Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 16h

The website was hijacked?

Or the owner allowed the domain to lapse and it was subsequently acquired by a pron site?

That is not hijacking.

UK libraries urged to remove children’s books with URL hijacked by porn site

Puffin issues alert to schools and local authorities over books in popular Spy Dog series by Andrew Cope

www.theguardian.com

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Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 21h

"Europe's favourite since 1536" is a controversial claim that basically gives the Spanish the credit for inventing the potato. France and Germany might disagree. As, of course, would the British.

Des Fitzgerald @desfitzgerald.bsky.social · 5d

So there's an EU-funded campaign to get millenials to eat potatoes and - I swear to Jesus I'm not making this up - it's slogan is: "Europe's favourite since 1536."

A screenshot of a website that says "DISCOVER THE TASTY VERSATILITY OF POTATOES! Europe's favourite since 1536." banner ads say "funded by the european union" and "enjoy - it's from europe."

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Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 21h

There's your Brexit bonus for you right there. You can eat discounted shonky potatoes from who knows where while the poor people of Norn Iron are paying full price for EU-compliant spuds.

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Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 21h

Yes. Both cities have demonstrated in the past they can host major sporting events. Other cities that could host the Big Depart include Berlin, Brussels and Birmingham.

Domestique @domestiquecycling.com · 22h

Could 🇱🇺 Luxembourg or 🇨🇿 Prague host the Grand Départ of the 2028 🇫🇷 Tour de France?

📄 www.domestiquecycling.com/en/news/luxe...

📸 Cor Vos

Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 1d

It's a parhelion, aka a sundog (it follows the sun). Sunlight is refracting off ice in the clouds.

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Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 1d

So the Jim Gavin thing comes down to him effing off a journalist - a Sunday Worst one at that - and thinking he could get away with it? #Aras25

A Tweet by Phoenix magazine (Ireland's version of Private Eye)

GAVIN'S NEMESIS: WHY THE SECRET?

The Jim Gavin beastly landlord episode that ejected the Fianna Fail presidential candidate out of the race had the Irish Independent and its Ireland editor, Fionnan Sheahan, congratulating themselves and each other with gusto this week following their ‘exclusive’ on Gavin’s €3,300 debt to a tenant 16 years ago. But the Indo excluded one significant detail from its arresting story, specifically the identity of the tenant at the centre of the story who was able to provide cast iron proof and details of the story.

There was much detail in the Indo about the investigative efforts the paper made in uncovering Gavin’s behaviour. What the newspaper and its editorial staff did not say is that the scoop was handed on a plate to them by Gavin’s tenant who happens to be a fellow colleague in Mediahuis, owner of the Indo and various titles, including the Sunday World. That former tenant is the deputy editor of the World, Niall Donald.

The Sunday Worst and Donald felt uneasy about breaking the story themselves and so the story was passed to the Indo with its chief source being the well placed Donald. One can see why the SW did not want to be the centre of attraction in the story — conflict of interest etc — but why should the Indo decline to name the tenant at the centre of its story? And why would the rest of the media, including the paper of record, the Irish Times, follow suit?

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Reposted by Feargal McKay

Randall Munroe @xkcd.com · 1d

Window Screen

xkcd.com/3151/

4-panel comic. (1) [person in front of window, shaped like a trapezoid with a curved top] This weekend, I had to make an oversized screen for a porch window. (2) [person sitting with hands on head surrounded by images of assorted equations and measurements] It involved countless tiny problems, each somehow way harder than it should be. Oblique angles. Curved edges. Noncoplanarity. (3) [person in front of window with screen on it, with building detritus strewn on the ground] ...I solved them all. I measured precisely. I did trigonometry. I made custom parts. And it fit *perfectly.* No gaps, no ripples. (4) [person typing at computer] I know that your foundation normally limits its purview to physics, medicine, peace, chemistry, and literature. However, if you review the attached photos showing how well the screen fits into the...

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Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 1d

With cycling's breakaway league currently on hiatus it's time to revel in the growing pains of other sports.

England among eight rugby nations who vow to ban players in rebel R360 league

Joint statement from England, Scotland, Ireland, New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, France and Italy says players will be ‘ineligible for international selection’

www.theguardian.com

Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 1d

He also makes it sound like Gavin is an abuse survivor who deep-sixed the memory. Which may actually fit with how Martin himself thinks of the Celtic Tiger's demise.

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Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 2d

It's time for Tre Valli Varesine today and an opportunity to remember Alfonsina Strada - a woman whose real story is even better than the myth - who, in 1959, died after returning home from watching the race.

Mythologies: A Girl Called Alf – Alfonsina Strada and an Apocryphal Hour Record

The story of Alfonsina Strada's legendary Hour record.

cycologies.com

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Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 1d

No one at the start of the Rás for the Arás - #Aras25 - foresaw how discussion of it would quickly descend into trolling Americans.

Conor Smith @conorsmith.ie · 3d

Gavin has shown himself unfit to be President. This is why we should let our current President take a third term, despite his age. Who cares what the constitution says.

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Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 1d

Def got Newsroom vibes about it.

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The Hollywood Reporter @thr.com · 1d

In an effort to cut down on noise pollution from suddenly blaring advertisements on, say, Netflix or Disney+, California legislators have passed a law to mandate that the noise level of commercials is at the same level as the movie or TV series being streamed.

California Passes Law Banning Loud Commercials On Streaming Services

In an effort to cut down on noise pollution from suddenly blaring advertisements on, say, Netflix or Disney+, California legislators have passed a law to mandate that the noise level of commercials is at the same level as the movie or TV series being streamed.

bit.ly

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Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 1d

The Guardian now forces you to accept 3rd party (advertisers') cookies or pay for an ad-lite (not ad-free) offering.

The ads I'm seeing are for shit products. The ads themselves are pretty distracting, animated affairs, some following you as you scroll down the page.

Not quite unusable but...

Press Gazette @pressgazette.co.uk · 5d

Guardian advertising bosses criticise publisher websites that create an "unusable" experience through ad overloading: "Surely this can’t be having a long-term positive impact on these publications?" pressgazette.co.uk/marketing/th...

The Guardian tells marketers to stop buying intrusive online ads

The Guardian shared its research that fewer ads are more effective at its Advertising Upfronts event on 2 October.

pressgazette.co.uk

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Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 1d

The start of a backlash? What, the backlash that cycling media - the Comic included - has been stoking for months now? The start of that backlash, you ask?

Cycling Weekly @cyclingweekly.com · 2d

Tadej Pogačar harassed and 'stickered' at European Championships: is this the start of a backlash against the world champion?

www.cyclingweekly.com/racing/tadej...

Tadej Pogačar harassed and 'stickered' at European Championships: is this the start of a backlash against the world champion?

The Slovenian faced fan hostility on the way to another emphatic victory

www.cyclingweekly.com

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Tom Isitt @tomisitt.bsky.social · 2d

I’ve been wondering how those journalists who drank the Adams Kool-Aid back in 2020 feel now. Some of the puff pieces were 🤮

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Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 1d

Those were the days, when Adams was just a millionaire philanthropist eager to buy a stake in teams like Quick Step or Ineos, and Chris Froome was going to win the Tour again.

He hadn't even saved stranded Afghans at that stage, steaming into Kabul on his bike and taking them out on his crossbar...

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Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 2d

It's time for Tre Valli Varesine today and an opportunity to remember Alfonsina Strada - a woman whose real story is even better than the myth - who, in 1959, died after returning home from watching the race.

Mythologies: A Girl Called Alf – Alfonsina Strada and an Apocryphal Hour Record

The story of Alfonsina Strada's legendary Hour record.

cycologies.com

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Reposted by Feargal McKay

Oisín Murphy-Goreless @bikesnbukes.bsky.social · 2d

Herself told me about the horrible news. As a former employee from the dim distant past, I am raging, glad that no one was hurt, and relieved that the shop can open again soon. I hope this wasn’t the actions of the far right, or we have descended to a whole new bad place.

The Irish Times @irishtimes.com · 2d

‘Really shocking’: Independent Dublin bookstore damaged in arson attack

Books Upstairs manager hopes to partially open the D’Olier Street store later on Monday

www.irishtimes.com

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Reposted by Feargal McKay

Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 2d

Seconds out! Round one!

THE DEVIL'S DANCE FLOOR

This isn't an official announcement from Duckworth. It's a page from my agent's newsletter and book fair rights catalogue, which is public. So, a tiny-text soft launch? Details subject to change.

A lot of thank yous and less Disney, to come.

🐻🥊👊🏾👊🏻🦁🍺

Page from literary agency Curious Minds rights guide for Frankfurt Book Fair etc. Alongside a photo of me looking slightly drunk and a lot hostile, it says, in tiny font:

NEW DEALS
AGENT - Eli Keren
PUBLISHER - Duckworth
PUBLICATION - Spring 2027
STATUS - Manuscript due April 2026
LENGTH - 80,000 words
RIGHTS SOLD
World English (Duckworth)
The Devil’s Dance Floor
Late-Victorian London and the Last Bareknuckle Boys
SARAH ELIZABETH COX
An 1880s’ group biography of the last of Britain’s
bareknuckle boxers from the historical consultant behind
A Thousand Blows (Disney+/Hulu)
THE DEVIL’S DANCE FLOOR is the first popular book from Sarah Elizabeth Cox,
the historical consultant behind Steven Knight’s television series A Thousand Blows
and author of the historical blog ‘Grappling with History’.
A group biography of Victorian boxers, THE DEVIL’S DANCE FLOOR is a cultural
history that does far more than recount the true story behind the fictionalized
version now streaming. Taking a narrative approach, Cox charts the decline of
bareknuckle boxing over the 1880s, and, in doing so, explores subjects ranging
from policing and healthcare to the press and entertainment – all while offering a
personal-scale view of the melting point of Victorian London (think Hallie
Rubenhold’s The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper but
with a lot more getting punched in the face).
The subjects themselves hail from as far afield as London’s East End and the North
to the United States and the Caribbean. Each has a unique story to tell and reveals
something not only about our shared history but also about the world we live in
today.
Sarah Elizabeth Cox was a historical consultant on season one and two of Steven Knight's
1880s’ boxing and crime TV drama A Thousand Blows. She researches biographies of
Victorian and Edwardian boxers and wrestlers for her website ‘Grappling with History’ and
works as the British Science Association’…

1888 portrait of boxer Hezekiah Moscow, a slim Black or Black/East Asian mixed heritage man, taken by Harry Carpenter. He is shirtless, fists raised, wearing white tights and a chequered sash at the waist. There are painted palms on the studio backdrop.

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 2d

January 9th 2026 🤜🏻🤛🏾

www.gq-magazine.co.uk/article/insi...

Inside A Thousand Blows season 2 with Steven Knight

Plus, creator Steven Knight gives us the low-down on what to expect from our return to the historical East End

www.gq-magazine.co.uk

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Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 2d

At this moment, everyone please think of poor Jeremy Whittle, cruelly denied the chance to spend the winter telling us how awful cycling will be in 2026 because of anti-genocide protests. Thoughts and prayers Jeremy. Thoughts and prayers.

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Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 2d

So we've lost Gavin as our future president and we've lost Adams as the man we love to hate. Normally these things are like magpies and come in trees, so who's next to go down on us like Icarus?

#PRDeathpool

Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 2d

Sylvan Adams steps down as face and voice of rebranded Israel - Premier Tech.

That took a lot less time than anyone imagined.

Wielerflits ᵇᵒᵗ @wielerflits.bsky.social · 2d

Israel verdwijnt uit naam van wielerploeg, eigenaar Sylvan Adams doet stap terug

Israel Premier Tech geeft gehoor aan de oproep van hoofdsponsor Premier Tech en zijn fietsenconstructeur Factor: de ploeg gaat verder onder een nieuwe naam, zonder de term Israël. Bovendien doet teameigenaar Sylvan Adams een flinke stap terug.Premier Tech, de hoofdsponsor van de wielerploeg

www.wielerflits.nl

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Feargal McKay @cycologies.com · 2d

An election-winning video...

🎃👻David 👻🎃 @rebelalliance77.bsky.social · 3d

#Áras25

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