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Reposted by Matteo Nebbiai

Matti Vuorre @matti.vuorre.com · 16d

Against Publishing: universonline.nl/nieuws/2025/...

Preprints are read, shared, and cited, yet still dismissed as incomplete until blessed by a publisher. I argue that the true measure of scholarship lies in open exchange, not in the industry’s gatekeeping of what counts as published.

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Catherine E. de Vries @catherinedevries.bsky.social · 16d

Every academic career is built on rejection, but we don’t show it.
 CVs list publications, grants & awards, not rejected manuscripts, unfunded proposals, or failures.
 But those invisible rejections shape us more than our successes ever do.

👉 catherineeunicedevries.substack.com/p/fail-bette...

🧵

Fail Better: Why Your Rejections Will Shape You More Than Your Publications

The Art of Learning from Rejection

catherineeunicedevries.substack.com

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Simon Hix @simonhix.bsky.social · 17d

Increasingly, politics in West Europe is a mirror of East Europe, with a large radical right party against a rag-tag of centrist/liberal, centre-left, green and radical left parties and a rapidly declining centre right. The challenge is to coordinate the progressive opposition to the radical right.

Catherine E. de Vries @catherinedevries.bsky.social · 17d

Scholars & pundits have focussed a lot on the electoral demise of center left, but in doing so we paid to little attention to the electoral problems of the center right.

Case-in-points here not only British conservatives or center right in France, but increasingly also the center right in Spain.

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Eerke Boiten @eerkeboiten.bsky.social · Jul 24

It is my opinion that introducing age verification now is irresponsible, mainly because we have now reached the point where Western governments *are* using "the database state" and exploiting online surveillance to be repressive - just as privacy activists warned for decades. This applies to UK & US

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David Henig @davidheniguk.bsky.social · 27d

One of those classic tales of the modern economy, a huge company nobody really knows is the middle of a supply chain. At this stage it seems such companies will be surviving Trump's efforts relatively unscathed. www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...

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Matteo Nebbiai @matteonebbiai.bsky.social · Sep 25

"Trump’s push to destroy democracy depends largely on creating a self-fulfilling prophecy...business leaders capitulate to his demands because they expect him to consolidate autocratic power - which, given his unpopularity, he can only do if businesses and other institutions continue to capitulate."

Is the Jimmy Kimmel Saga a Sign that the Tide is Turning?

Why we may not be Russia or Hungary

paulkrugman.substack.com

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Sharon @sharonk.bsky.social · Sep 21

One thing that remains fascinating to me is how much radical Trumpism wants to move down the value chain, instead of upwards to more value-add + complex production and research. Instead, RFK kills the NIH and NSF.

Historically, the US economy’s competitive advantage was tied to sophisticated, complex products and services. It needs to regain that edge. There is no surer path to better and more advanced products than increased levels of basic research and development. But US investment in basic research has declined significantly; funding for the US National Institutes of Health (NIH), the National Science Foundation (NSF), and other government research organizations has declined by more than 60 percent in relation to GDP since the 1960s. The 2022 CHIPS and Science Act should help, by providing $280 billion in funding to boost domestic research and manufacturing, especially in the field of semiconductors. But the work to increase government investment has barely begun.

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Dan Hirschman @asociologist.bsky.social · Sep 15

The firing of faculty and university staff and journalists for… reposting news articles about Kirk’s actual statements? And talking about other acts of political violence? … is staggering. Academic freedom and free speech are facing an incredible attack right now.

Dan Hicks @profdanhicks.bsky.social · Sep 15

a professor of theatre at Austin Peay State University in Tennessee is fired reportedly for simply reposting a Newsweek headline on social media
clarksvillenow.com/local/apsu-f...

UPDATE: APSU fires professor over ‘insensitive’ social media post following shooting of Charlie Kirk - ClarksvilleNow.com

Austin Peay State University has fired a professor over a post he shared on social media apparently in response to the shooting death of Charlie Kirk.

clarksvillenow.com

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ChrisO_wiki @chriso-wiki.bsky.social · Sep 14

Grok is being sent to the reeducation camp

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · Sep 10

The professor has been fired and senior administrators removed from their post. No mention of this in the New York Times, The Free Press, The Atlantic or other outlets who drove the campus speech moral panic.

Houston Chronicle @houstonchronicle.com · Sep 10

Texas A&M University System orders audit of all courses after gender identity lesson goes viral

Details: bit.ly/42jauQZ

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Raffi Melkonian @rmfifthcircuit.bsky.social · Sep 10

Literal cancel culture.

Houston Chronicle @houstonchronicle.com · Sep 10

Texas A&M University System orders audit of all courses after gender identity lesson goes viral

Details: bit.ly/42jauQZ

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will o’the wisp pooley @willpooley.bsky.social · Sep 9

all those years of rw commentators complaining about cancellation, and here we are.

what they disliked was being challenged or criticized for their views. this, by contrast, is a system where academics are being sanctioned for saying something that disagrees with the president. slow clap

Dan Hirschman @asociologist.bsky.social · Sep 9

Texas A&M’s President just removed a dean and department head from their positions after they supported a professor whose lesson on gender was challenged by a student. www.kbtx.com/2025/09/09/a...

A&M Dean removed following student complaints over curriculum

The Department of Justice has also acknowledged the situation and said it would be investigating.

www.kbtx.com

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Adam Gurri @adamgurri.liberalcurrents.com · Sep 9

Daniel hits the nail on the head here. Not only are Silver's characteristics not particularly unique to any group on social media, they accurately describe the group that just *won multiple electoral victories in 2024*. MAGA and Trump have done 100% of the things centrists say Democrats shouldn't do

Daniel Drezner @dandrezner.bsky.social · Sep 9

I wrote about Nate Silver's definition of Blueskyism and how I don't think it explains all that much. open.substack.com/pub/danieldr...

Is Blueskyism Really a Thing?

A few thoughts on Nate Silver's thesis that the weird politics of 2020 explains the authoritarian politics of 2025.

open.substack.com

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Matteo Nebbiai @matteonebbiai.bsky.social · Sep 9

"The point... is that what we are witnessing today is not the failure of international law but rather the failure of international politics."
www.theguardian.com/law/2025/jun...

Are we witnessing the death of international law?

The long read: A growing number of scholars and lawyers are losing faith in the current system. Others say the law is not to blame, but the states that are supposed to uphold it

www.theguardian.com

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Eliot Higgins @eliothiggins.bsky.social · Sep 9

Reports of an attack, allegedly by a drone, on a vessel in the Global Sumud Flotilla (GSF), while anchored outside the port of Sidi Bou Said in Tunisia. The below video shows the moment of the incident. Keep it in mind when you read the next post. www.instagram.com/reel/DOXaR_M...

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William B. Fuckley @opinionhaver.bsky.social · Sep 8

NFT sort of geniunely were bullied and mocked out of existence because they were fundamentally a status good that’s basically worthless if it’s seen as stupid and stigmatized. People overindexed on that and think they can do the same with AI. You can’t though, because LLMs, etc are actually useful.

Anil Dash @anildash.com · Sep 7

this is the really ineffective head-in-the-sand reaction a lot of folks on Bluesky tend to have if you talk about any harm reduction-based approach to the reality that millions of people are using AI tools today. The current approach to critiquing AI is obviously not working, but they don't care.

alert saying "@auska.esq has added you to the "Al Apologists" moderation list"

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Wessel van Rensburg @wildebees.bsky.social · Sep 8

"Any time you ask an LLM system to summarize a web page, read an email, process a document or even look at an image there’s a chance that the content you are exposing it to might contain additional instructions which cause it to do something you didn’t intend."

Rob Bowley @robbowley.net · Sep 8

I don’t think people yet fully appreciate how the “lethal trifecta” restricts agentic AI use cases. When private data access, untrusted inputs, and external actions converge, you create a structural vulnerability we don’t yet know how to contain.

simonwillison.net/2025/Jun/16/...

The lethal trifecta for AI agents: private data, untrusted content, and external communication

If you are a user of LLM systems that use tools (you can call them “AI agents” if you like) it is critically important that you understand the risk of …

simonwillison.net

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Michael Hobbes @michaelhobbes.bsky.social · Sep 5

I don’t find this very convincing, either as a unique problem with Bluesky or as an electoral liability for democrats.

The first essential characteristic:
Smalltentism
Aggressive policing of dissent, particularly of people "just outside the circle" who might have broader credibility on the center-left.
Censoriousness, often taking the form of moral micropanics that designate a rotating cast of opponents as the main characters of the day. Self-reinforcing belief in the righteousness of the clique, and conflation of its values with broader public sentiment among "the base".

The second essential characteristic:
Credentialism
Appeals to authority, particularly academic authority. Centering of the suitability of the speaker based on his or her credentials and/or identity characteristics (standpoint epistemology) as opposed to the strength of his or her arguments, accompanied by the implicit presumption to claim to be speaking on behalf of the entire identity group.

The third essential characteristic:
Catastrophism
Humorless, scoldy neuroticism, often rationalized by the view that one must be on
"war footing" because the world is self-evidently in crisis. Sublimation of personal anxiety as a substitute for political activism or material solutions to the crisis, with expressions of weariness and pessimism signaling virtue and/or savviness.

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Matteo Nebbiai @matteonebbiai.bsky.social · Sep 5

Name a better location for this @himself.bsky.social slideshow
#SISP

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Matteo Nebbiai @matteonebbiai.bsky.social · Sep 2

This #Trump conference gives Nintendo Direct vibes

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Matteo Nebbiai @matteonebbiai.bsky.social · Sep 2

Paradoxically, more decentralised #EU regulations (i.e., DSA, GDPR) are likely more resilient to "geopolitical winds".

Can the EU trade away its digital rules?

It's not that easy.

matteonebbiai.substack.com

Matteo Nebbiai @matteonebbiai.bsky.social · Sep 2

Centralising enforcement at the #EU Commission level strengthens consistency and coordination. Yet it also creates a single point of vulnerability, where regulatory enforcement can be more easily politicised.

Google’s adtech fine pulled at last minute over EU-US trade tensions | MLex | Specialist news and analysis on legal risk and regulation

An EU antitrust sanction against Google that was scheduled for today was put on hold hours before the planned announcement, following opposition from EU trade commissioner Maroš Šefčovič and lobbying ...

www.mlex.com

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Matteo Nebbiai @matteonebbiai.bsky.social · Aug 28

"This is how smart people become useful idiots: not through stupidity but through selective attention. They created information ecosystems where campus politics was the main character and everything else was background noise."

www.techdirt.com/2025/08/27/w...

Were A Few Random DEI Programs Worth Killing Democracy?

Eight months ago, those of us actually paying attention—not just scrolling outrage bait about Biden’s age or the latest campus controversy, but genuinely tracking the systematic preparation for aut…

www.techdirt.com

Matteo Nebbiai @matteonebbiai.bsky.social · Aug 26

4/ In conclusion, the EU “capitulation” strategy is partially constrained by its institutional architecture: even if it accepts Trump’s requests, reducing enforcement might be easier said than done, and could be more feasible for some laws (e.g., the DMA) than for others (e.g., the DSA).

Matteo Nebbiai @matteonebbiai.bsky.social · Aug 26

3/ Enforcement can be more easily “steered” when a law is enforced (1) by more politicised agencies and (2) in a centralised manner. The #DMA, which is enforced centrally by the Commission, is therefore easier to steer than the #DSA, whose many provisions are enforced by national agencies.

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