Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 2m

I’ll tell you one thing: I am absolutely not buying anything edible from Temu

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 3m

To borrow a little from Chuck Palahniuk, “on a long enough timeline, everything is policy”

1

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 12m

Flowers is definitely little known by the public, partly because since the pardon campaign Turing is now a household name so by definition almost everyone else in British computing history is relegated to a footnote, even the father of Colossus.

1

Reposted by Anthony Dhanendran

Jo Michell @jomichell.bsky.social · 34m

The book actually says that when interest rates are at the zero lower bound, you absolutely should not do fiscal
consolidation. They thought they knew better than the book, we are all living with the consequences.

Yuriy Akopov @yakopov.me · 1h

I sometimes think how frustrating it probably was for Cameron and Osborne. They did everything by the book, and the book says that when you cut the fat and weather the immediate storm, you then get growth and dynamism in response... and that part simply never happened!

Marwood @marwoodlennox.bsky.social · 2h

For the past 40 days reactionary assaults on the welfare state have been part premised on the idea that welfare is a corrupting force that erodes values and then they cut it, everything gets a bit worse and values don't change.

2 1 19

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 2h

These are all great but the cricket one is particularly evocative.

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 2h

Honestly no idea what would turn up if you ordered these 😬

1

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 3h

Arf

1

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 3h

Just pretend that the first sentence ends with a question mark.

1

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 3h

Who is buying knock-off crisps on Temu. And why?

A Temu ad on Instagram showing Pipers Crisps for sale, 24 packets for £1.77

3

Reposted by Anthony Dhanendran

James O'Malley @jamesomalley.co.uk · 12h

It's almost exactly four years since Tim Shipman's notorious "Boris Johnson squats like a giant toad" tweet.

Seems like important context given how we often talk as though the next election – four years away – is a done deal.

19 76 270

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 11h

Just lost the Keith Vaz game *because Keith Vaz is advertising to me on Instagram* - it turns out Big Tech was in the pocket of Big Vaz all along.

A massive picture of Keith Vaz, on Instagram

1 3

Reposted by Anthony Dhanendran

Joel Morris @gralefrit.bsky.social · 13h

Perfect posting from Tim Heidecker, 24 hours apart.

What an incredible experience, getting to perform at the Riyadh Comedy Festival. I left feeling grateful and humbled by his majesty's generosity. I'll never forget this memorial experience and all the fun we had. Hope to do it again soon.

upon further reflection, there is a small part of me that feels I sent the wrong message, regarding the Riyahd Comedy Festival last night. While, I do think it's important for comedy to have the opportunity to thrive in all parts of the globe, there are some aspects of The Royal Highness, King Salmon and his leadership in the region that i don't agree with entirely, but it's a different culture when it comes to freedom and rights and I gotta respect that we are all different and have different values. My manager is now investigating the possibility of donating some of my fee to a charity for Vetrans of War.

31 260 1.5K

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 2d

Fair enough. Decided to go with:

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 2d

Rob correctly points out that I failed to notice that he specifically banned TPOL in the rules, which is fair.

I can now only think of:

Bad Day (REM 9/10, Daniel Powter 1/10) = 10
Galway Girl (Steve Earle 10/10, Ed Sheeran 0/10) = 10
Lost (Cool Calm Pete 8/10, Orbital 6/10) = 14

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 2d

Rob correctly points out that I failed to notice that he specifically banned TPOL in the rules, which is fair.

I can now only think of:

Bad Day (REM 9/10, Daniel Powter 1/10) = 10
Galway Girl (Steve Earle 10/10, Ed Sheeran 0/10) = 10
Lost (Cool Calm Pete 8/10, Orbital 6/10) = 14

1

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 2d

eg en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zombie_... and en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_S...

Wikipedia list of songs called Black Star

1

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 2d

I read the rules, but I refuse to play by them. Also, surely most of these will constitute part of a triple, so any given pair would count. My pair is the first two picks (also, to be honest, I missed that you had specifically called out TPOL as ineligible, fair cop guv).

2 1

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 2d

This is a great game.

The Power of Love (Huey Lewis and the News) 9/10
The Power of Love (Frankie Goes to Hollywood) 7/10

...The Power of Love (Jennifer Rush) 5/10

Rob Davies @byrobdavies.bsky.social · 2d

Fun music game.

Take two songs with the same name and post your combined score out of 10. How high can you get?

No covers/no triples (e.g. Power of Love)

My first effort, which i think is hard to beat...

Zombie (Fela Kuti) 10/10
Zombie (The Cranberries) 7/10

Total score: 17

2 1

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 2d

I think this piece, which is quite good, has been badly served by its headline (I think the writer clearly knows what he's doing but at a guess, the sub who wrote the headline doesn't know any of the three musicians well).

In my older son's last year of preschool, his bearded, guitar-strumming
teacher sat the class down in a circle and asked everyone to name their
favorite songs. I have no clue what anyone else said (I suspect there were a lot of wheels and buses, maybe some repeated vowels and farm animals), but my kid chose "Ring of Fire." I've rarely been prouder.

It's not hard to figure out why Cash never got the same respect for his
writing that Dylan (or Paul Simon or Bruce Springsteen) did. He sang
country music, which "serious" critics treat the same way they treat horror and comedy-as a lesser genre, entertaining but basic. He was never counterculturally cool, and he could seem a little square. He was deeply Christian and unashamedly patriotic.

But, as a Christian and a patriot, he was never shallow or pharisaical. His concerts at San Quentin and Folsom prisons were famous, but he played dozens of prison shows to much less fanfare during his career (always unpaid) and advocated for prisoners' rights long before it was fashionable. He saw inmates as his countrymen, and his faith taught him that nobody was beyond salvation; there was good in everyone.

In other words, what Johnny Cash lacked in chicness he more than made up for with principled decency. Like the man himself, his songs aren't flashy; they're oaken, sturdy and timeless. They deserve to be better known.

Jon Fasman is the Economist's senior culture correspondent, based in New York.

1 4

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 2d

I feels you're both right: part of the reason Dylan became outwardly cool was diffidence and a reputation for being aloof, which in turn feels like it partly came from his feeling ill at ease in front of cameras or when being interviewed in the early-mid-60s (eg the jumpy nervous laugh he had then).

2 1

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 2d

All true/sensible. And every time the NPP rolls around people forget that it's been a joke for 50+ years already.

1 2

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 2d

Venezuela getting new 100 per cent tariffs, then?

2 5

Reposted by Anthony Dhanendran

James O'Malley @jamesomalley.co.uk · 2d

I am pro-NATO because I am anti-imperialist.

8 38 210

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 2d

To the tune of Born Slippy

1

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 3d

Disappointed to find that 20+ people have made this joke before me in the QTs. No word on how they pronounce it, though.

In London there are the obvious ones: Leicester Square, Holborn, Marylebone, but the latter two also frequently trip up native English speakers who aren't (central) Londoners.

1

Anthony Dhanendran @dhanendran.co.uk · 3d

Shibboleth

Merriam-Webster @merriam-webster.com · 4d

What’s the word where you’re from that, when pronounced exactly as it looks, identifies a tourist immediately?

1 2