What a special treat!  A packed Sheringham Little Theatre enjoyed an audience with Mark Stuckey — a familiar face from BBC 1's popular The Repair Shop. While Stuckey may be best known as the electronics expert on the show, his talents are many and varied — an astronomer, a professional magician, a movie buff and a Dr Who aficionado. He even has a Dalek and a small observatory at home.

Mark Stuckey with his Dalek. Credit Richard Batson. Used with permission

Over the course of the afternoon, Stuckey delighted us with tales of behind the scenes moments and hidden secrets of The Repair Shop. The fundraising treat was hosted by Richard Batson, former editor of North Norfolk News and Trustee of Sheringham Little Theatre - a charity-run, community arts venue. The theatre relies on donations, volunteer efforts and special events, such as Mark Stuckey's talk, to sustain its operations and encourage amateur and youth productions.

Batson told East Anglia Bylines, "Interviewing Mark is always a pleasure as he has so many stories to tell from his Repair Shop fame to his less-well-known other careers and hobbies. The only problem was trying to cram them into a two-hour show."

Certainly, two hours was not enough, and at the end, the audience wanted to hear more from the very accomplished Stuckey.

Behind the scenes

Fans of The Repair Shop will know that the expert craftsmen and women work in a barn. What they may not know is how "freezing" the Chichester barn can be. Stuckey confessed that while he may be smiling and wearing a shirt, giving the impression of warmth, the production and camera crew may be sporting layers of warm clothing. Fellow star, Steve Fletcher, often wears a plug-in heated motorbike suit. There have even been occasions when Stuckey has had to defrost items with a hairdryer.

Mark Stuckey talking about the production crew. Credit Kate Moore. Used with permission

Comparing the task of repair to solving an Agatha Christie murder mystery, Stuckey says a great deal of patience is required. Not only is there the painstaking detective work of identifying which electrical component is faulty, but also the production of the programme requires immense patience.

At times, he desperately wants to progress a key part of the repair, yet, if the camera crew are not ready to film at that moment, it could be hours before he may resume his work. With a wicked smile, he tells the audience that it's very tempting to say, "Hard luck, I've done it," even if it incurs the wrath of the director.

It's more than just a repair

The programme is very successful - there can be as many as 5,000 repair enquiries a week. But it is the story that goes with the broken item and what it means to the owner, which determines if it makes the show.

The experts have no early sight of the item to be repaired until the owner arrives. And sometimes, they vastly underestimate repair time. Describing his task of repairing a 1950's juke box, Stuckey initially quoted seven days to fix the "beautiful machine". Days turned into weeks as time and time again, each 'repair' proved unsuccessful. Eventually, he took the jukebox to his own workshop in Cromer. The recurring fault proved to be two of the over 300 wires wrongly connected. When revealed, the newly working jukebox proved a huge hit. The story of the repair, with its emotional backstory, went viral. Stuckey proudly declared it holds the programme's record for taking the longest repair time.

Perhaps the most fascinating repair Stuckey described, is that of Polly, the porcelain dog in a kennel. Stuckey's joy at recounting the story is evident, not least because 70-year-old Polly was a magical trick and "not a bloody radio". The clever toy required the dog to exit the kennel when its name, Polly, was called at the kennel opening. With a magician's background Stuckey realised the secret was the way a cellophane diaphragm, near the contacts that propelled the dog forward, moved in response to exhaled breath when saying the dog's name, and especially the "Poh".               

The pleasure seeing the delight of the daughter working the magic trick is what Stuckey loves about participating on the show. He describes their work as more than repairing. Having witnessed the owner's emotion and joy upon receipt of a repaired object, he believes their work is often a fundamental part of the owner's "healing process".

Becoming a repairer Mark Stuckey in his workshop. Credit Richard Batson / Stuckey's observatory. Credit Kate Moore. Used with permission

Stuckey claims that the inspiration that steered his life was William Hartnell's Dr Who, and, more importantly, the Time Lord's wide knowledge of physics, psychology, astronomy etc. "Everything stems from my love for learning and wanting to understand how things work," he explained. 

At 15, Stuckey left school, and after an abortive start at a Bedfordshire mechanical engineering workshop, he was offered a job in a local radio and television shop. Remarkably, this eventually led to working on atomic weapons systems, cluster bombs and other top secret MOD projects.

Surprisingly, Stuckey has also had a broad career in television and film, so was quite at ease entertaining the audience with tales of time spent with Eric Clapton, Tommy Cooper, film producer Peter Rogers, as well as other members of the Repair Shop team. His love of film extends to assisting with the restoration of The Broadway Cinema in Prestwick, Scotland, working with Projected Picture Trust, which restores projection equipment, and with Film is Fabulous! which locates lost film reels. He was also involved in producing Red Dwarf.

Stuckey remains concerned about opportunities available today for the younger generation to follow in his footsteps. Gone are the uncomplicated cars of his youth, where he practised his electro-mechanical skills. Hopefully, The Repair Shop will inspire future generations to become craftsmen.

At the end of the event, Debbie Thompson, Theatre Director, announced An Afternoon with Mark Stuckey raised over £3,000 for Sheringham Little Theatre.

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The river Blyth meanders for 19 miles through idyllic Suffolk countryside from its source at Laxfield to the sea at Southwold. Pastoral perfection. And polluted. In common with the majority of rivers and lakes in the UK, this river is degraded by human activity. Will the government's new proposals for the water industry, announced on 20 January, offer the Blyth any hope?

Environment Agency records

A glance at the test records of the Environment Agency (EA) over the last 20 years reveals a sorry tale of persistent pollution and adverse effects on aquatic life. The pollutants include: nutrients such as phosphates, nitrates and ammonia; heavy metals such as mercury, 'forever chemicals' (e.g. from fire retardants), pesticides, and a huge range of cleaning agents and drugs that we flush into our waste system. Add to this the debris, fuel and tyre residues washed off our roads.

For the last few years, local citizen scientist groups such as Wilder Wenhaston (on the Blyth) and the Deben Climate Centre have stepped in to fill the lamentably sporadic record of testing by the EA, and our results have shown there has been little or no improvement. Moreover, we have been testing for faecal bacteria (including E. coli) and the results would make you avoid dipping a toe in these rivers, let alone swim in them.

Unlike the other parts of the UK where farming is the major contributor to river pollution, our rivers in East Suffolk suffer predominantly from waste-water treatment:

• untreated sewage 'spills' overflowing into rivers from Combined Storm Overflows (CSOs) - only permitted legally under 'exceptional weather conditions'
• the treated effluent discharged after processing at sewage treatment plants.

As an example of how dismal the water company's record on 'spills' is, consider this: in 2024, the pumping station at Laxfield 'spilled' untreated sewage and run-off into the source of the Blyth on 24 occasions, most of them during periods of little or no rainfall.

Underinvestment

So, what's gone wrong? In a nutshell:

• massive underinvestment in infrastructure modernisation ever since the post-war boom (1950s)
• opaque and inadequate regulation; disregard for the effects of pollution on nature (out of sight, out of mind)
• failure of the privatised water industry business model.

This has, quite rightly, led to public outcry and eventually to recent government reports. The Cunliffe report, in July 2025, revealed a failing, dysfunctional water industry. The Office for Environmental Protection published reports in December 2025 showing "failures to comply with environmental law by each of the three public authorities [Defra, Ofwat and the Environment Agency] relating to the regulation of network CSOs." The government's White Paper was published on 20 January 2026.

This White Paper promises simplification and strengthening of the regulators, "spot check MOTs" on water infrastructure, and a raft of measures integrating the regulators more fully with the water industry, with the aim of providing the transparent mandates and long-term low-risk that investors would like.

The elephant in the room

Sounds a bit like 'motherhood and apple pie', but of course all this ignores the huge elephant in the room, standing knee-deep in sewage. It's a continuation of the failed privatised water industry in the vain hope that new regulatory involvement will make everything better. Given the lengths the government will have to go to - from supervisory roles, oversight of appointments, mapping assets, setting maintenance targets etc - it may as well be running it in public ownership And what's more, the government can borrow money for investment at 4-5% interest, as opposed to the water companies who have to pay 8-12%.

Several environmental groups critical of the White Paper's 'Vision for Water' point out that the whole system from government to regulators has failed to uphold the law. They don't need more powers, they have all the powers necessary.

Too little too late

Back to the poor old river Blyth. How do we reduce CSO 'spills' to zero? With updated pumping station/pipework infrastructure and emergency storage tank capacity, and increased treatment capacity at the sewage treatment works - not rocket science, but diggers, concrete and pipes. The current target for the Laxfield CSO is to reduce the number of spills to 10 a year by - wait for it - the year 2050. Ye gods!

And how do we improve the quality of treated effluent discharged into the river? By investing in modern treatment technologies, such as Biofilm reactors, ultrafiltration, reverse osmosis, UV advanced oxidation. Science fiction? No, exactly what is planned for Essex & Suffolk Water's advanced water recycling plant at Lowestoft. All treatment works should be producing a clean effluent that we can be proud to put into our rivers. Yes, expensive, but don't our rivers and wildlife deserve the best treatment possible?

And, as for untreated sewage flowing regularly into the Blyth, our water industries' logo should really be 'shit happens'.

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More from East Anglia Bylines Activism River Watch is back: help research pollution and wildlife byEast Anglia Bylines 12 September 2025 Environment Most sewage discharges aren't classified as pollution incidents byProf Alex Ford 23 July 2025 Anglia Water company bosses should face prison for serious pollution, says Environment agency byJ.J. Jackson 18 July 2022 Environment This simple solution stops pollution going into the sea byAmaya Edwards 9 February 2025 Friends of Bylines Network

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Dear Editor,

Just announced is a landmark trade deal between India and the EU. Described by Ursula von der Leyen as the "mother of all deals", it not only covers free trade between these two huge markets, it also includes defence, technology, climate action and more. The best thing is that it delivers an unambiguous 'two fingers' to Trump, who will, here-on, be left increasingly in the cold. And deservedly. 

The trade treaty will also concern Putin for at least two reasons - economics, and India's tacit support for his brutal and unjustified war. It will surely offer a glimmer of hope for Ukraine and some comfort to its long-suffering citizens during these freezing dark nights of constant attack. 

It will also send a clear message to both Trump and Putin that their parsimonious and petty trade obstructions, and their senseless plans for expensive and blood-soaked expansionist land-grabs are no match for a world of open and free trading alongside peaceful cultural and social exchanges at all levels.

Britain needs to tread carefully though. Farage - a Trump acolyte if ever there was one - is currently on track to form our next government. He will not be offering relief to the broken society that he has contributed so much to create. His Utopia is Trump's America, a deregulated, unregulated and violently divided society in which people with money can avoid prison or, as Trump did, avoid the military draft. Unfortunately, the electorate believed his childishly-delivered, simplistic drivel.

But let's hope this doesn't happen here. Farage's Reform UK is now comprised of many disillusioned former Conservatives - ship-deserters, if you like - all of whom slam their former party for reaping chaos and lies. It's clearly too much of a stretch for them to remember that they themselves - as former ministers - were the backbone of those lies and the chaos.

They are all Brexiters, political relics, adrift, clutching desperately onto the lifebuoy of a failed ideology. Reform UK is once again the Brexit party. If ever there was a dead horse to flog, then it has to be Reform UK.

Sadly, we're currently on course to find that out the hard way. But it doesn't have to be that way.

As the EU deepens its economic and strategic ties with India, the question for Britain is not who we rail against but rather, where we choose to stand. Deals like this show what is possible when countries work through cooperation rather than grievance - and how far the UK risks drifting from the action if it continues to define itself by yesterday's battles.

Richard Hare
Woodbridge

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The post Letter: The EU-India deal is the future Britain is missing first appeared on East Anglia Bylines.

Primary-aged children are among almost 300 pupils suspended or excluded from Norfolk schools for taking drugs in the past year, it has emerged. In total, 259 pupils were suspended for using illicit substances, including two children in primary schools. A further 11 secondary-age pupils were permanently excluded.

The figures come from an investigation into drug use among Norfolk children, which also found that 120 young people accessed drug and alcohol treatment in the county last year. Nearly one in ten of those seeking treatment were under the age of 14.

Ministers say social media is making it easier for young people to buy illicit substances online, contributing to a rise in the number of children seeking help nationally. Officials also warn that access to treatment can depend heavily on where a child lives, describing a "postcode lottery" for support.

What the data shows

Data obtained by the BBC Shared Data Unit found that more than 16,000 under-18s in England were in drug and alcohol treatment last year - a 13% increase on the previous year.

Norfolk is an exception to the national trend, with a small fall in numbers. However, the drop was marginal - from 125 children in 2023-24 to 120 in 2024-25, a decrease of just 4%.

Of those 120 children:

• 8% were under 14, and
• 46% were aged 15 or younger.

Most were boys, with 80 boys seeking treatment compared with 40 girls.

Multiple substances, rising ketamine use

Children often presented with problems involving multiple substances, but cannabis was the most common issue, with 100 young people accessing help.
There were also:

• 45 children needing help with alcohol
• 25 with ketamine use
• 25 with nicotine
• 20 with ecstasy
• 10 with cocaine
• 5 with benzodiazepines
• 5 with solvent abuse

There were no reports of children receiving treatment for opiates or crack cocaine.

Notably, this is the first time nationally that the number of children reporting problems with ketamine has exceeded those needing help for ecstasy, reflecting a sharp rise in ketamine use among young people.

Schools and courts accounted for the majority of referrals, and drug use was found to have a significant impact on children's education.

Compared with other parts of England, Norfolk ranks among the top 50 areas for the number of children receiving treatment. In neighbouring Suffolk, 90 children accessed treatment, with 11% under the age of 14.

'A postcode lottery'

Professor Dame Carol Black, the government's independent adviser on drugs, said a range of factors were driving the rise in under-18s needing treatment. These include the availability of drugs, the role of social media in online purchasing, wider social pressures, and a "very worrying increase" in mental health problems among young people.

Children's Commissioner Rachel de Souza warned that access to treatment remains inconsistent.

"Children should never be denied health care because of where they live," she said. "I'm deeply concerned that too many children face this kind of postcode lottery in accessing specialist support for dealing with drugs and addiction." She added that long waits were causing some children's conditions to worsen, leaving them "frustrated and anxious not knowing when help will be given".

She has called for a cross-government approach to children's health and wellbeing, with prevention and early intervention "at its heart".

Council and government response

Norfolk County Council says it is confident children are receiving timely support. Councillor Fran Whymark, cabinet member for public health and wellbeing, said the number of children in treatment had "remained stable over the past year".

She said the council commissions services from the Matthew Project's Unity Service, which works proactively with schools and other partners to identify and support young people. The service offers confidential advice and aims to ensure treatment begins within three weeks of referral, in line with national targets.

A spokesperson for the Department of Health and Social Care said the government was committed to ensuring people with drug or alcohol problems can access support.

They said that from 2026, treatment and recovery funding would be channelled through the Public Health Grant, with over £13bn allocated across three years, including £3.4bn ring-fenced for drug and alcohol treatment and recovery. Support would also be expanded through the government's 10 Year Health Plan, with a greater focus on prevention.

The figures point to more than a public health issue. That children so young are encountering drugs - and in some cases needing formal treatment - is likely to unsettle many parents and teachers. While Norfolk's numbers have not risen sharply, they underline how early substance use has become part of some children's lives, raising difficult questions about prevention, support and the pressures young people are facing long before adulthood.

This article is adapted from a report by the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

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Charles de Gaulle was wrong. American leadership has been great for Europe. But Trump's performance at Davos was a clear signal to anyone who had missed it up to now. The US can no longer be relied upon to lead. Its allies can no longer assume the US is theirs.

A year ago, on the eve of Donald Trump's inauguration on 20 January 2025, I wrote here: "This time, everything is at stake".

Trump's threats to the territorial and economic integrity of its closest allies - Canada, Denmark and Greenland, the UK, and much of the rest of Europe - represent an existential challenge. This is true for countries that have benefited most from the US-led arrangements established after the Second World War, as well as for those that have fared less well. In the process, the president and his team resort to humiliation - a tactic typically used by those seeking to demoralise and dominate their victims.

The great game theory

The increasing technological, political and economic global interconnectedness which has developed over the last two centuries, and with ever greater intensity during the last half century, leaves no place to hide when restraint and predictability in world affairs are abandoned and scrambling for advantage, and protection becomes the norm.

We have ample evidence from those centuries that "balance of power" - or "multipolarity" - is a sly euphemism for instability, conflict and biblical slaughter. The three decades of chaos, conflict and industrial murder the world suffered from 1914-45 are Exhibit A.

When there is no anchoring force, international relations become a dangerous game of betrayal, beggar-my-neighbour, and coercion instead of cooperation, as powers manoeuvre to secure their positions.

Under such unstable circumstances, seemingly inconsequential details can lead to horrors. As AJP Taylor set out in War by Timetable, railway timetables sparked the outbreak of hostilities in summer 1914.

Hyper power or hyper alliance?

Despite problematic actions over the decades, the US did not behave as an unconstrained "hyper power". It saw the need for self-restraint, clear rules and collaborative alliances.

Perhaps morals played a role. But it is anyway doubtful that the US has ever been in a position to achieve global control without powerful allies. It certainly isn't now.

We have had a "hyper alliance". Without continuing to exercise sufficient restraint, the US cannot sustain that alliance. Without the alliance, the US cannot lead global affairs.

Where fools should fear to tread

For a US administration not to understand these points, or for it to calculate that coercion and invasion are available to it as an alternative to strong alliances, would be foolish.

To imagine - as some in the administration do - that installing authoritarian, nativist governments in allied countries or attempting to "divide and rule" is a way to get around the limitations of the US's position, would be suicidal. The destructive political forces it would unleash would ravage Europe and other regions, leaving Americans with nothing except isolation, impoverishment and eventual internal collapse.

Nightmare on Downing Street

The first year of Donald Trump's second term has broken so much trust among allies that there is no going back.

The US loses leverage by being unreliable. If allies can no longer assume it will live up to its commitments to them, it is unsurprising if they conclude they have much reduced incentives to live up to theirs to the US.

The Old Alliance is dead. We need a New Alliance. But imagine there is none.

Examining the implications of that for the UK suggests a radical shift in circumstances, with a to-do list containing much which is frightening, expensive or both.

Previously, failing to get everything right wouldn't hurt us too badly. Now, getting our list done promptly is the minimum we must achieve if we are to avoid severe consequences.

We need to spend far more on defence for at least ten years than any public discussion has acknowledged. And to build a new, powerful defence alliance independent of the US. Ukraine must be defended and its territorial integrity restored, aggressors punished and weakened, and future aggressions deterred.

The UK must join the EU customs union and single market (and the EU must let it). Consistent with that, we must form new alliances around the world and strengthen old ones. The climate emergency and energy transformation must be addressed, potentially against US opposition. We must robustly confront and disable anti-democratic, anti-constitutional forces in our societies and their overseas backers.

At the same time, while making ourselves autonomous from the US, we continue to rely on it for defence capabilities and much else.

We need to leave the door open to a New Alliance with a US once again ready to engage appropriately. Neither we, nor they, can afford for there not to be one.

Finally, we must build major, very pricey "national fortress" capabilities in defence, and economic and societal resilience, for the possibility that allies, perhaps even immediate neighbours, become hostile, or militarily aggressive adversaries.

All roads lead to DC

It would be easy to dismiss the role we need the US to play, and comforting to ignore the consequences which will flow if it fails to do so.

But we must not.

The UK, European and other allies, absent the US, simply do not have and will not have anything like the scale of necessary resources, nor (unlike the US) the political and decision-making coherence, to be able to sustain a global order. To reiterate: nor is the US able to without its allies.

China faces similar limitations, and it is highly questionable whether the Chinese Communist Party would be a good partner under any circumstances.

Russia is a wrecker, not a builder, and is in any case relatively puny.

Not on the menu

The US must steer its own path.

Outsiders can affect American opinion forming, policy making and use of executive authority. But only to a limited extent.

If it trashes its own prospects and those of others through a combination of domestic dysfunction and external ineptitude, then the world will burn.

Charles de Gaulle's German counterpart, Konrad Adenauer, said, "An infallible method of conciliating a tiger is to allow oneself to be devoured."

No one in the US should imagine that anxious Europeans, polite Canadians or others will meekly put themselves on the menu. They may take their time, but as we saw in the speeches by Prime Minister Carney and Chancellor Merz at Davos, they are already halfway to the exit at the All American Diner.

@realDonaldTrump: thank you for your attention to this matter

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For much of the 20th century, Sweden enjoyed a justifiable reputation as one of Europe's most egalitarian countries. Yet over the past two decades, it has transformed into what journalist and author Andreas Cervenka calls a "paradise for the super-rich". Today, Sweden has one of the world's highest ratios of dollar billionaires, and is home to numerous "unicorn" startup companies worth at least US$1 billion (£742 million), including the payment platform Klarna and audio streaming service Spotify.

The abolition of the wealth tax (förmögenhetsskatten) 20 years ago is part of this story - along with, in the same year, the introduction of generous tax deductions for housework and home improvement projects. Two decades on, the number of Swedish homes that employ cleaners is one marker of it being an increasingly two-tier country.

Listening to those who built the welfare state

As part of my anthropological research into the social relationships that different tax systems produce, I have been working with pensioners in the southern suburbs of Sweden's capital, Stockholm, to learn how they feel about the decreasing levels of taxation in their later lives.

This trend has been coupled with a gradual shrinking of the welfare state. Many of my interviewees regret that Sweden no longer has a collective project to build a more cohesive society.

"Us pensioners can see the destruction of what we built, what was started when we were small children," Kjerstin, 74, explained. "I was born after the end of the war and built this society through my life, together with my fellow citizens. [But] with taxes being lowered and the taking away of our social security … we're not building anything together now."

Sweden's gini coefficient, the most common way to measure inequality, has reached 0.3 in recent years (with 0 reflecting total equality and 1 total inequality), up from around 0.2 in the 1980s. The EU as a whole is at 0.29. "There are now 42 billionaires in Sweden - it's gone up a lot," Bengt, 70, told me. "Where did they come from? This didn't used to be a country where people could easily become this rich."

But like other pensioners I met, Bengt acknowledged his peer group's role in this shift. "I belong to a generation that remembers how we built Sweden to become a welfare state, but so much has changed. The thing is, we didn't protest this. We didn't realise we were becoming this country of rich people."

Opposite of the American dream

Wealth taxation was introduced in Sweden in 1911, with the amount due based initially on a combination of wealth and income. Around the same time, some of the first moves towards the Swedish welfare state were made - notably, the introduction of the state pension in 1913.

The term used to describe this, folkemmet ("the people's home"), denoted comfort and security for all in equal measure. It was arguably the ideological opposite of the American dream - its aims not exceptionalism but reasonable living standards and universal services.

After the second world war, the wealth tax - now separated from income - was raised again in several steps up to a historical high of a 4% marginal rate for wealthy individuals in the 1980s, although actual tax burden is is less clear due to complex exemption rules. But total revenues generated from the tax were still relatively low. As a share of Sweden's annual GDP, it never exceeded 0.4% in the postwar period.

By the end of the 1980s, the political winds were starting to change in Sweden, in line with the shift to privatisation of public services and deregulation of financial markets in several European countries, including the UK under Margaret Thatcher, and the US.

The case against Sweden's wealth tax

One recurrent criticism of Sweden's wealth tax was that it was regressive, taxing middle-class wealth (mainly housing and financial assets) while exempting the wealthiest people who owned large firms or held high-up positions in listed companies. Another criticism was that the wealth tax drove tax avoidance, especially in the form of capital flight to offshore tax havens.

While a wealth tax might appear to signal their country's commitment to socioeconomic equality, my interviewees said it wasn't something they really thought about much until it was abolished in 2006 by Sweden's then-rightwing government, following the axing of inheritance tax a year earlier by the previous social democratic government.

"When the wealth tax was abolished," Marianne, 77, told me, "I wasn't thinking about millionaires being given a handout, because … we didn't have lots of rich aristocrats who owned everything. Abolishing the wealth and inheritance tax seemed like a practical thing, not so political."

Marianne and other pensioners I talked to all told a story of the welfare state having been built through communal effort, as opposed to it being a Robin Hood project - of taking from the rich to give to the poor. This notion of the Swedish welfare state as having been built by equals, by an initial largely rural and poor population, arguably distracted these pensioners from questions of wealth accumulation.

While Sweden still taxes property and various forms of capital income, in hindsight, many of my elderly interviewees now regard the abolition of the wealth tax "on their watch" as a crucial step in reshaping Swedish society away from a social democracy welfare state towards something new - a place of billionaires and increased social disintegration.

"I think about my children, my two daughters who are working and have young families," Jan, 72, told me. "As children, they were provided for by the welfare state, they went to good schools and had access to football and drama class and the dentist - but now I worry that society is going to get worse for them."

As with others I spoke to, Jan showed regret at his own role in this change. "I now think that is partly my fault," he said. "We got lazy and complacent, thought the Swedish welfare state was secure, didn't worry about abolishing the wealth tax, didn't think it was going to change anything … but I think it has."

'A society that is more humane'

My research suggests the impacts of wealth taxes, or absence of them, are not only about fiscal revenue streams and wealth redistribution. They have wider social ramifications, and can be foundational to people's vision of society.

Only three European countries currently levy a whole wealth tax: Norway, Spain and Switzerland. In addition, France, Italy, Belgium and the Netherlands impose wealth taxes on selected assets, but not on an person's overall wealth.

In Sweden at least, the question today isn't just whether wealth taxes work or not, but about what kind of society they project - one of folkhemmet, or a paradise for the rich.

"Tax was just natural [when] I grew up in the 1950s," Kjerstin recalled. "I remember thinking when I was in second grade, that I will always be taken care of, that I didn't ever have to worry."

Reflecting on how different living in Sweden feels today, she said: "Now people don't want to pay tax - sometimes even I don't want to pay tax. Everyone is thinking about what they get back and how to get rich, instead of about building something together."

"I don't think you can say: 'I pay this much in taxes and therefore I should get the same back.' Instead, you should pay attention to the fact that you live in a society that is more humane, where everyone knows from second grade they'll be taken care of."

Names of research participants have been changed.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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The post How abolishing the wealth tax changed a country first appeared on East Anglia Bylines.

Image by Blue Diamond Gallery / Nick Youngson via Alpha Stock Images (CC BY-SA 3.0)

The UK Government has quietly published a long-suppressed intelligence report examining global biodiversity loss, ecosystem collapse, and national security. Produced by the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) and supported by DEFRA research, the report was originally presented last year at COBRA (the cabinet committee convened to handle matters of national emergency). Despite its gravity, it was withheld from the public - until now.

Its sudden appearance on a government website, without announcement or explanation, strongly suggests an attempt to minimise attention. Released amid the international crisis of Trump's Greenland aggression, the timing appears calculated to bury the story. That must not be allowed to happen.

From environmental issue to security emergency

The report's title, Global Biodiversity Loss, Ecosystem Collapse and National Security, marks a decisive shift in official framing. Ecological breakdown is no longer treated as a distant, 'merely' environmental, concern, but as a direct and escalating threat to national and international stability.

The report warns that multiple ecosystem collapses are now likely, not merely hypothetical. These failures, it states, will have "dire implications" for national security and will require serious strategic adaptation merely to limit the damage. Such language is measured, but the message is unmistakable: the risk is immediate, systemic and severe.

Just one of the ways British national security is threatened by ecological breakdown as outlined in the report is through migration pressure. As ecosystems degrade, food systems fail, water scarcity increases and livelihoods collapse, "development gains begin to reverse." This restrained phrase points to mass human suffering - entire communities pushed back into poverty and instability. The report makes clear that these dynamics will drive large-scale displacement, creating cascading pressures on regional stability and on countries such as the UK.

Where's the rest?

While the report is significant, it's pretty clearly not the full version and is strikingly thin in key areas. There is little detail on the geo-regional analyses that presumably underpin its conclusions. The links between specific regional ecosystem failures and concrete national security risks to Britain are not clearly explained. Even the report's 'Key Judgements', which are normally the core of any JIC assessment, are presented without adequate justification or depth.

This strongly suggests that what has been released is only part of a larger piece of work. The omissions appear deliberate, consistent with an effort to satisfy Freedom of Information requirements while withholding the most politically sensitive and disturbing findings.

The Government seems to be acknowledging the problem in principle while concealing its true scale and immediacy; in other words, withholding precisely the information citizens need in order to understand how to adapt to a declining global ecosystem.

First suppression, and now silence

That this report was suppressed at all is deeply concerning. Its existence became public last October only through investigative journalism (based probably upon one or more officials taking risks with their own jobs), followed since then by sustained pressure from campaigners including notably Ruth Chambers, whose FOI work has been exemplary here.

Back in October, reporting was necessarily extremely limited; journalists had not been permitted to read the report itself. Now that the document has emerged, it is clear that earlier coverage barely captured its significance. This was not merely a warning about climate damage. It was a strategic assessment of how ecological collapse could destabilise entire regions, intensify conflict, disrupt economies and directly threaten the UK's security.

Its presentation at COBRA underscores this point. COBRA is convened for the most serious national threats. That ecosystem collapse featured there should have triggered urgent public debate. Instead, the report was buried.

Why this moment matters

The quiet publication of this report may nonetheless mark a turning point. Once ecosystem collapse is formally recognised as a national security threat, the implications could be profound. Security threats demand preparation, strategic planning and decisive action. They also demand honesty.

The report exposes a widening gap between the scale of the threat and the inadequacy of current responses. Incremental policy measures and rhetorical commitments are clearly insufficient if multiple ecosystem collapses are likely within the foreseeable future. Strategic, nature-based adaptation will be unavoidable, and delay will only increase the human and economic cost.

This may explain the Government's reluctance to publicise the findings. Once citizens understand that ecological collapse threatens food security, migration stability, economic resilience and peace, pressure for meaningful action becomes unavoidable. This only bolsters the necessity for the Climate Majority Project's campaign calling on the government to fund (with mission-like deep pockets) a National Climate Resilience Plan; with military national security threats, we are always able to find the money to fund a response. It should be no different when the threat to national security is climate/ecological breakdown.

The case for full disclosure

There is now a compelling public interest case for releasing the full report. Democratic societies cannot respond effectively to threats that are only partially disclosed. Nor can citizens prepare for profound disruption if key information is withheld to avoid political discomfort.

Those who pursued the report's release through Freedom of Information requests deserve credit, as do those who commissioned it in the first place. But partial transparency is not enough. If the state holds detailed assessments of regional collapse, cascading risks and timelines, the substance of that knowledge must be shared. Anything less is a disservice to its citizens.

This is not about inducing panic. It is about enabling resilience, informed decision-making, and collective adaptation.

Facing the reality

Finally, it must be said that the report's implications are emotionally difficult. To confront the likelihood of widespread ecosystem collapse is deeply distressing. That reaction is both rational and human.

When I first learnt what was really in this report, I suffered a serious episode of climate/polycrisis anxiety. Partly perhaps because I live on the edge of the Broads, in East Anglia, and so am intensely aware already of the (figurative and literal) rising tide of threats we now face.

If engaging with this material provokes anxiety or grief in you, it should not be faced alone. Talk with others. Seek support. Take time to process, and where possible, take action.

The attempt to bury this report has failed. The question now is whether we choose to face its warnings honestly, demand the full truth, and act accordingly, or allow one of the most consequential intelligence assessments of our time to slip quietly back into obscurity.

The stakes honestly could not be higher.

Postscript…

Green Party MP for Waveney Valley, Adrian Ramsay, asked in Parliament on Thursday why the critical report was delayed and called for a debate on what the government is doing to prepare for the risks it outlines. The leader of the House responded by committing to making time for the debate (He also claimed that the Government had intended all along to publish the report…).

Crucially, on 23 January The Times also published a major new story about the report, which it observes is not the full version: agreeing with what I have written above. 

The story reads in part: "…a full, internal version of the report, seen by The Times, goes further [than what the Government published last week], suggesting that the degradation of rainforests in the Congo and the drying up of rivers fed by the Himalayas could drive people to flee to Europe, leading to "more polarised and populist politics in the UK" and putting "additional pressure on already strained national infrastructure".

There is much more to come out…

Do pressure YOUR MP to get the full security assessment released.

Thanks to Joe Eastoe for crucial editorial assistance in the writing of this piece.

Rupert Read is Co-Director of the Climate Majority Project.

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More from East Anglia Bylines Environment Inside MAGA's worldwide campaign to undermine climate science byGeoff Dembicki 5 January 2026 Environment Who should we grow food for? People or animals? byJenny Rhodes 23 April 2025 Climate Nature-friendly farming offers food security and better resilience byMartin Lines 23 May 2025 Environment How new smarter greenhouses could improve the UK's food security byDr Sven Batke 12 February 2025 Friends of Bylines Network

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The post A suppressed warning finally appears: ecosystem collapse as a national security threat first appeared on East Anglia Bylines.

Local elections due to take place this May across large parts of East Anglia will not go ahead. In Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex and parts of Cambridgeshire, voters have been told they will have to wait until at least 2027 before casting a ballot for new councils.

The government insists this is a postponement, not a cancellation, tied to its devolution and local government reorganisation plans. Critics describe it as undemocratic, with some areas now facing a second consecutive year without elections. Both claims contain elements of truth - and it is the tension between them that has made the decision so contentious.

Why the government says elections are being delayed

The postponements are part of a programme to abolish the existing two-tier system of county and district councils and replace it with larger unitary authorities. Ministers argue that running elections while councils are being dismantled and replaced would divert officer time and money away from what they describe as a "once-in-a-generation reform".

Councils were invited to tell the government whether holding elections would stretch capacity or represent poor value for money. Where they made that case, ministers agreed to delay polls.

Steve Reed MP image by Chris. CC BY 3.0

Steve Reed, the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, said the changes would "cut through two-tier bureaucracy", delivering "faster decisions on housing, simpler access to services, and more money going to potholes, tackling crime and caring for older people instead of being lost to duplication".

The government also points to precedent. Between 2019 and 2022, elections were postponed in several areas to allow reorganisation to proceed. Ministers insist the same principle applies now.

What postponement actually means in practice

While "postponement" sounds temporary, the practical consequences are more far-reaching. In many cases, existing councillors will never face the electorate again in their current roles.

Where elections are delayed, councillors' terms are extended. In Suffolk, where county elections had already been postponed once, councillors elected in 2021 for a four-year term will now remain in post until the council is wound down. In Ipswich, where the borough council explicitly requested cancellation, there will be no further elections to that authority at all unless by-elections are triggered.

Voting for the new unitary "shadow authorities" is expected in May 2027, with the new councils operational by April 2028. For voters, the immediate reality is simpler: no ballot this May, and no opportunity to judge current councils at the polls.

Suffolk: 'appalled' opposition and a democratic dead end

Suffolk provides one of the starkest examples. Elections for both Suffolk County Council and Ipswich Borough Council will not take place. While Ipswich requested outright cancellation, the county council avoided taking a formal position, instead supplying information to ministers.

Cllr Matthew Hicks, the Conservative leader of Suffolk County Council, said: "Alongside delivering local government reorganisation, we will now continue to work hard for Suffolk residents, focusing on priorities like improving our roads, improving SEND services and ensuring vulnerable residents continue to receive the best possible support."

Cllr Andrew Stringer. Image by Suffolk County Council.

Opposition councillors were far less sanguine. Cllr Andrew Stringer, leader of the county's Green, Liberal Democrat and Independent group, said his group was the only one to argue clearly for elections to go ahead. "We are not surprised, just disappointed," he said.

Reform councillor Christopher Hudson was blunter: "I am shocked and appalled that democracy has been cancelled again for the second year."

Essex: patchwork decisions and public anger

In Essex, the picture is uneven. Elections have been postponed in Basildon, Harlow and Thurrock, but will still take place in Colchester, Brentwood and Epping Forest, despite all being involved in reorganisation.

Basildon Borough Council cited capacity pressures and savings of around £250,000. But residents reacted angrily. "As a woman, I am so angry about this," said Maureen King, a 68-year-old grandmother from Basildon. "Historically women had to fight for the right to vote and now it's being taken away so quickly and easily."

Others questioned why elections could go ahead elsewhere in Essex but not locally, adding to a sense that decisions were being made without consultation.

Cambridgeshire and Norfolk: choice, blame and mistrust

Cambridgeshire underlines that postponement is not inevitable. Elections will go ahead in Cambridge City, South Cambridgeshire and Huntingdonshire, but not in Peterborough, which asked for a delay. Ministers honoured each council's request.

In Norfolk, the fallout has been sharper. Labour MPs accuse the Conservative-led county council of failing to clearly oppose postponement, while Conservative MPs blame Labour ministers for "cancelling democracy".

Terry Jermy. Image by UK Parliament via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 3.0)

Terry Jermy, Labour MP for South West Norfolk, said: "If Norfolk Conservatives wanted elections to take place, they would have said so. But they didn't."

Conservative MP Jerome Mayhew countered: "Democracy cannot be delayed at the whim of the government. This is Labour's mess and they should own it."

In Norwich, Labour councillors voted to ask for postponement, prompting a Green Party petition demanding elections go ahead. A Green spokesperson said: "Politicians need democratic legitimacy. The people of Norwich deserve a voice."

Political incentives and democratic principle

Reform UK has been among the loudest national critics of the postponements, including launching a legal challenge. The party argues that delaying polls denies voters the right to hold councils to account and protects incumbents from defeat.

That criticism is not politically neutral. Reform made significant gains in the May 2025 local elections and believes it would benefit from elections being held this year. Similar incentives are visible elsewhere: in Norwich, the Greens oppose postponement and also believe they could gain control if elections went ahead.

None of this invalidates the democratic arguments being made. But it does explain why the issue is so combustible. When decisions about postponing elections are taken locally, by councils whose political futures are at stake, suspicion is almost inevitable.

Democracy is a principle, not a party position

Postponing elections during reorganisation is legal, and it is not unprecedented. Nor does criticism of the delays imply alignment with any particular party. Democratic principle does not belong to Reform UK, the Greens, Labour or the Conservatives.

What has been less discussed is cost. Local authorities fund elections from their own budgets, and running a county-wide poll can cost hundreds of thousands of pounds. In councils already under severe financial pressure, spending £200,000-£300,000 on an election for bodies that will exist for barely a year is, for many voters, a questionable use of council tax.

That does not make democratic concerns illegitimate. But it does explain why the issue is more finely balanced than some of the louder rhetoric suggests. Many of the strongest objections have come from parties that believe they would gain from an election being held now, while many residents may reasonably ask whether running two full elections in quick succession represents good value.

Local government reorganisation may yet deliver benefits, or it may not. But if elections are to be postponed on practical and financial grounds, governments and councils owe the public a clear, transparent explanation of the trade-off being made - not just appeals to precedent or principle, but an honest account of costs, capacity and consequence.

This article is based on several reports by the Local Democracy Reporting Service, compiled by ChatGPT and edited by East Anglia Bylines.

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More from East Anglia Bylines Democracy Another county election delay - and democracy takes a hit byEast Anglia Bylines 19 December 2025 Democracy Transforming local government: what next in the East? byStephen McNair 8 October 2025 Letters Letter to the editor: Britain should learn from France on local government byEast Anglia Bylines 2 September 2025 Democracy Is Labour finally ready for real electoral reform ? byStephen McNair 18 July 2025 Friends of Bylines Network

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The post Why East Anglia voters are denied a say this year first appeared on East Anglia Bylines.

As the world teeters on the brink, your weekly oracle paradoxically feels the unmistakable fizz of optimism. For the world we knew, this is apparently the end game. Time to find the courage to be honest with ourselves. (On this subject, any reader who has not read the Mark Carney speech to Davos should do so.)

So we begin with optimism, not with the moral cirrhosis of Donald Trump and his grisly mise en scene of world events. It is with regard to Labour's tangled relations with the EU. For literally years, Pecksniff has been insisting their present position cannot hold till the next election. Current world events only serve to highlight that.

Till now, Keir Starmer has been dishonest about closer EU links and has effectively forbidden his MPs to mention Brexit. But this week, the New Statesman told how Labour MPs had been casually invited to "drop-in" sessions with Nick Thomas-Symonds, minister for European union relations. It was so popular that somebody likened it to "political speed dating".

Gleeful MPs were told they now have permission to talk up the EU. Is this as a result of cataclysmic international affairs, and being Billy No-Mates in the cold new reality? Perhaps. Anyway, there is no going back to omertà. As far as Labour is concerned, the EU is now back on the menu and the government's claimed position to date won't hold water.

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We find more cause for optimism in the present world chaos. If you need it spelled out, dear reader, then Mark Carney in his Davos speech does so. We have been living in pretence, a dishonesty in which we all colluded. But Donald Trump has forced us to face a brutal reality - only not the reality he thinks it is.

Mr Carney sets out the new reality, and your diarist challenges readers not to admit to a frisson of excitement that, at last, a world leader has spoken honestly and courageously. To be fair, Keir Starmer tries to be honest and even courageous. His speech at PMQs has rightly been praised. But we have discussed before how he is a man who believes fervently that all we need is a bit of invisible mending and everything will be well. He is a gradualist, at a time when we need radical change.

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Unfortunately, after that speech we were introduced to the usual hubris. The PM tells us:

Image by UK Parliament via Flickr (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

"We've got through the last few days with a mix of British pragmatism, common sense, but also that British sense of sticking to our values and our principles." Nowhere does he even mention our EU or NATO allies, who were perhaps there just to make the tea. His comments might reasonably have been seasoned with a little humility. In its absence, the omens for the PM to grasp the need to move closer to the rest of Europe are not compelling.

So far, Mark Carney's historic speech appears to have been ignored by the British government, presumably because the PM would see Mr Carney's argument as burning our boats.

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We will know we are becoming a more civilised country when our politicians no longer feel the need to boast constantly that we are world leaders in whatever comes to hand. Really, the British people will not succumb to the vapours without it. We used to be known for our British understatement, and we can only assume the hubris is a vulgar habit picked up from our constant obeisance to American philistinism.

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Mark Carney's speech is already being hailed as historic because here was a world leader being honest and admitting that things have to change fundamentally. It was a call to arms. In a part of his speech which could well have been specifically aimed at Britain, he said: "There is a strong tendency for countries to go along, to get along, to accommodate, to avoid trouble, to hope that compliance will buy safety. Well, it won't."

Full Davos speech

Sir Keir does not have the luxury of the dramatic gesture, nor is it in his character to know quite which gesture to make. (Answers on a postcard, please…) But he seems under the delusion that ambiguity is the safest place to be. Mr Carney's speech is not yet holy writ. But the PM faces a choice: between the old way which under President Trump is guaranteed to fail, or the adventure into a new world where there is no guarantee of success.

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On the subject of the Labour leadership, this diary has reported moves afoot to find Andy Burnham a seat in the Commons, and this week the proposed seat has come up for grabs. Andrew Gwynne (Gorton and Denton) is to retire, which will mean a by-election, and it is in Greater Manchester where of course Mr Burnham is already the popular mayor.

Mainstream supporter and Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham © tfgm.com (PR)

There are many precarious steps before Mr Burnham could have his name on the ballot paper - let alone actually be elected - not least of which is having his nomination confirmed by Labour's national executive: rigorously disciplined by Morgan McSweeney and stuffed with Starmer loyalists.

But for them to refuse Mr Burnham's nomination, as a potential threat to their hegemony, might well bring civil war to the parliamentary party, as well as destroying the remaining integrity of the PM.

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Kemi Badenoch. Image by London Assembly (CC BY 3.0)

We learn that the Trump spat over the Chagos Isles may have been promoted by none other than the present leader of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition, Kemi Badenoch (NW Essex). She met Mike Johnson, Republican speaker of the House of Representatives and, it is alleged, put him up to suggesting the Trump outburst. (It is also alleged Nigel Farage did the same, but we will let them fight it out between themselves.) It must be galling to have to appear to back your political opponent at dangerous times like these, but effectively acting as a fifth column takes Ms Badenoch's lack of judgement to a whole new dimension.

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More optimism. We learn that the Conservatives' own polling shows Reform's vulnerability lies in voters' fear of their economic policies. At the same time comes the realisation that they can't beat them on immigration.

This might introduce a potentially dramatic change to our domestic politics. If it is the economy and not migration on which the Tories will concentrate, that ought to mean immigration and thus small boats occupies less news space.

It would also leave only Reform and (checks notes) the Labour Party fighting it out over who can be most brutal to immigrants.

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The manner of Robert Jenrick's dismissal from the Conservatives and subsequent jump to Reform seems to have been an embarrassment for all involved. Mr Jenrick faced the excruciating realisation that he had been betrayed by leaving his plans behind in a photocopier. Kemi Badenoch (NW Essex) made the best of a bad job by exposing her erstwhile colleague's conceit.

For a while, Honest Bob had no answer to the charges. He had hoped triumphantly to seal his acceptance within Reform and then march in with hosannnas, and palm leaves strewn before his feet. "A new sheriff in town" was how he described himself. It is difficult to imagine anything better designed to offend Nigel Farage's amour propre. But as it was, Mr Jenrick had merely been caught avec le pantalon descendu.

When Nigel Farage was asked whether Mr Jenrick would be joining Reform, he claimed (apparently truthfully) that there had been no such agreement. But in the circumstances, neither Mr Jenrick nor Reform had much option but to go ahead.

Even then, the intended celebratory press conference went off half-cocked when Mr Jenrick failed to appear. Was he lost in the corridors of the media centre, as one version had it, or did he deliberately keep Mr Farage and the hacks waiting?

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Robert Jenrick. Image by UK Parliament via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 3.0)

We must wonder what Mr Jenrick hoped to gain by jumping ship. Only a couple of months ago he had hopes of becoming party leader of His Majesty's Loyal Opposition. Now, he has been forced into joining a party wholly owned by its leader, so it is hardly likely that job will become vacant.

Mr Jenrick plainly feels a philosophic detachment from the woes of the country and the principles and demands of public life. He is out to capture such spoils as may be available. If only he grew his sideburns into piccadilly weepers, he would go the full ravioli and look like a Dickensian villain out to cheat his nephew out of his inheritance and throw some random paupers into the gutter.

So did he really join Reform just to become one of Mr Farage's loyal courtiers? Not on your nelly, my dears. However he calculated it, the move was a bid for power. Mr Farage recognises that too, never fear. So… Might it have been a cunning plan deliberately to upset whatever Reform apple carts might be available, encourage antagonism among an already restive membership, cause a schism, and then rely on all his thus-far thwarted ambition to out-do the Farage faithful? Unlikely? Perhaps. But we are looking at a practice well known on the radical left of politics. It is called entryism.

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Image by Gage Skidmore via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.0)

Nigel Farage is coming under increasing stress: including from his party's faltering in the opinion polls - this week Kemi Badenoch beats him for popularity - his financial affairs, and the collapse of his political investment in Donald Trump. Now comes the Jenrick dilemma.

It was no surprise that the devoted Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg wanted to put him on our screens again, but it was a surprise that he declined, claiming a convenient illness. It was perhaps also a surprise - or at least the cause of raised eyebrows - that he was later known to have attended a lunch instead (which involved money, of course) and then was well enough to swan off to Davos the next day.

Mr Farage has never enjoyed having to face questions and explain himself in public, though Ms Kuenssberg is hardly the most intimidating interviewer. For reasons best known to themselves, the BBC also decided to give Robert Jenrick half an hour's publicity, during which La Kuenssberg pointed out he had previously claimed Reform could only split the right. But a volte face comes easily to Newark's finest. His line now is it can only strengthen it. (His seat is an anagram of what people call him.) Ms Kuenssberg of course let it go.

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Image by Alex Catt.

We mention 'entryism' above in musing on Robert Jenrick and Reform. But its traditional home is among Trotskyists, and it is there that it appears this week too. There have been stories over the past few years of frustrated ex-Corbyn supporters leaving Labour for the Greens, and that would naturally include Trotskyists. But now we have confirmation that indeed the Greens are in danger of being blown off course as a serious party by Trotskyist infiltration: entryism.

The Alliance for Workers' Liberty have published (at inordinate length, of course) a project for its members to conduct "reconnaissance" within the Green Party (i.e. infiltration), in the hope of turning it into yet another self-indulgent and deluded group of lefties - something in which historically at least the Greens should need no further tuition.

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Rupert Lowe. Image by UK Parliament via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 3.0)

President Trump's excesses have put all kinds of stresses on his UK supporters, including Rupert Lowe (Gt Yarmouth), who like everybody else takes exception to his suggestion that British troops "stayed a little back," in the Afghanistan fighting, "a little off the front lines".

He still supports Mr Trump though.

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Clive Lewis MP. Image by UK Parliament via Flickr (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

The government's plans for excusing water companies' excesses regulating the water industry are about to be launched. They do not consider a return to public ownership (supported by 82% of the public). Clive Lewis (Norwich S) is a leading campaigner on water, and he and a group of campaigners wanted to meet the environment secretary, Emma Reynolds. It is fair to say that she was somewhat reluctant to agree.

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Readers will not be astounded to find Your Party has already split, again, with its latest schism (apparently led by Jeremy Corbyn) being The Many.

This diary began with such optimism, but really, my dears, what can one do? Except of course bugger off to the pub, which is where your diarist is headed. Every week it's the same. Friday night at the Muckrakers, halfway through the second pint and there is an urgent call from the esteemed editor: "You can't say that!"

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With thanks this week to: Mary Marshall, James Porter, Malcolm Lynn, Liz Crosbie, Celina Błędowska, Karl Whiteman, Mark Popay, David Patey and Helen Forte.

<<< Previous Pecksniff's Diary

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The post Pecksniff: The end of the world is nigh. So what's next? first appeared on East Anglia Bylines.

I have to admit when I first went away with Cromer's Twinning Association, I thought I had a pretty good understanding of what town twinning involved. I was impressed by the idea of communities standing together and also the chance to discover more about other cultures.

But it wasn't until I was there myself, staying with families, sharing meals and being part of day to day life, that I realised just how personal those relationships are.

The town of Crest in southern France, on the river Drome image by Pline. via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 4.0) Fostering cultural and commercial links

Town twinning can sound so institutional when you read about it. On paper, it can sound structured and official. In reality, it works in a much quieter way. It grows through friendships, through people opening their homes, through a simple willingness to share time and ordinary routines. That people-led spirit still shapes Cromer's twinning relationships today.

Cromer is officially twinned with Crest in France and Nidda in Germany. Longstanding links have also been established with Ponte San Nicolò in Italy and other towns in Europe. These relationships are not merely ceremonial or symbolic. They're active, modest in scale, and sustained through regular exchanges that place understanding above display.

Groups originating from Cromer have made consistent trips to their twin towns throughout Europe during recent years. Local hosts welcome small groups during cultural and civic weekends in Nidda and Ponte San Nicolò, which the groups finance themselves through self-funded travel and accommodation. The emphasis is always on everyday experience. Attending local events, visiting museums, meeting community groups, sitting around a table and talking.

Building trust

In Nidda, representatives from several twin towns came together for a cultural weekend that blended local history, music, and shared celebration.

The Cromer party received an invitation to a civic dinner at Ponte San Nicolò and they explored both Padua and Venice afterward. Local government and regional history details emerged at these events while creating openings for meaningful conversation and forming friendships.

What stays with you is how grounded these exchanges feel. Trust builds slowly, visit by visit, in ways no single event ever could.

Nidda old town, viewed vrom across the river image by Sven Teschke. via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0 DE) Greater understanding

Twinning is not an occasion for declarations, nor a tool for furthering agendas. It is a matter of taking time to see how people in other communities live, and how they are organised, and what matters to them. People freely discuss the shared difficulties of small-town life through community traditions and education, all while acknowledging the social bonds that sustain their communities.

Mike Bossingham, Chair of Cromer Twinning Association © The author. Used with permission

The earliest twinning arrangement occurred after the First World War. Soldiers from Keighley, West Yorkshire who had witnessed the devastation in northern France encouraged their local compatriots to raise funds towards the rebuilding of Poix-du-Nord's community centre. That sense of promoting reconciliation and reconstruction led to more town twinning after the Second World War.

Back in Cromer, we're still very firmly twinned in the town. The Association attends local events throughout the year, unloads stalls, sets out displays and of course chats to passers-by. It's often in these informal chance conversations that we're most likely to explain the purpose of twinning to someone discovering it for the first time. Through these actions we secure our international friendships within our local home life.

Looking ahead

Planning for the future, the Twinning Association is looking at possible future exchanges. Our vision is for a reciprocal arrangement where our 'twin friends' can visit Cromer, and young people are given opportunities through schools and projects. This requires agreement with our partner towns, and planning of cultural and arts-based collaboration. As always, these ideas are approached carefully and realistically, shaped by goodwill rather than expectation.

In a Europe that has shifted in recent years, town twinning offers something quietly steady. It gives communities a way to stay connected, to learn from one another, to remain friends beyond headlines or policy debates. Sustained by volunteers, by ordinary acts of hospitality, these relationships endure because people choose to invest in them.

That choice, to visit, to listen, to welcome, is at the heart of twinning. The joy of these partnerships, and the friendships forged, is that they continue to hold significance well after their initial creation. If you would like to know more about Cromer Twinning Association and how to participate, details are on our website. New members are always welcome.

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Four years after updates to the Highway Code were implemented to make roads safer for people cycling and walking, Cycling UK is calling for an awareness campaign to ensure all road users understand and follow the new rules

Four years since updates to the Highway Code were introduced to better protect vulnerable road users, calls for a renewed, nationwide education campaign are mounting

In a big step forward for our campaigning, MPs from across the political spectrum gathered for a poignant, passionate and at times personal debate about improving women's safety in public spaces. Cycling UK's Public Affairs Manager Eleanor Goldberg Mitchell tells us more

Please fill in the form below to register for the Group Leader course - 17 February 2026 - Newcastle

Touring across Spain on her gravel bike in spring, Cycling UK member Becci May was cheered to swallows on her ride - maybe the same ones she'd see back in the UK

Hamida Jogee got back on a bike in her late 50s. Taking part in a protest ride to highlight Muslim women cycling led her to Cycling UK's Big Bike Revival programme. Media Relations Officer Tiia Jaakola spoke to her

Connecting Communities rides with the Aberdeenshire Bothy are helping Irene Anderson swap solo indoor cycling for sociable outdoor journeys she actually looks forward to

A life member of Cycling UK, John will be remembered for his love of cycling and his passion for sharing his enjoyment, as well as his dedication to his family

Please fill in the form below to register for the Basic Maintenance course - 24 February 2026 - Kent

Please fill in the form below to register for the Basic Maintenance course - 09 February 2026 - Manchester

Today's web is not always an amiable place. Sites greet you with a popover that demands assent to their cookie policy, and leave you with Taboola ads promising "One Weird Trick!" to cure your ailments. Social media sites are tuned for engagement, and few things are more engaging than a fight. Today it seems that people want to quarrel; I have seen flame wars among birders.  

These tensions are often at odds with a site's goals. If we are providing support and advice to customers, we don't want those customers to wrangle with each other. If we offer news about the latest research, we want readers to feel at ease; if we promote upcoming marches, we want our core supporters to feel comfortable and we want curious newcomers to feel welcome. 

In a study for a conference on the History of the Web, I looked to the origins of Computer Science in Vienna (1928-1934)  for a case study of the importance of amiability in a research community and the disastrous consequences of its loss. That story has interesting implications for web environments that promote amiable interaction among disparate, difficult (and sometimes disagreeable) people.

The Vienna Circle

Though people had been thinking about calculating engines and thinking machines from antiquity, Computing really got going in Depression-era Vienna.  The people who worked out the theory had no interest in building machines; they wanted to puzzle out the limits of reason in the absence of divine authority. If we could not rely on God or Aristotle to tell us how to think, could we instead build arguments that were self-contained and demonstrably correct? Can we be sure that mathematics is consistent? Are there things that are true but that cannot be expressed in language? 

The core ideas were worked out in the weekly meetings (Thursdays at 6) of a group remembered as the Vienna Circle. They got together in the office of Professor Moritz Schlick at the University of Vienna to discuss problems in philosophy, math, and language. The intersection of physics and philosophy had long been a specialty of this Vienna department, and this work had placed them among the world leaders.  Schlick's colleague Hans Hahn was a central participant, and by 1928 Hahn brought along his graduate students Karl Menger and Kurt Gödel. Other frequent participants included philosopher Rudolf Carnap, psychologist Karl Popper, economist Ludwig von Mises (brought by his brother Frederick, a physicist),  graphic designer Otto Neurath (inventor of infographics), and architect Josef Frank (brought by his physicist brother, Phillip).  Out-of-town visitors often joined, including the young Johnny von Neumann, Alfred Tarski, and the irascible Ludwig Wittgenstein. 

When Schlick's office grew too dim, participants adjourned to a nearby café for additional discussion with an even larger circle of participants.  This convivial circle was far from unique.  An intersecting circle-Neurath, von Mises, Oskar Morgenstern-established the Austrian School of free-market economics. There were theatrical circles (Peter Lorre, Hedy Lamarr, Max Reinhardt), and literary circles. The café was where things happened.

The interdisciplinarity of the group posed real challenges of temperament and understanding. Personalities were often a challenge. Gödel was convinced people were trying to poison him. Architect Josef Frank depended on contracts for public housing, which Mises opposed as wasteful. Wittgenstein's temper had lost him his job as a secondary school teacher, and for some of these years he maintained a detailed list of whom he was willing to meet. Neurath was eager to detect muddled thinking and would interrupt a speaker with a shouted "Metaphysics!" The continuing amity of these meetings was facilitated by the personality of their leader, Moritz Schlick, who would be remembered as notably adept in keeping disagreements from becoming quarrels.

In the Café

The Viennese café of this era was long remembered as a particularly good place to argue with your friends, to read, and to write. Built to serve an imperial capital, the cafés found themselves with too much space and too few customers now that the Empire was gone. There was no need to turn tables: a café could only survive by coaxing customers to linger. Perhaps they would order another coffee, or one of their friends might drop by. One could play chess, or billiards, or read newspapers from abroad. Coffee was invariably served with a glass of purified spring water, still a novelty in an era in which most water was still unsafe to drink. That water glass would be refilled indefinitely. 

In the basement of one café, the poet Jura Soyfer staged "The End Of The World," a musical comedy in which Professor Peep has discovered a comet heading for earth.

Prof. Peep: The comet is going to destroy everybody!

Hitler:  Destroying everybody is my business.

Of course, coffee can be prepared in many ways, and the Viennese café developed a broad vocabulary to represent precisely how one preferred to drink it: melange, Einspänner, Brauner, Schwarzer, Kapuziner. This extensive customization, with correspondingly esoteric conventions of service, established the café as a comfortable and personal third space, a neutral ground in which anyone who could afford a coffee would be welcome. Viennese of this era were fastidious in their use of personal titles, of which an abundance were in common use. Café waiters greeted regular customers with titles too, but were careful to address their patrons with titles a notch or two greater than they deserved. A graduate student would be Doktor, an unpaid postdoc Professor.  This assurance mattered all the more because so many members of the Circle (and so many other Viennese) came from elsewhere: Carnap from Wuppertal, Gödel from Brno, von Neumann from Budapest. No one was going to make fun of your clothes, mannerisms, or accent. Your friends wouldn't be bothered by the pram in the hall. Everyone shared a Germanic Austrian literary and philosophical culture, not least those whose ancestors had been Eastern European Jews who knew that culture well, having read all about it in books.

The amiability of the café circle was enhanced by its openness. Because the circle sometimes extended to architects and actors, people could feel less constrained to admit shortfalls in their understanding. It was soon discovered that marble tabletops made a useful surface for pencil sketches, serving all as an improvised and accessible blackboard.

Comedies like "The End Of The World" and fictional newspaper sketches or feuilletons of writers like Joseph Roth and Stefan Zweig served as a second defense against disagreeable or churlish behavior. The knowledge that, if one got carried away, a parody of one's remarks might shortly appear in Neue Freie Presse surely helped Professor Schlick keep matters in hand.

The End Of Red Vienna

Though Austria's government drifted to the right after the War, Vienna's city council had been Socialist, dedicated to public housing based on user-centered design, and embracing  ambitious programs of public outreach and adult education. In 1934 the Socialists lost a local election, and this era soon came to its end as the new administration focused on the imagined threat of the International Jewish Conspiracy. Most members of the Circle fled within months: von Neumann to Princeton, Neurath to Holland and Oxford, Popper to New Zealand, Carnap to Chicago. Prof. Schlick was murdered on the steps of the University by a student outraged by his former association with Jews.  Jura Soyfer, who wrote "The End Of The World," died in Buchenwald.

In 1939, von Neumann finally convinced Gödel to accept a job in Princeton. Gödel was required to pay large fines to emigrate. The officer in charge of these fees would look back on this as the best posting of his career; his name was Eichmann.

Design for Amiability

An impressive literature recounts those discussions and the environment that facilitated the development of computing. How can we design for amiability?  This is not just a matter of choosing rounded typefaces and a cheerful pastel palette. I believe we may identify eight distinct issues that exert design forces in usefully amiable directions.

Seriousness: The Vienna Circle was wrestling with a notoriously difficult book—Wittgenstein's Tractus Logico-Philosophicus—and a catalog of outstanding open questions in mathematics. They were concerned with consequential problems, not merely scoring points for debating. Constant reminders that the questions you are considering matter—not only that they are consequential or that those opposing you are scoundrels—help promote amity.

Empiricism: The characteristic approach of the Vienna Circle demanded that knowledge be grounded either in direct observation or in rigorous reasoning. Disagreement, when it arose, could be settled by observation or by proof. If neither seemed ready to hand, the matter could not be settled. On these terms, one can seldom if ever demolish an opposing argument, and trolling is pointless.

Abstraction: Disputes grow worse when losing the argument entails lost face or lost jobs. The Vienna Circle's focus on theory—the limits of mathematics, the capability of language—promoted amity. Without seriousness, abstraction could have been merely academic, but the limits of reason and the consistency of mathematics were clearly serious.

Formality: The punctilious demeanor of waiters and the elaborated rituals of coffee service helped to establish orderly attitudes amongst the argumentative participants. This stands in contrast to the contemptuous sneer that now dominates social media.  

Schlamperei: Members of the Vienna Circle maintained a global correspondence, and they knew their work was at the frontier of research. Still, this was Vienna, at the margins of Europe: old-fashioned, frumpy, and dingy. Many participants came from even more obscure backwaters. Most or all harbored the suspicion that they were really schleppers, and a tinge of the ridiculous helped to moderate tempers. The director of "The End Of The World" had to pass the hat for money to purchase a moon for the set, and thought it was funny enough to write up for publication.

Openness: All sorts of people were involved in discussion, anyone might join in. Each week would bring different participants. Fluid borders reduce tension, and provide opportunities to broaden the range of discussion and the terms of engagement. Low entrance friction was characteristic of the café: anyone could come, and if you came twice you were virtually a regular. Permeable boundaries and café culture made it easier for moderating influences to draw in raconteurs and storytellers to defuse awkward moments, and Vienna's cafés had no shortage of humorists. Openness counteracts the suspicion that promoters of amiability are exerting censorship.

Parody: The environs of the Circle—the university office and the café—were unmistakably public. There were writers about, some of them renowned humorists. The prospect that one's bad taste or bad behavior might be ridiculed in print kept discussion within bounds. The sanction of public humiliation, however, was itself made mild by the veneer of fiction; even if you got a little carried away and a character based on you made a splash in some newspaper fiction, it wasn't the end of the world.

Engagement: The subject matter was important to the participants, but it was esoteric: it did not matter very much to their mothers or their siblings. A small stumble or a minor humiliation could be shrugged off in ways that major media confrontations cannot.

I believe it is notable that this environment was designed to promote amiability through several different voices.  The café waiter flattered each newcomer and served everyone, and also kept out local pickpockets and drunks who would be mere disruptions. Schlick and other regulars kept discussion moving and on track. The fiction writers and raconteurs—perhaps the most peripheral of the participants—kept people in a good mood and reminded them that bad behavior could make anyone ridiculous.  Crucially, each of these voices were human: you could reason with them. Algorithmic or AI moderators, however clever, are seldom perceived as reasonable. The café circles had no central authority or Moderator against whom everyone's resentments might be focused. Even after the disaster of 1934, what people remembered were those cheerful arguments.

"Language is not merely a set of unrelated sounds, clauses, rules, and meanings; it is a totally coherent system bound to context and behavior." — Kenneth L. Pike

The web has accents. So should our design systems.

Design Systems as Living Languages

Design systems aren't component libraries—they're living languages. Tokens are phonemes, components are words, patterns are phrases, layouts are sentences. The conversations we build with users become the stories our products tell.

But here's what we've forgotten: the more fluently a language is spoken, the more accents it can support without losing meaning. English in Scotland differs from English in Sydney, yet both are unmistakably English. The language adapts to context while preserving core meaning. This couldn't be more obvious to me, a Brazilian Portuguese speaker, who learned English with an American accent, and lives in Sydney.

Our design systems must work the same way. Rigid adherence to visual rules creates brittle systems that break under contextual pressure. Fluent systems bend without breaking.

Consistency becomes a prison

The promise of design systems was simple: consistent components would accelerate development and unify experiences. But as systems matured and products grew more complex, that promise has become a prison. Teams file "exception" requests by the hundreds. Products launch with workarounds instead of system components. Designers spend more time defending consistency than solving user problems.

Our design systems must learn to speak dialects.

A design dialect is a systematic adaptation of a design system that maintains core principles while developing new patterns for specific contexts. Unlike one-off customizations or brand themes, dialects preserve the system's essential grammar while expanding its vocabulary to serve different users, environments, or constraints.

When Perfect Consistency Fails

At Booking.com, I learned this lesson the hard way. We A/B-tested everything—color, copy, button shapes, even logo colors. As a professional with a graphic design education and experience building brand style guides, I found this shocking. While everyone fell in love with Airbnb's pristine design system, Booking grew into a giant without ever considering visual consistency.  

The chaos taught me something profound: consistency isn't ROI; solved problems are.

At Shopify. Polaris (https://polaris-react.shopify.com/) was our crown jewel—a mature design language perfect for merchants on laptops. As a product team, we were expected to adopt Polaris as-is. Then my fulfillment team hit an "Oh, Ship!" moment, as we faced the challenge of building an app for warehouse pickers using our interface on shared, battered Android scanners in dim aisles, wearing thick gloves, scanning dozens of items per minute, many with limited levels of English understanding.

Task completion with standard Polaris: 0%.

Every component that worked beautifully for merchants failed completely for pickers. White backgrounds created glare. 44px tap targets were invisible to gloved fingers. Sentence-case labels took too long to parse. Multi-step flows confused non-native speakers.

We faced a choice: abandon Polaris entirely, or teach it to speak warehouse.

The Birth of a Dialect

We chose evolution over revolution. Working within Polaris's core principles—clarity, efficiency, consistency—we developed what we now call a design dialect:

ConstraintFluent MoveRationale
Glare & low lightDark surfaces + light textReduce glare on low-DPI screens
Gloves & haste90px tap targets (~2cm)Accommodate thick gloves
MultilingualSingle-task screens, plain languageReduce cognitive load

Result: Task completion jumped from 0% to 100%. Onboarding time dropped from three weeks to one shift.

This wasn't customization or theming—this was a dialect: a systematic adaptation that maintained Polaris's core grammar while developing new vocabulary for a specific context. Polaris hadn't failed; it had learned to speak warehouse.

The Flexibility Framework

At Atlassian, working on the Jira platform—itself a system within the larger Atlassian system—I pushed for formalizing this insight. With dozens of products sharing a design language across different codebases, we needed systematic flexibility so we built directly into our ways of working. The old model—exception requests and special approvals—was failing at scale.

We developed the Flexibility Framework to help designers define how flexible they wanted their components to be:

TierActionOwnership
ConsistentAdopt unchangedPlatform locks design + code
OpinionatedAdapt within boundsPlatform provides smart defaults, products customize
FlexibleExtend freelyPlatform defines behavior, products own presentation

During a navigation redesign, we tiered every element. Logo and global search stayed Consistent. Breadcrumbs and contextual actions became Flexible. Product teams could immediately see where innovation was welcome and where consistency mattered.

The Decision Ladder

Flexibility needs boundaries. We created a simple ladder for evaluating when rules should bend:

Good: Ship with existing system components. Fast, consistent, proven.

Better: Stretch a component slightly. Document the change. Contribute improvements back to the system for all to use.

Best: Prototype the ideal experience first. If user testing validates the benefit, update the system to support it.

The key question: "Which option lets users succeed fastest?"

Rules are tools, not relics.

Unity Beats Uniformity

Gmail, Drive, and Maps are unmistakably Google—yet each speaks with its own accent. They achieve unity through shared principles, not cloned components. One extra week of debate over button color costs roughly $30K in engineer time.

Unity is a brand outcome; fluency is a user outcome. When the two clash, side with the user.

Governance Without Gates

How do you maintain coherence while enabling dialects? Treat your system like a living vocabulary:

Document every deviation - e.g., dialects/warehouse.md with before/after screenshots and rationale.

Promote shared patterns - when three teams adopt a dialect independently, review it for core inclusion.

Deprecate with context - retire old idioms via flags and migration notes, never a big-bang purge.

A living dictionary scales better than a frozen rulebook.

Start Small: Your First Dialect

Ready to introduce dialects? Start with one broken experience:

This week: Find one user flow where perfect consistency blocks task completion. Could be mobile users struggling with desktop-sized components, or accessibility needs your standard patterns don't address.

Document the context: What makes standard patterns fail here? Environmental constraints? User capabilities? Task urgency?

Design one systematic change: Focus on behavior over aesthetics. If gloves are the problem, bigger targets aren't ""breaking the system""—they're serving the user. Earn the variations and make them intentional.

Test and measure: Does the change improve task completion? Time to productivity? User satisfaction?

Show the savings: If that dialect frees even half a sprint, fluency has paid for itself.

Beyond the Component Library

We're not managing design systems anymore—we're cultivating design languages. Languages that grow with their speakers. Languages that develop accents without losing meaning. Languages that serve human needs over aesthetic ideals.

The warehouse workers who went from 0% to 100% task completion didn't care that our buttons broke the style guide. They cared that the buttons finally worked.

Your users feel the same way. Give your system permission to speak their language.

We've heard plenty about how digital life wrecks our focus and atrophies our social skills. But Patricia Martin's book Will the Future Like You?: Reflections on the Age of Hyper-reinvention (out today, January 29 from Karnac Books) argues the damage cuts deeper: constant connectivity is eroding our ability to form a stable sense of self. — Read the rest

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Nearly half of American consumers went into debt during holiday shopping, and many are now avoiding the bill. Psychiatrist and neuroscientist Judson Brewer calls this "money avoidance" — ignoring our financial situation, often to our detriment. NPR's Life Kit talked to him about how to break the habit. — Read the rest

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Virginia "Ginny" Oliver, Maine's "Lobster Lady," died January 21 at 105. She'd been hauling lobster traps since 1928 — starting at eight years old with her father and brother — and didn't stop until a fall at 103, reports The Guardian. — Read the rest

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Kevin Westerhold, 51, was arrested this week and charged with exposing his sexual organs after what Osceola Count Sheriff's Office described as a "sexual performance with a vacuum cleaner."

The Oviedo, Florida man was identified after reports of a man "exposing his sexual organs in front of a residence" on Grassendale Street in Kissimmee's Windsor Hills Resort; video was provided to officers of the act as described. — Read the rest

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In 1935, German-Jewish critic Walter Benjamin wrote an essay that reads like prophecy today. "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" analyzed how mass media — radio, photography, film — transforms us into distracted spectators, turning politics into entertainment. — Read the rest

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About a dozen FBI agents executed a search warrant on Wednesday at Fulton County, Georgia's election center, seeking to seize ballots from the 2020 election. The move deploys the Justice Department's investigative power behind Trump's repeatedly debunked claims that the election was stolen from him — claims Georgia's own Republican officials have refuted, reports The New York Times. — Read the rest

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A new book called Forrest Trump: The Half-Wit and Wisdumb of America's Last President and First Führer collects Trump's real quotes organized into helpful categories. The author, Tom Asspain, describes it as "an act of Anticipatory Disobedience, published while we still have a chance to express free speech." — Read the rest

The post Forrest Trump: The Half-Wit and Wisdumb of America's Last President and First Fuhrer appeared first on Boing Boing.

Greenlanders intervened to stop a man who tried to raise a US flag in Nuuk, with Denmark's TV2 news showing video of the incident in the island's capital city. As translated by Google:

A person attempted to raise the American flag in Nuuk on Wednesday, the Greenland Police confirmed to TV 2.

— Read the rest

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In case you missed the news this past July, a life-sized Ronald McDonald statue was stolen from a McDonald's restaurant in Pennsylvania. The McThieves were a group of youngsters who apparently couldn't bear to leave Ronald behind. Footage shows them casually walking out of the restaurant, holding Ronald by the legs. — Read the rest

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If you're curious about the morbid genre of things found in museums, the Ripley's Believe It or Not Museum has the preserved head of a killer from 1931. Peter Kürten committed a series of horrible crimes in Düsseldorf and was beheaded and dissected as a result. — Read the rest

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Writer and comics historian Mark Evanier writes about an auction of a famous piece of art that is currently up for bid.

In 1969, publisher Jim Warren must have taken a look at the demographic group buying horror comics in his magazines Creepy and Eerie and realized that the exact same group might be interested in a bit of sexual content. — Read the rest

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Bruce Springsteen has just released a song about the horrors playing out in Minnesota, "Streets of Minneapolis."

He wrote on Bluesky:

I wrote this song on Saturday, recorded it yesterday and released it to you today in response to the state terror being visited on the city of Minneapolis.

— Read the rest

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After talking about cracking down for months, YouTube favoring slop over its human creators has finally come to an end: the video platform is removing and gutting the top slop channels. This comes days after the CEO, Neal Mohan, targeted "low-quality AI content" in a recent blog post about "managing AI slop." — Read the rest

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TL;DR: The Mymanu Orb Open-Ear AI Translation Earbuds provide real-time, AI-powered translations for over 50 languages. Grab a pair for just $139.99 (reg. $179.99). 

Language barriers are part and parcel of traveling, but there is nothing more frustrating than having to quickly load up your translation app before missing the moment entirely. — Read the rest

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Archeologists found a 430,000-year-old tool, and it isn't Rupert Murdoch. The artifact, one of two found at a lake shore in Greece, are the oldest wooden implements ever identified. Described as a "spindly stick" about 2 and half feet long, it could have been used to dig. — Read the rest

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Yoon Suk Yeol, the former South Korean president impeached and jailed after trying to impose martial law on the country, was jailed for 5 years earlier this month for abusing his power, and could face a more severe sentence on other charges. — Read the rest

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TL;DR: BrowserCopilot AI works directly on the pages you're already using, offering customizable copilots, multi-model support, and fewer reasons to copy and paste all day now $69 (reg. $619).

Your browser already knows everything about your life. Your emails, half-finished drafts, endless tabs, research rabbit holes, and the document you swore you'd finish [yesterday] all live there. — Read the rest

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