Year: 2025
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In Britain, when Parliament turns on the Crown…
…the Crown must act — How to explain the persistence and apparent indestructibility of the British monarchy. More to the point, how to explain its desperate and paranoid response to…
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Bad bad net
The Internet, which we thought was going to be liberating, turns out to be a tool of control: repressive, coercive and damaging to our most basic freedoms — So it…
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Working in space
It’s a review of 2001: A Space Odyssey from my Hollywood history newsletter GROSS, but it’s also an essay about working in space and a comparison with Director Bong’s Mickey…
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Art book sale!
I’m having a bit of a clear-out. Here are some of the art books I’ve accumulated over the years. All priced to sell (I don’t think you’ll find any of…
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Hillman in Hendon and in Tehran
Is the Israeli attack on Iran the first on a country that manufactures electric cars by one that doesn’t? — I met this gorgeous car and its proud owner in…
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Nationalise what?
Public ownership as end-of-life care. — This is a quick note in response to the head-spinning fact that, apparently, both ends of the British Parliamentary political spectrum are now positively…
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On the beach after the gold rush – annotated
I wrote this article for Mark Ellen at The Word fourteen years ago (I hope he won’t mind my putting it up here). The events described – my stupid progress…
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Paragraphs about AI
All these thoughts I keep having about AI, I’m going to put them here… — Jared Bush, writer/codirector of Zootopia 2 and Chief Creative Officer at Walt Disney Animation Studios,…
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What have we learnt?
The liberal world order, the whole post-war, rules-based thing that we treasured. That’s obviously over. It’s not just what’s happening now, and not just in theatres of war: the symptoms…