Alastair Horne
@pressfuturist.bsky.social
3.2K followers 1.4K following 5.1K posts
Lecturer in Publishing at the University of Stirling. Researcher of smartphone storytelling. Author of seven books for Amber on Paris, London, Scotland, cemeteries (twice), chess, & dragons. Erstwhile doer of other things. Baritone. Often mediocre. He/Him
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pressfuturist.bsky.social
Evening all! I’m a lecturer in publishing studies at the University of Stirling, as well as the author of a few books for Amber Books. I sort of built what passes for my career by being on Twitter, so I’m sorry to see it go, but needs must.
pressfuturist.bsky.social
I still have the screenshot. ;-)
pressfuturist.bsky.social
Chump who misunderstood my post about the Bookseller website to slag me off for buying books online has belatedly deleted his post. :-D
pressfuturist.bsky.social
Ten years ago today, I built this at a wedding reception.
Man in black looks on proudly at an absurd tower built from Jenga pieces.
Reposted by Alastair Horne
pressfuturist.bsky.social
Leaving the office after an hour of lectures, four hours of seminars, and ninety minutes of meetings with students, and this is really so much the best part of the job. It helps make up for all the admin and marking and announcements.
Reposted by Alastair Horne
pressfuturist.bsky.social
“We need to junk the established footballing calendar again because we’ve corruptly awarded the world cup to a country unsuited for it,” says Trump-patsy Gianni Infantino.

www.bbc.co.uk/sport/footba...
World Cup: Fifa keep 'open mind' about dates of football's premier competition
President Gianni Infantino says Fifa is discussing how to make the World Cup
www.bbc.co.uk
Reposted by Alastair Horne
pressfuturist.bsky.social
Eleventh anniversary of my second-best typo on Twitter.
“Erratum: an earlier tweet stated that Russian bishops had halved in the past years. That should have been “bookshops”.”
pressfuturist.bsky.social
I went on a stag do there, but a colleague who was local forewarned me about the pronunciation…
pressfuturist.bsky.social
You’d think the education minister might be busy dealing with this crisis rather than spending all their time fishing for a promotion, but no.

bsky.app/profile/prem...
premnsikka.bsky.social
UK Universities cut 12,000 jobs, more on the way.

40% of Unis in financial crisis.

Major exporter destroyed by successive govts

Obstacles for foreign students.
Low fees in England, lack of govt funding.
£267bn student debt.
Home student numbers down.

How will the UK compete with other nations?
Thousands more university jobs cut as financial crisis deepens
University workers will vote on national strike action this month over a 1.4% pay offer made in the summer.
www.bbc.co.uk
pressfuturist.bsky.social
The bit ly links for the figures produce this. (Possibly not all of them, but certainly the three I checked.)
pressfuturist.bsky.social
Switched over in time for Scotland’s *hilarious* third goal.
pressfuturist.bsky.social
Still seeing nothing to contradict my view that Gordon isn’t good enough for England.
pressfuturist.bsky.social
Eleventh anniversary of my second-best typo on Twitter.
“Erratum: an earlier tweet stated that Russian bishops had halved in the past years. That should have been “bookshops”.”
pressfuturist.bsky.social
Saka seeing less of the ball than he used to under late-Southgate England, where he and Walker doubling up would often be the only line of attack, and he would fade horribly in the second half because he was visible exhausted. So that might not be a bad thing really.
pressfuturist.bsky.social
*remembering how absolutely up themselves certain Welsh fans were in 2016*
pressfuturist.bsky.social
Oh, Bukayo Saka, you *beauty*.
pressfuturist.bsky.social
The university sector is in crisis, and you’re doing nothing about it as Minister for Education, @bphillipsonmp.bsky.social – it’s really hard to trust that you’ll be more committed to your role as deputy leader.
pressfuturist.bsky.social
Absolutely: that would have allowed them to fix the problem immediately!
pressfuturist.bsky.social
“We need to junk the established footballing calendar again because we’ve corruptly awarded the world cup to a country unsuited for it,” says Trump-patsy Gianni Infantino.

www.bbc.co.uk/sport/footba...
World Cup: Fifa keep 'open mind' about dates of football's premier competition
President Gianni Infantino says Fifa is discussing how to make the World Cup
www.bbc.co.uk
pressfuturist.bsky.social
I think so, yes. If the link was in an online product, you could change it so easily to fix the problem. Or, actually,if they’d used a URL shortener in print, they could fix it at that point.
pressfuturist.bsky.social
It’s the business model, isn’t it? Buy up a URL for a site that someone hasn’t renewed, and pick up on any traffic: I doubt they’re even aware that it was a site for children. :-/
pressfuturist.bsky.social
Leaving the office after an hour of lectures, four hours of seminars, and ninety minutes of meetings with students, and this is really so much the best part of the job. It helps make up for all the admin and marking and announcements.
pressfuturist.bsky.social
Indeed. I spent five minutes with the class analysing the publisher statement as a damage limitation exercise, as well as talking through the longer term problems of digital links in print books.