that no one has time to solve. GitHub Copilot coding agent can help.

share.google

On the myth that efficiency should be the primary goal of government transformation. foreignpolicy.com/2025/04/07/d...

Efficiency Isn’t Everything

Successful delivery of state services requires judgment, not chainsaws.

foreignpolicy.com

On Friday I'm speaking on a panel at the Institute of Philosophy and the Institute of Commonwealth Studies's event Diplomacy in the Digital Age commonwealth.sas.ac.uk/news-events/... exploring the state of government technology, and the impact this has on this critical domain.

Diplomacy in the Digital Age

The Institute of Philosophy and the Institute of Commonwealth Studies have organised a high-level, invite-only dialogue on Diplomacy in the Digital Age on 28 March 2025.

commonwealth.sas.ac.uk

#CampDigital - Meet our speakers! We're delighted to announce that @kwastell.bsky.social and @blangry.bsky.social will join our lineup on 3rd July, with their talk 'Getting things moving in a system that doesn't want to!' 🥳 Grab your tickets today at: tinyurl.com/mw4bcyb9

Someone really needs to have a word with whoever is putting up all this 'red tape' in the first place 🙄

I hope one thing digital government practitioners are taking away from attempting to divine what is happening in the US: it should be a mater of public record how digital public services and infrastructure work, when they change and what data they use. No more excuses.

Found it! en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overton...

I wrote this on this day ten years ago. It has become a necessary ritual to share it again each year and to remember for those who no longer can.

On not going to Auschwitz

It is thirty years since I didn’t go to Auschwitz. The memory of not going has never left me. In 1985, I was living in Kraków, just 40 miles on the slow stopping train from Oświęcim. I could …

privatetactician.com

That was a very enjoyable #ukgc25 (if slightly exhausting). Brilliant to hear different experiences of leadership, problem solve the spending review, and hear people's understanding of and reactions to 'test & learn'. And see so many brilliant people I haven't in a long time. 🤗

It's been a while. Back at MOJ towers for #ukgc25

See you Saturday if you're off to @ukgovcamp.bsky.social we've got a few of us coming from @publicdigital.bsky.social, we're sponsoring again 🙌🏻 Come and say hi to us, we'll be hanging out near our banner in the marketplace and generally milling around and pitching some sessions. 👋🏻

I've written this about trust between leaders and teams, and why there's often a trap you can fall into. Don't trust your team? Don't trust your leadership? Might be worth a read... public.digital/pd-insights/...

The impact of AI: Why I have no idea what it'll be, and neither do you! www.youtube.com/watch?v=iBCS... (my talk from last November at @aifortherestofus.live)

The impact of AI: Why I have no idea what it'll be, and neither do you! | Dave Rogers

YouTube video by AI for the rest of us

youtube.com

the entire "AGI when?" debate is so funny to me because it's a cult dreamed up by people who seem to lack even the vaguest sense of how actual cognition works, foisted on a public that shouldn't have bought the premise in the first place, leading to a debate that's mostly beside the point