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01factory.bsky.social
Ex-historian of social and political thought (Cambridge, Birkbeck). Ex-Amazon (Alexa and AGI). Chief scientist at Mind Mage. LRB reader. 2025 side-mission: fighting global bias on Wikidata & Wikipedia. "Only that which has no history can be defined"
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#OnThisDay, 7 Jun 1929, Margaret Bondfield becomes Minister of Labour in the UK government. She is the first woman to hold a British Cabinet post. [photo (c) National Portrait Gallery London] #WomenInHistory #OTD #History #WomensHistory #BritishHistory 🗃️

submitted 18 hours ago • 0 comments

Raymond Geuss on Alasdair MacIntyre newleftreview.org/sidecar/post...

submitted 3 days ago • 0 comments

Fantastic - my talk's been accepted for #Wikimania 2025 in Nairobi! It's on the work I've been doing this year trying to measure and improve global representation in #Wikidata.

submitted 4 days ago • 2 comments

Some pleasing Oxford comma here. "My quondam Doctor, Poet, and my Friend,"

submitted 6 days ago • 0 comments

Some 1,300 Israeli academics have issued an open letter recognising the complicity of their academic institutions in the "horrifying litany" of crimes committed against Palestinians, and calling on academic leaders "to mobilize the full weight of Israeli academia to stop the Israeli war in Gaza”.

submitted 9 days ago • 0 comments

“He lived a full life, fought a good fight.” RIP Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o

submitted 10 days ago • 0 comments

@esqueer.net makes excellent and uncomfortable reading in The Dissident. "Many in the international community are not ready for the US to abuse its hegemonic power in ways that directly destroy the ability for international NGO's and even liberal democratic governments to function." Indeed.

submitted 11 days ago • 0 comments

Do you guys remember that time when Molly Shah dressed up in a snake costume or something and persuaded that lady to take the fruit off that tree?

submitted 12 days ago • 0 comments

Goodness. I've just read that Melanie Klein (apparently, alone among her sibs) was wet-nursed. The possibility had never occurred to me.

submitted 12 days ago • 0 comments

We were hoping that this letter to @bsky.app could first be shared by a Gazan, but we were too worried that doing so would get their account deleted so we are sharing first. You can sign on to the letter about the unfair treatment of Gazans on Bluesky here: docs.google.com/document/d/1...

submitted 14 days ago • 109 comments

Doctor slams BBC for echoing Israel youtu.be/d5yFJ1CjZYE?... via @YouTube

submitted 13 days ago • 2 comments

I'm vague about IR, and even vaguer about its history. But this was enthralling. First, a fascinating cast of thinkers and teachers and activists. Florence Melian Stawell, Lilian Knowles, Lucie Zimmern, Mary Gwladys Jones, Eileen Power, Margaret Cleeve, Margery Perham, Elizabeth Wiskemann, 1/

submitted 17 days ago • 1 comment

"I have had the notion of compiling the largest collection that I can of the errors that are met with in Dictionaries... I shall make digressions on authors of every sort whenever the opportunity arises..." (Pierre Bayle to Jacques de Rondin, 'Project for a Critical Dictionary', 1692.)

submitted 17 days ago • 0 comments

Byung-Chul Han has some really interesting work on this subject and he's been on my reading list for a while. It's dense work though, I've been putting it off. Anyone have other recommendations?

submitted 18 days ago • 0 comments

It's tomorrow, 21 May! Join us with IR/Hist to welcome Prof Patricia Owens @whitproject.bsky.social to talk about her book "Erased: A History of International Thought without Men" at 5pm ARB SG2 (that's ground floor by the cafe), drinks to follow! @campolis.bsky.social @ansteecentre.bsky.social

submitted 18 days ago • 0 comments

Congratulations to @kingscollege.bsky.social for doing this

submitted 18 days ago • 1 comment

When is a UK government going to put its money where its antisemitism mouth is and start putting in place economic sanctions against Musk?

submitted 21 days ago • 0 comments

The bullying beneath Musk's international dreams: how the Trump regime leans on African countries to accept Starlink contracts. DRC, Somalia, Guinea-Bissau, Lesotho & Chad have granted Starlink licences this year. This report focuses on Gambia, but Cameroon Djibouti & Bangladesh are other targets.

submitted 22 days ago • 0 comments

What kind of infrastructure is an algorithm: @amoorelouise.bsky.social from @geogdurham.bsky.social will be delivering the second Infrastructural Geographies Annual Lecture on the 29th May, 16:00-17:30. All welcome!

submitted 22 days ago • 1 comment

Sociology hive mind: I’m in search of ideas to explain sociology to a group of first-graders (6-7). I’m trying to think of social norms/rules that kids would know beyond “because my parent/teacher/etc said so.” Or examples of cultural differences. Bonus points for work & labour-related. Thoughts?

submitted 26 days ago • 6 comments

Per @washingtonpost.com: 'President Donald Trump on Thursday fired Carla Hayden, the Librarian of Congress — the first woman and first African American to hold the position. She was informed of the decision in a terse, two-sentence email'. #DrCarlaHayden #LibraryofCongress.

submitted 29 days ago • 8 comments

Yay! I've reached my first #Wikidata global representation goal! Women from the countries shaded red are 25% of global population, but in Dec '24 were only 0.83% of Wikidata bios. I set a target to increase this to 1%. Four months later, with 10,000 women added, they're now 1.01% of Wikidata bios!

submitted 36 days ago • 1 comment

Continuing my exploration of IIASA Workshop Reports and reading Groping in the Dark, possibly the greatest conference proceeding ever edited, and definitely the most unusual.

submitted 36 days ago • 2 comments

The latest #HOPOS features part 1 of Sander Verhaegh's two-part paper reconstructing "the analytic turn in American philosophy through a comparative, longitudinal study of philosophy departments." #philsky #hps Link: www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...

submitted 33 days ago • 0 comments

Our NEA grant was canceled. Here’s a letter from our development director about what’s happening.

submitted 34 days ago • 8 comments

I wrote about this amazing little poem by Lorine Niedecker, and what it tells us about how we read poems in our heads someflowerssoon.substack.com/p/585

submitted 33 days ago • 1 comment