John PHI⑊PIN

Fri, 09 Oct 2026 22:02:48 +1300

FOR FUCK SAKE - but then consider the source:

🔗 Holborn and St Pancras by-election results: Zack Polanski loses bid to become MP | News Politics | Metro News

On the click through …

Green Party leader Zack Polanski has failed in his bid to become an MP, with a narrow loss in the Holborn and St Pancras by-election.

Narrow!

Victorious candidate Sagal Abdi-Wali, the leader of Camden Council since May, secured 12,292 votes to Polanski’s 8,928.

27,309 ballot papers were cast in Holborn - some 97 of which were spoiled.

• Abdi-Wali: 45.17% (roughly; see spoiled papers) • Polanski: 32.81% (ditto)

The point being that a majority of roughly 12.4 percentage points of all ballots cast is not ‘narrow’.

Votes were cast and Zack was cast out and thrown off the island.

Fri, 09 Oct 2026 17:30:16 +1300

🎵 4 Additions to the library this week - thank you @lmika for the first three. The images only worked on 4 - Samplextra by Lee Rosevere wasn’t coming up (attempting to discover in 🍎 Music) - what else am I missing.

The other album is the artist I mentioned to you that sits atop my heap.

Fri, 09 Oct 2026 17:12:08 +1300

📸 Talk about throwback Friday … took me back a bit. I had this exact one in my childhood bedroom.

Fri, 09 Oct 2026 15:21:48 +1300

🔗 The Pain Is Coming. Choose When You Pay.

People who look straight at a coming loss don’t hurt less when they lose someone, but they often have fewer regrets, because they said what they wanted to say and showed up while they could.

💬 Joan Westenberg

Fri, 09 Oct 2026 15:21:11 +1300

🔗 A quote from Ben Affleck I did not expect to read … 🤯

..and then again … this one not via Simon Willison, Ben on Social Media …

“He credited Daniel Day-Lewis, Meryl Streep, Viola Davis, and Denzel Washington as ‘brilliant actors’, noting that “

It doesn’t help me appreciate their movies to see what they had for lunch.

💬 Ben Affleck

Fri, 09 Oct 2026 11:43:50 +1300

🔗 Daring Fireball: Jaguar Type 01

I agree about the logo, though not convinced my feelings would stop me buying a beautiful car - which this one - based on the images in the click through - is not. So moot?

Fri, 09 Oct 2026 11:41:29 +1300

🪦 🔗 Thank You Mark Stephens, aka Robert X. Cringely

.. sorry to read this ‘Bob’ - always enjoyed your work when I saw it. Have to say, you kept quiet - but I had this feeling. Hope your son gets that `Product out the door’.

Fri, 09 Oct 2026 11:27:05 +1300

Thoughts❓

Fri, 09 Oct 2026 05:47:26 +1300

💬 me … many many years ago.

Fri, 09 Oct 2026 05:44:45 +1300

💬 There is something called bad revenue. This avoids some of it … but as Charlie says .. it’s a floor. I will drop some other issues in the comments later.

In case you were wondering …

CAC is Customer Acquisition Cost
LTV is Customer Lifetime Value

Fri, 09 Oct 2026 05:38:38 +1300

💬

Thu, 08 Oct 2026 12:24:14 +1300

Oh good: 🔗 Joyous - Replace surveys with dynamic AI chats and real-time action

My position?

For years we called AI an answer machine. One question in, one answer out. Vending machine.

A survey is a vending machine too. Ten questions, five minutes, a finish line.

A dynamic AI chat has no finish line. It wants you to think out loud, and at length.

AI removes the cost of asking questions. It doesn’t remove the cost of answering them. It raises it. And that cost lands on the respondent.

So most people will do what they do when a vending machine asks for a conversation: give it the minimum, or leave. After all, what’s in it for them?

Prediction: the people who go deep won’t be representative. They’ll be the ones who like talking to AI. You’ve swapped a bad sample for a self-selected one.

Here we go again …

Tech saves the organisation money and pushes the cost onto the people.

Thu, 08 Oct 2026 11:57:50 +1300

👁️ This is what success looks like. It has been a minute of two since I Iast saw this.

Thu, 08 Oct 2026 11:41:51 +1300

Historically I have had a lot of blogs and for whatever reason it is only (relatively) recently that I started using this 27 year old domain to host one.

Before that I always felt that I needed another URL. Many of them over the years it turns out.

Thanks to @manton and micro.blog the challenge of amalgamation is easily fixed. And as I close various URLs down - and let the domains go - that is what I have done. (Thats one reason why there are quite as many posts on here than you might normally expect. (Though I am no 🔗 Dave Winer❗️)

Not so easily fixed is how the blogs all look in their new home. But since I am pretty much the only person that reads new posts on this blog - much less posts from 10 years ago - I don’t spend time much time sorting it out - life is too short. Instead I fix them one by one on a very ad hoc basis.

🖇️ Like this one about the sister of a long time friend who won the Nobel Prize .. just done. The. images weren’t there and despite a thorough ‘PHI⑊PINian’ and new Siri search could not find anything locally.

And so back to my original source (referenced in the original (newly fixed) post - and pictures provided. (Thanks Ros). My world is once more complete - other than whatever is on my new task tracker over in Craft.

Thu, 08 Oct 2026 10:50:28 +1300

Note for @manton - no action needed.

Not yet managed to get to a repeatable case to create a ticket, but it happens a lot. Upload an image - use it - all works fine.

Later when in the upload library spot that there are two copies of the image. (But which one is the post using? So you leave them both.)

I will narrow the exact behaviour that causes this before reporting it. In the meantime. anyone else seeing this behaviour?

Thu, 08 Oct 2026 10:43:39 +1300

😂😂😂

🔗 John Ternus is already doing it all

Alas, Apple customers will not know the joys of having an AI ask us to do all the things we’ve already tried all over again before advising we log out of iCloud and then back in.

💬 The Macalope

Thu, 08 Oct 2026 10:36:02 +1300

🔗 Don McCullin: Vietnam | AnOther

You Can’t Save a Life with a Nikon Camera

💬 Don McCullin

(Via @maique - thank you )

Thu, 08 Oct 2026 10:24:24 +1300

A few days ago, the most powerful superpower in the world evacuated 12 of the most powerful aircraft in its military from the base of a strong ally because of the threat of a drone attack from a country we’ve been repeatedly told has been completely defeated.

💬 Dave Pell

Thu, 08 Oct 2026 10:23:53 +1300

🔗 We are going to kill ‘unalive’

I am all for the steady evolution of language - as ever it has been. Not new is the constant flow of new words by younger people. You know what I mean ‘daddy cat’.

But this is definitely different and a wake-up call for any and all who are concerned about any stifling of speech - free or not.

The spread of censored and mangled syntax is happening because people believe, or have experienced, that platforms will silence them for accurately describing the world in plain language. This shit is terrible, and it has to stop.

💬 Anil Dash

Added to my Readwise.

Wed, 07 Oct 2026 18:07:41 +1300

🔗📼😂 The good ol' Boys

Wed, 07 Oct 2026 14:16:40 +1300

👁️ 🖇️🔎 In a nutshell - 4 people in 3 countries on 3 continents over 8 years.

Wed, 07 Oct 2026 14:08:59 +1300

Finally - where it all started with @dogcow

🖇️🔎Micro.Blog-MEETUP Number 1 - Tuesday March 6th, 208 - Palo. Alto, CA, USA

Wed, 07 Oct 2026 14:06:48 +1300

…and then in 2019 … again for posterity … ‘The @Devilgate MeetUp.

🖇️🔎Micro.Blog-MEETUP Number 2 - Wednesday June 5th, 2019 - London, England

Wed, 07 Oct 2026 14:03:04 +1300

BTW … Number 4?

Indeed. Pretty sure I posted about these earlier - but for posterity … ‘The @Miraz MeetUp - over 6 years ago now!

🖇️🔎Micro.Blog-MEETUP Number 3 - Sunday March 22nd, 2020 - Kapiti Coast, New Zealand

Wed, 07 Oct 2026 13:40:20 +1300

I thought I’d let 🔗 Leon’s settle in before I threw in mine. It was indeed a bundle of fun and totally serendipitous. Enjoy the rest of your trip @lmika - I will be checking out that music soon.

🖇️🔎Micro.Blog-MEETUP Number 4 - Tuesday October 6th - Wellington, New Zealand