Described by Samantha Bee as the most well informed thoughtful person to ever dress like the EU flag
On Mastodon at @mat8iou@mas.to
Dec 1, 2021 • 15 tweets • 6 min read
Sad to see a project I worked on the refurbishment of (what doesn't seem that long ago) headed for the scrap yard... travelweekly.com/Cruise-Travel/…
I worked on the refurbishment of Costa Romantica in 2011, after which it became known as Costa neoRomantica.
We did all of the cabins including a load of new ones address on top.
Nov 4, 2021 • 16 tweets • 4 min read
Architect resigns over a building to house 4,500 students.
90% of the rooms are windowless.
I find the concept of this so utterly horrific. It's an experiment that could go do badly wrong. Nothing like this has been attempted on such a scale before. dezeen.com/2021/11/02/arc…
Would the developers live in somewhere with no windows? Would they want their families to? Or is it just something they feel is acceptable for others?
Feb 1, 2021 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
This is interesting, although perhaps not surprising.
I've often thought that (not just in this) too much focus on the mean (or the median) rather than other figures that may help to better understand situations - such as the Standard Deviation or Coefficient of Variation.
Speculating as to why this is - it probably suits some to claim a superficial equivalence which is in reality somewhat illusory. At the same time though, there is also school of though that anything under the simplest measures are misunderstood or perceived as data manipulation.
Aug 12, 2020 • 69 tweets • 16 min read
A thread on the asylum seekers crossing the channel and why I stand on the side of Ben and Jerry's on this, not that of Nigel Farage and Priti Patel.
Some of you who know me outside of twitter may already be aware that my wife was once a refugee.
Vietnam is more diverse culturally than many people realise.
There are significant minorities in some areas, particularly the Hoa - ethnic Chinese who lived in the North of the country.
Jun 10, 2020 • 12 tweets • 3 min read
Just reading about the Zong Case AKA Gregson v Gilbert.
Horrific, but tells you a lot about the motivations of slave traders & their attitude to their cargo.
In August 1781, Zong, a ship designed for approx 193 slaves sailed with 442 slaves aboard from Accra, Ghana to Jamaica.
On 18th November, the ship stopped in Tobago, but did not top up its water supplies.
On 28th November the crew sighted Jamaica 50km away, but thought it was Hispaniola (modern Haiti / Dominican Republic), so kept going.
Jun 10, 2020 • 14 tweets • 4 min read
It's more of a cult than grounded in reality:
The historical figure of Edward Colston was being reinvented in the Victorian period to represent the economic, social and political perspectives of the Bristol business elite. brh.org.uk/site/articles/…
Ritual commemoration, celebration and memorialisation of Edward Colston in the Victorian public domain were crucial to propagating both the elite concept of Colston and the belief that this concept was validated by long-standing tradition.
Jun 8, 2020 • 43 tweets • 12 min read
Perhaps the real story that people should be looking at with regards to Bristol is who the Merchant Venturers are and how in today's world they have the power to overrule the democratically elected government of the city?
Because they are the ones that have blocked most attempts to do things with the Edward Colston statue in the past.
Jun 5, 2019 • 40 tweets • 18 min read
Donald Trump says everyone he saw was happy with him.
He's a brief thread of pictures from yesterday of the ones I saw that weren't... #TrumpUKvisit#TrumpProtest#TrumpNotWelcome#Trump
And some more
Dec 21, 2018 • 16 tweets • 3 min read
It's worth looking into the causes of rationing post WW2.
We imported a lot and didn't have the foreign currency to pay for it.
By 1945 we were spending 52% of GDP on the military and had trouble adjusting to a peacetime economy.
In August 1945, the USA terminated Lend Lease, the program that had distributed food, oil, and materiel to the UK (amongst others). This happened very suddenly. Even his already in transit at that point now had to be paid for.
Apr 9, 2018 • 6 tweets • 3 min read
Please to hear the indefatigable late Robin Cook's resignation speech was chosen to start speech week on @BBCPM today.
Well worth listening to if you missed it. #bbcpm#iraq#robincook#blair#UKlabour#UKpolitics
The speech is still remarkably prescient on so many levels:
Of the need for unilateralism and how Britain can't go it alone.
Of how this wasn't an objection to any and all military intervention.
Of how the problems although bit fully crystallised could be foreseen in advance.
Jan 10, 2018 • 10 tweets • 8 min read
Not sure if I'm more upset that Kodak, the once global undisputed master of imaging has resorted to being a crypto-currency peddling huckster or that enough people bought into this to significantly inflate their share price davidgerard.co.uk/blockchain/201… #KodakCoin#KodakCES2018#Kodak
The crazy thing is that Kodak isn't even the worst example of throwing cryptocurrency buzzwords about to pimp your share price. Even chilled beverage manufacturers are in on the action. arstechnica.com/tech-policy/20… #KodakCoin#cryptocurrency#blockchain
And some more 
