Matej Žganec
@mzganec.bsky.social
Friendly neighborhood Eurocrat. Discussing transport, mobility, urbanism, environment, energy, sustainability, EU and international relations.
The European response to the #Ceuta crisis will go down in history as an own goal that emboldened Europe’s adversaries. Instead of showing solidarity, Italy & co sought to punish it. Now, with the vast majority of arrivals already returned, the failure wasn’t border control but European solidarity.
It's worth stressing that the *magnitude* by which some of these records are being broken is nothing short of astonishing
Ed Hawkins@edhawkins.org · last mo.Hotter and hotter and hotter www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Exclusive: I have seen OpenAI's audited financials for 2024 and 2025. In 2025, OpenAI had $13.07 billion in revenue and $34 billion in costs. $867 million of its revenue came from SoftBank, and $303 million came from Microsoft. www.wheresyoured.at/exclusive-op...
Exclusive: OpenAI Losses Increased Nearly 8X in 2025, With Spending Hitting $34 Billion
Soundtrack: In Flames - Colony To further support my independent journalism, please subscribe to my premium newsletter. It’s $7 a month or $70 a year. If you’re subscribed to the free newsletter and ...
wheresyoured.at
“Russian operatives ran their sabotage & provocation campaign remotely through social media & the messaging app Telegram, we found, creating fake online far-right & Muslim groups, which were used to organise acts of vandalism in the UK & stir up division and fear” www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Russia was behind arson attacks targeting PM, BBC reveals
Evidence shows Russians directing the plot and stoking tensions with fake far-right and Muslim groups.
bbc.co.uk
Tax cuts defund public services & barely help Real Folkz, episode 57,298
Craig Harrington@craigipedia.bsky.social · 3mo agoSuspending the Federal Gas Tax in the middle of a fuel price spike does nothing to relieve your pain at the pump, but it *does* drain investments in federal highway and infrastructure maintenance. There's no guarantee it would meaningfully reduce prices, or even be passed to consumers at all.
I wrote about being inundated with AI writing at every turn, unwittingly turning my brain into the AI police, and how shitty AI writing is randomly showing up in my real life outside of the internet www.404media.co/your-ai-use-...
Your AI Use Is Breaking My Brain
AI writing is impossible to avoid, is making everything sound the same, and is driving us crazy.
404media.co
Look around. The case for more, not less, liberal arts education is stronger than ever. Also, the way you know this is nonsense is that Jay Caspian King & everyone else who writes for the New Yorker will be obsessed with sending their children to elite private colleges, just as it's been forever.
Jeff (Gutenberg Parenthesis) Jarvis@jeffjarvis.bsky.social · 3mo agoWTF, NYer. "If we agree that college primarily serves a credentialling process that stamps select young people as worthy of work..." We do not. So much for the bastion of erudite journalism. This is sensationalism, damaging our most vital institution: education. www.newyorker.com/news/fault-l...
In Seattle's Pike Place Market, vendors claimed that removing cars would cripple them. Nope. Sales actually rose. Remember: Studies show that biz owners consistently exaggerate how many customers drive and undercount those who walk, bike, or ride transit. Info: www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
Pike Place Market Pedestrianization Pilot Boosts Sales and Visits
All signs point to Seattle's pilot program limiting car access to Pike Place being a success: sales were up 6.5% in 2025 compared to 2024, and the number of local visitors jumped by 5.6%. As the City ...
theurbanist.org
No more talk of "transit death spirals" in New York City. Since Central Business District Tolling Program (congestion pricing) was introduced in 2025, ridership on #NYC subway is up to 1.28 billion/yr—a 7.7% increase. 72,600 fewer cars enter Lower Manhattan/day. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
NYC Subway Ridership Jumps 7.7% Due to Congestion Pricing Toll
New York City’s controversial congestion pricing toll is helping to boost subway ridership, according to a committee that represents transit riders.
bloomberg.com
There has always existed a sort of Jevon’s paradox for productivity tools. Part of the pitch is that the tools save time, but the workers who adopt them only end up working harder for longer hours. I experienced this in architecture when AutoCAD replaced hand drafting…
When Using AI Leads to “Brain Fry”
As firms increasingly incentivize employees to build and oversee complex teams of agents—for example, by measuring and rewarding token consumption as a proxy for performance—people are finding themsel...
hbr.org
Keep this in mind when people claim cars mean business — closing Central #Madrid to cars over holidays resulted in a 9.5% boost in retail spending on its main shopping street: STUDY. There was also a 71% drop in air pollution. Via @carltonreid.com in @forbes.com. #citymakingmath #citiesforpeople
Closing Central Madrid To Cars Resulted In 9.5% Boost To Retail Spending, Finds Bank Analysis
City of Madrid significantly boosted the takings of its shops and restaurants last Christmas by banning cars from the CBD, finds an analysis by Spain's second largest bank.
forbes.com
Epidemic abuse: "One-third of all Americans killed by strangers are killed by police" "White nationalists pervade law enforcement 10,000 family dogs killed by police every year (DOJ: "epidemic") "Police solve just 2% of all major crimes" "NYPD Costs $10 Billion a Year "50% of municipal budgets
Things that make you go huh 🤔 Chico spends 48.7% of it’s budget on the Police Department. By comparison, NYC spends 7.7%, Los Angeles 25.5% and Chicago comes in high at 37%.
Posted in r/ChicoCA by u/StandUpChico • 819 points and 490 comments
old.reddit.com
NYTimes: affirmative action for mediocre editors angry at MeToo@originalist.bsky.social · 7mo ago"never want to hear MAGA claim to believe in freedom. Masked agents of the state random people into unmarked cars while saying “liberals ruined the country” bsky.app/profile/maxb... "government money to pay ICE agents larger sums of money, yet teachers buy their own pencils bsky.app/profile/orig...
These freaks want territorial expansion and they know Trump will do everything he can to deliver. This isn’t just a tweet from some random asshole either. This is Stephen Miller’s wife. Miller was in the room with Trump during the kidnapping of Maduro.
The story of Europe’s economic decline while US is 'soaring' is everywhere. But it is wrong. It is a myth. Europe delivers more leisure, longer life expectancy, less inequality than the US. Gabriel Zucman dismantles the myths.
Decline, what decline? The myth of dying Europe
There is a widespread view that, by comparison with the USA, Europe is in economic and social decline. But, Zucman argues, it's not true
eastangliabylines.co.uk
Elon Musk promised a lot of things by 2025 - colonists arriving on Mars - xAI achieving AGI - Tesla robotaxis serving half the U.S. - completely driverless robotaxis - a Tesla Roadster demo - DOGE cutting trillions none of them happened mashable.com/article/elon-mus...
Everything Elon Musk promised in 2025, but didn't deliver
Musk is now infamous for his false promises, but even this is excessive.
mashable.com
Enshittification's first three stages - from a platform people love to a platform businesses profit off of to a platform that hurts consumers and businesses alike - are well-known. But I argue we're in a fourth stage where stocks have become enshittified too. www.wheresyoured.at/the-enshitti...
The people who profited most from the cancel culture/free speech panic were less interested in actual freedom of speech than establishing their own control over public discourse. You don't even have to take my word for it. www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2025/1...
Thing is: this should have been obvious BEFORE regulators greenlit Waymo. Having business be the tail that wags the dog of government--as neoliberal ideology would have it--simply privatizes gains and sticks ordinary people with the costs of being corporate guinea pigs.
State Senator Jesse Arreguin@jessearreguin.bsky.social · 8mo agoAutonomous vehicles that are unable to adapt to emergencies present a risk to our public safety. With such vehicles being considered for deployment in the East Bay, more must first be done to ensure they will operate safely when the unexpected happens.
US tech leaders say we need climate-disrupting and water-depleting data centers because we need the US to be the leaders in GenAI innovation. Apparently their idea of innovation is overwhelming our information ecosystems with deception & manipulation.
Craig Silverman@craigsilverman.bsky.social · 8mo agoI've been investigating digital deception for ~15yrs and 2025 was the worst year. VC-backed bot farms, endless AI slop, industrial level scams, abusive AI nudifiers, Meta paying $ for hoaxes... Deception was legitimized, monetized & shoved down the public’s throat: indicator.media/p/2025-the-y...
How Elon Musk's DOGE became a fiasco of deception and accounting gimmicks -- failing in its mission to slash government waste Explore this gift article from The New York Times. You can read it for free without a subscription. www.nytimes.com/2025/12/23/u...
How Did DOGE Disrupt So Much While Saving So Little?
nytimes.com
Year 1 data on congestion pricing in Manhattan… * Vehicle traffic: -11% * Foot traffic: +3.4% * Storefront vacancy: -0.9% * Pollution: -22% * Revenue for mass transit: $548M So YES this has been a huge success.
This is obscene. Why can't other politicians say that? The 25 richest families are collectively $358.7 billion richer than a year ago, with a combined fortune totaling $2.9 trillion.
No surprise: new analysis shows that heat pumps can deliver excellent performance even in older buildings with no meaningful correlation between building age & heat pump efficiency. This is in line with my own experience of having a heat pump in a 1880 Victorian home with only modest insulation.
Amazing, the @dailymail.co.uk manages to publish an entire lengthy feature bewailing (!!!!) the exodus of Poles from Britain without once mentioning Brexit. Apparently this outcome (which is surely exactly what they campaigned for in 2016) is all the fault of Keir Starmer. mol.im/a/15379789
The great exodus: How Poles are ditching UK for their booming homeland
New statistics reveal that while 7,000 Poles arrived in the year ending last June, 25,000 returned home: a net outflow of 18,000. The UK's total Polish population has shrunk to 750,000.
mol.im
Energy transitions can happen faster than we think: In 2000 almost 90% of Denmark's electricity was from fossil fuels. In 2024 less than 10% of Danish electricity was from fossil fuels.
Gedankenspiel: Donald Trump ist ein Scheinriese. Die Umfragewerte sind rekordniedrig. Er hat den Handelskrieg gegen China verloren. Russland gegenüber knickt er immer wieder ein. Die Europäer haben seinen “Friedensplan” verhindert. Bald kommen die Epstein-files. Someone call the bluff!
Lesson for Europeans sucking up to Trump - look how much you're getting screwed while Brazil, India & China defy him and end up winning. "When Macron's like, 'Oh Donald you're a genius'" says Ben Rhodes, "they keep getting the rug pulled from under them" podcasts.apple.com/be/podcast/p...
