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Reposted by Bill Thompson

The Secret Barrister @barristersecret.bsky.social · 3d

This is a lie.

There are many criticisms you might sensibly and truthfully make of the Sentencing Council and the Sentencing Guidelines. I’ve been making them for years.

But this is an outright lie. Pure fabrication. A fraud on the public.

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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 4d

Birthday. Cake. Kaffeine London. The finest coffee shop in town.

A table with an espresso, a lemon cake, a laptop and a phone in a Teams call

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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 8d

Great minds… from an internal note I wrote this week…

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New_ Public @newpublic.org · 9d

How will technology continue to shape how we talk to each other? We’re seeking a researcher to help tackle big questions like this.

Working with Co-Director @eli.bsky.social, this is a chance to engage with experts, dive into the research, and contribute directly to the field and our strategy.

Job posting graphic with coral orange background featuring white text that reads "NOW HIRING Research Fellow - AI & The Future of Social Conversation" with an abstract geometric illustration of a door or archway. Details include 20-25 hours per week, $40/hour, remote position for U.S. or Canada, working through 2/28/26.

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Adam @adamcobb.bsky.social · 9d

It's a small point but CBS is the BBC's news partner in the US (ABC had played this role for at least a decade previously) and they often use CBS correspondents for smaller US stories. Can that continue?

Justin Baragona @justinbaragona.bsky.social · 9d

This is what CBS staffers have told me about the possibility of Bari Weiss taking over the newsroom:

One, she's not a journalist, as far as we're concerned. And two, the idea that she's going to carry some sort of editorial stick for us is hard to swallow.”

www.independent.co.uk/news/world/a...

‘He lied to us’: CBS News staffers say new owner David Ellison ‘can’t be trusted’

EXCLUSIVE: Multiple CBS News staffers said new owner David Ellison has broken his promise not to “politicize” the network by installing a Trump loyalist as ombudsman, and courting The Free Press found...

www.independent.co.uk

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James Ball @jamesrball.com · 9d

At a time when new cyberattacks debilitate British businesses seemingly daily, the UK government is demanding that security is made worse for UK users.

Techmeme @techmeme.com · 9d

Sources: the UK Home Office issued a new order to Apple in early September to create a backdoor into its cloud storage service, this time focused on UK users (Financial Times)

Main Link | Techmeme Permalink

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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 10d

Once I saw the BLINK tag I knew he could never be trusted with anything important.

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Vagina Museum @vaginamuseum.bsky.social · 10d

*sigh* Bluesky is Blueskying again. Here's that link again, this time visible to everyone. Trans people's experiences are not adult content, mods. www.vaginamuseum.co.uk/communitygal...

A post from the Vagina Museum, labelled as "adult content": The last day to view Trans Ephemera is 5th October. This community-created exhibition explores diversity, medicalisation and experiences of oppression through the medium of things that are normally thrown away. The exhibition is free to visit - plan yours now!

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Heather Burns @heatherburnstech.bsky.social · 10d

Because much of my professional life is pointing out how laws meant for one thing are used for something else: the Trump administration is using a law meant to protect access to abortion clinics, which it is no longer enforcing, to go after pro-Palestinian protesters. www.reuters.com/legal/govern...

DOJ sues over pro-Palestinian protest, using law on abortion clinic access

The U.S. Justice Department is suing pro-Palestinian organizations and demonstrators it accuses of intimidating Jewish worshipers at a New Jersey synagogue, using a U.S. law that has traditionally been used against people blocking access to abortion clinics.

www.reuters.com

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Paul Clarke @paulclarke.com · 10d

A really good reason: not knowing where someone currently resides is a huge risk when it comes to legal redress if they nick the hire car or whatever. I love how the magic word 'digital' makes idiot ministers think chaotic humans will suddenly transform into compliant automata because of an app

Alec Muffett @alecmuffett.bsky.social · 10d

If you have a driving licence then you use that and a utility bill

If you have a passport then you use that and a utility bill

If you have a digital ID then you will use that and a utility bill

This is and will be an invariant pattern in modern business for some reason.

Will law change that?

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Dr. Damien P. Williams Wants A Better Sociotechnical Paradigm @wolvendamien.bsky.social · 12d

Call Gavin Newsom's office like you called ABC/Disney/Sinclair/Nexstar

South Bay Queer Solidarity @sbqsolidarity.bsky.social · 13d

A huge win for trans people in California: the state legislature passed five bills protecting our rights!

Now it's time to call on Governor Gavin Newsom to sign them. Contact him before October 12th: transfamilysos.org/action-neede...

#TransRights #TransYouth #TransCalifornia

Action Needed: Urge Governor Newsom to Sign Five Critical Trans Rights Bills

TransFamily Support Services is proud to co-sponsor five critical trans rights bills that have officially passed the California Legislature. This is a major victory—one made possible through a powerfu...

transfamilysos.org

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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 12d

Jam, Jerusalem, and Gerrymandering

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Tom Coates @tomcoates.bsky.social · 12d

This is the British political equivalent of arguing that the Women’s Institute are a Nazi cabal and control the Conservative Party.

What does every Labour Prime Minister, half the cabinet, the London Mayor, the Attorney General, and the Governor of the Bank of England have in common?
They are all Fabians.
What now? Who?
Are we being destroyed by a Radical Left kabal?
l do some digging
thatalexwoman.com/p/the-powerful...

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Paul Clarke @paulclarke.com · 14d

I'm seeing so many takes around parts of the "ID card" melange, I have to add a few.

It's not about cards. It's about registers. A register is a definitive 'true source' of data, about people, places, buildings, whatever.

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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 13d

A beautifully captured lunch with one of the actors who never disappoints. And a useful life lesson for us hacks from @janinegibson.ft.com - don’t choose the ciabatta.

Maria Farrell @mariafarrell.bsky.social · 13d

This might be the best Lunch with the FT I've ever read (it helps to be obsessed with Tom Hollander).

Fascinating, funny, wholly un-vain on both parts, vulnerable but never cloying. Loved every word and re-read chunks repeatedly, savouring it to the end.

extra gift-link here: on.ft.com/3Vzowud

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BBC Radio 3 Now Playing Bot (Unofficial) @bbcradio3bot.bsky.social · 13d

BBC Radio 3
Train Tracks

Tom Service with a musical and cultural celebration of a landmark moment: the 200 year anniversary of the birth of the modern railway.

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Reposted by Bill Thompson

Lego Lost At Sea @legolostatsea.bsky.social · 16d

Not sea glass but fragments of plastic car tail lights, indicators and brake lights, probably washed into storm drains after heavy rain, eventually making their way to the sea. #oceanplastic

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Gordon Guthrie @foundationsofthedigitalstate.com · 17d

People, good people, civil servants, give up their time and their money to make Civil Service Staff Networks the fantastic resource and public service they are and the government spits in their face, it makes me sooooo mad...

Grrrrrr

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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 17d

Why doesn’t @bbc6music.bsky.social get louder as my tram gets nearer to Media City? That’s where they are playing from…

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Lee Hurley @hleehurley.com · 18d

Yes, it being 'unworkable' and 'unfunded' is the problem.

JFC.

Adam Bienkov @adambienkov.bsky.social · 18d

Keir Starmer’s spokesperson asked for the PM's response to Nigel Farage’s plan to deport hundreds of thousands of people living and working completely legally in the UK, replies that he thinks it is “unworkable” and “unfunded”.

So his objection is that they’ve got their sums wrong

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Bill Thompson @billt.bsky.social · 17d

It’s clear that the cruelty is the point. Anything to distress, frighten, undermine, create divisions. And the answer has to be to say ‘no’, ‘never’, not ‘this wouldn’t work’. Anything less is complicity.

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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 18d

Retrospectively removing indefinite leave to remain would be immoral and economically damaging. It would tear families apart.
Attacking it as ‘potentially illegal’ is completely beside the point.
Argue with the (awful) idea. Don’t try ’well, actually you can’t do that’.

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Rachel Coldicutt @rachelcoldicutt.bsky.social · 20d

Reminder you can buy a "FOMO is not a strategy" sticker here carefulindustries.teemill.com/product/fomo...

FOMO is not a strategy

Fear of missing out isn't a strategic decision, and sometimes it's useful to have a sticker on your laptop to remind people of that. Also yes, it doe...

carefulindustries.teemill.com

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Kevin M. Kruse @kevinmkruse.bsky.social · 22d

Call me radical, but I think we *don't* need to have polite chats with racists who are spewing conspiracy theories that keep motivating white supremacists to massacre our fellow citizens, and we *don't* need to have bipartisan deals with fascists trying to destroy our democracy and our government.

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mattie lubchansky @mattielubchansky.com · Nov 30

posting this Classic over here in honor of the big man himself. adios bitch

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