Rupert Stubbs
Proudest of the posts I didn’t send.
Most embarrassed by the ones I do.
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- Had to read Jude The Obscure for junior school and wrote an essay that it was intended as a black comedy - “because we are too manny”, etc. Lousy marks but still think I’m right.
- The thing about Rachel Reeves I really don’t understand is a seeming total lack of interest in system-wide tax reform. UK tax system is riddled with cruft, Labour needs money, UK needs growth.
- This is a brilliant and fun column by @chrisgiles.ft.com that uses EV subsidies and salary sacrifice to explain a big flaw in our tax system.
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- Still needs a coherent framework (and narrative) to hang it from. Which seems more elusive than ever for self-inflicted reasons.
- This is weirdly fascinating to me.
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- Works in China - not sure it works where there are competition commissions. Amazon probably the closest to it atm, but would anyone buy banking or houses through it?
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- Beware of letting go of nurse… but yes, I agree the focus on short term shareholder value has moved Apple away from making life nicer for customers (tiny online storage, can’t buy Kindle books through app, etc). Yet still no one I know who moved from Windows wants to go back.
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- Agreed. I’d argue that “new products” are a close cousin to line extension. If Apple just focused on iterating its existing product ecosystem better than anyone else it would still be a success. App Store (and lousy free online storage) not putting customers first - problem with having shareholders.
- 👇👇👇👇
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- Though for a brit the sight of a bacon sarnie overrules all critical facilities…
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- Hard to say that Tim Cook’s been a failure at Apple - but your point is right that businesses often become more focused on themselves than on their customers when they grow past a certain size.
- right, coining the Distracted Guy Meme decade - there's technically space out there for both a broad Labour voting coalition or a broad Tory voting one but neither party actually likes the look of their voters, they'd much rather have that other voting coalition over there, thank you very much
- Ed Davey:
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- In my day it was called line extension, and considered a dangerous but beguiling Heffalump trap. It speaks to the most self-deceiving part of a business - the idea that its customers love the brand, and will want more from it. Customers are not loyal, and they do not love brands.
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- Bugger - you’re right. Read it completely wrong. Puts Bristol NW at the v bottom. Seems surprising as someone who lives there.
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- FFS Wordle 1,426 X/6* ⬛⬛⬛⬛🟨 ⬛🟨🟨🟨⬛ ⬛🟩⬛🟩🟩 ⬛🟩⬛🟩🟩 ⬛🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⬛🟩🟩🟩🟩
- Bristol North West alone accounting for 3.7% though.
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- Quite right.
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- You have to wonder about Netflix’s assessment of the way their customer base behaves during the ads (ie. focus entirely on phones rather than only partially during the shows).
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- But who defines who’s a fascist? Seems to be a label that’s too often applied emotionally rather than analytically, esp on social media.
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- Fantastic book. A slow and mildly confusing build, which keeps ramping up until you find yourself in true mindfuck territory.
- What I'm getting from the new book on Biden's age is that George Clooney has bigger balls than the entire Democratic leadership. www.newyorker.com/news/the-pol...
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- Ezra Klein did his best…
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- A good selection (though Ready Player 1 is abysmal). My additions: - Anathem (Neal Stephenson). - Permutation City (Greg Egan). - The Knights of the Limits (Barrington J Bayley). - Dogs of War (Adrian Tchaikovsky). - Just One Damned Thing After Another (Jodi Taylor). - It’s A Good Life (J Bixby).
- I really think the desire to normalize Trump and characterize him as the next logical step in presidential history is counterproductive. He is dangerous specifically because he’s a freakish aberration, a break from normality. Even if you liked Bush or Reagan or whatever, you should hate him
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View full threadHe can’t even speak in sentences or write a letter on his own! He’s bizarre and dangerous, unfit from top to bottom, a husk of a human, an endless black hole of resentment and ego you wouldn’t trust to run a Burger King.
- I’d check out Ian Leslie’s article on the upcoming post-literate society - open.substack.com/pub/ianlesli... - as he points out the communication style that will fit best in a short-video age (reverting back to pre-literate simplistic messages repeated often), which Trump exemplifies.
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- Apple Turnover: hypercritical.co/2025/05/09/a...
- Sad but true. Apple is now in the business of makeing great profits, not great products.
- “making” obvs - bloody autocarrot.
- Probably when they stopped talking directly to the public as partners in society, and instead rely on tweets and press releases to put ideas out there for testing – treating us as passive consumers of politics.
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- xkcd.com is a great place for them to explore anyway. Highly recommended.
- www.economist.com/britain/2025... quite the chart from @archiehall.bsky.social
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- Worse - they reinforce the idea that what’s being proposed is dangerous to established thinking (which feels as if it hasn’t done those people any good).
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- And hope the EU sees it as evidence of pragmatism and not weakness.
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- I can see why white-ball matches haven’t taken off there.
- We know from the referendum that the people who vote for Brexit/Reform/MAGA see negative economic forecasts as confirmation that their policies would shake up the established order - which is all they want to happen, on the off-chance it ends up with them slightly higher up.
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- They shall not grow old, tatty and full of holes, as we that are left will do...
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- Gotta churn out those TikToks…
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- It feels all part of our accelerating slide into a low-trust society, which adds inordinate cost, friction and legislation.
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- Bastard. Wordle 1,420 4/6* ⬛⬛⬛⬛🟩 🟩🟩⬛⬛🟩 🟩🟩🟩⬛🟩 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
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- Though 1883 was brutal, haunting and rather wonderful
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- Great article. Trump certainly has a zero-sum mindset, though it’s added to his “assumption of bad faith in others, since it reflects what he would do in their situation” mindset…
- Well worth 5 minutes of your time.
- your pope name is your mum's maiden name and the last three numbers on the back of your card
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- 👏👏👏
- Horrific by intent.
- A report from the scene of a horrifying kidnapping on the streets of Worcester, MA today by @billshaner.bsky.social www.welcometohellworld.com/they-dont-ne...
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- Slander is having so much fun. The rest is irrelevant.
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- What’s the soft power benefit to the US of half a million children who owe their lives to it? Not to mention their parents and extended families…
- This study in The Lancet found that cuts to US spending on PEPFAR, the program to deliver H.I.V. and AIDS relief abroad, could cost the lives of 500,000 children by 2030. Half a million kids. Kids. www.ox.ac.uk/news/2025-04...
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- “Economic security blanket” is a typical Trump “plan for a concept” attempt to make a nothing sandwich sound like something more substantive.
- The most baffling part of the Alex Avila AI propaganda vid is the part where he seeks to debunk the idea that "art requires creative intent" by bringing up Jackson Pollock. The implication being that Pollock was creating without intent, or at least without control. Which is super ridiculous.
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- If I was Starmer I would hire Rory Sutherland and his behavioural marketing team to look at the potential low-cost ways we could make people *feel* better in this country. No-one feels better about a 0.5% rise in GDP.
- A fascinating (and chilling) perspective on men… @mscaitlinmoran.bsky.social might be intersted...
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- @bengoldacre.bsky.social wrote the book…
- Damn right.
- oh god, at last, this is going to save so many lives
- Ridiculous (the new legislation, not your response). I thought we’d progressed beyond the idea of sacrilege, for lawk’s sake.
