Ben

@benfields

🇺🇸immigrant in LDN recovering academic Trying to understand humanity with data, music, libations Might not be looking in the right places – currently: Head of Data @lakaHQ previously: @bbc @futurelearn @funandplausible cf

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Ben@benfields· 12h

It seems 20 years in the UK has moved my dialect from San Diego to Washington. Another couple decades and I'll just sound like a native of BC I guess

My dialect map showing a blurred western regional dialect with a Northern skew, though it is labelled as 'standard'

Ben@benfields· 1d

also, fwiw www.nytimes.com/2019/10/12/b...

As captioned by the NYT: "At Jeffrey Epstein’s Manhattan mansion in 2011, from left: James E. Staley, at the time a senior JPMorgan executive; former Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers; Mr. Epstein; Bill Gates, Microsoft’s co-founder; and Boris Nikolic, who was the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s science adviser."

Ben@benfields· 7d

aLl THesE CycLISts RuNNinG REd LIgHtS (this is from my prework group ride today)

Ben@benfields· 7d

Look, I'm really sorry.

The title card from the Avengers Doomsday trailer, except instead of 'Avengers Doomsday' it says 'TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES'

Ben@benfields· 21d

Such a great follow up fact www.theguardian.com/world/2026/a...

Netanyahu replies by doubling down. “Yes, but you know someone said the first Islamic republic with nuclear weapons will be the Islamic republic of Britain.”

Pakistan, officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, has had a nuclear arsenal since the 1990s.

Ben@benfields· Jul 27

"Name a perfect album from the 90s composed mostly by _non-white_ musicians" technically this is six months too early but whatever

The album cover for "Batman", Prince's eleventh studio album, released in June 1989 as a soundtrack to the film. It is full of bangers.

Ben@benfields· Jul 15

it is a kind of hyper-distilled version of the easily mockable ha-ha-business types from the twenty teens and the demotivating force I feel is an amplified version of the vibes from all those TED talks gone by.

the Ha Ha! Business! meme:
a white male is dressed in generic nineties business attire, on a mobile phone from that era, with a very satisfied demeanour/expression, perhaps from 'landing that deal' or 'closing that sale' or other such business things.

Ben@benfields· Jul 4

Some really good context from The Guardian www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...

“As for those who peddle Marxist lies about our heritage, tell our children that we live on stolen land or that our heroes were oppressors, they’re doing something much worse than slandering our past,” said Trump. “They are slandering and attacking our future – not going to let that happen.”

Yet he was speaking in the Black Hills, which the US government illegally seized from the Sioux Nation in 1877 after Congress forced the tribe to cede land it had been guaranteed under treaty.

Ben@benfields· Jun 30

ages ago (15 years apparently!) @plamere.bsky.social ran an informal survey on his blog trying to see if a playlist was better by a person, a machine (AI in today's terms), or random. Surprisingly, no! But, a clear assumption that the playlists people liked were human, middling AI, and bad -> random

a table:
Actual Origin Rating
------------- ------
Human expert 2.5
Algorithm 2.7
Random 2.6

a table:
Predicted Origin Rating
---------------- ------
Human expert 3.4
Algorithm 2.7
Random 2.1

Ben@benfields· Jun 22

a fun fact for you to hold in your head when you hear lots of people talking about how Starmer 'made Labour electable' or whatever. Labour Party candidates got more votes under Corbyn in 2019 ("Labour's worst election") than under Starmer in 2024, it's just that _half_ of the 2019 Tory voters left

The wikipedia info box for the 2024 UK General Election available at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_United_Kingdom_general_election

the wikipedia info box for the 2019 UK General Election as seen at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_United_Kingdom_general_election

Ben@benfields· Jun 21

I mean this is just funny www.theguardian.com/politics/liv...

Screen grab of a post from The Guardian's UK politics liveblog on 21 June 2026. It reads:
"Trump predicts Starmer will resign as UK prime minister after failing 'badly' on immigration and energy
In a post to Truth Social, the US president, Donald Trump, has just said that Keir Starmer “will resign” as the UK’s prime minister, in comments that will cause huge embarrassment to Downing Street.

Trump wrote: “He failed badly on two very important subjects- IMMIGRATION AND ENERGY (OPEN NORTH SEA OIL!). I wish him well!”

Starmer, looking to stay on the right side of the erratic president for preferential trade terms for the UK, was accused of kowtowing to Trump after the Republican president took office last January.

But the two leaders’ relationship broke down over Starmer’s refusal to be involved in the US-Israel war on Iran as much as Trump would have liked. The US president repeatedly lashed out at Starmer’s refusal to approve direct military involvement in the war, labelling him “no Winston Churchill” because of his cautious leadership style."

Ben@benfields· Jun 8

it's the always has been astronaut meme.
First astronaut says "it's the enshittification of everything."
second astronaut, point gun at first, says "Always has been."

Ben@benfields· Jun 8

Got to this and stopped reading. This is the classic intentional misunderstanding of CRT that right wing agitators like Chris Rufo have openly spread. If your setup parrots US right wing agiprop, under the cover of being in the 'reasonable' centre right, you're just doing their work for them

Critical race theory, for example, is a dangerous doctrine that justifies a type of identity politics that is deeply divisive. It became pervasive in the US, especially after the Black Lives Matter protests, and the election of Donald Trump can be seen as a reaction to it.

Ben@benfields· Jun 1

AI revolution going really well over at gitlab

A screenshot of a browser error page. It reads:
"This XML file does not appear to have any style information associated with it. The document tree is shown below.
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<Error>
<Code>NoSuchBucket</Code>
<Message>The specified bucket does not exist.</Message>
</Error>"

Ben@benfields· May 29

Welcome to @thewaroncars.bsky.social Brian Phillips

Black text on a white background that reads, "13. JESUS EFFING CHRIST (forgive me, Father) GET TOUCH SCREENS OUT OF CARS. Did you know that with physical buttons, it’s actually possible to turn the air conditioner up via muscle memory? You don’t have to take your eyes off the road for 20 seconds to navigate a multilayer options tree that cannot be operated unless you’re staring at it! No one under 30 will believe this!"

Ben@benfields· May 26

choose your fighter

A Tesla Cybertruck, in raw stainless steel

Ben@benfields· May 21

I'm back at my parents house going through a bunch of stuff from high school, and uh, look at this (attn @comicscovers.bsky.social )

The cover of Captain America Return of the Asthma Monster
It is apparently compliments of your physician and Allen& Hanbury™ (division of Glaxo Inc).

Ben@benfields· May 20

40 in _all_ of the UK is wild though. Like 40 in the Hebrides!? 🫠 🫠 🫠

White background, black text, from linked guardian article. First sentence is highlight. The text reads: 'Heatwaves are expected to exceed 40C in all parts of the UK by 2050. Periods of hot weather will be longer, which could lead to an additional 10,000 heat-related deaths a year. About nine in 10 UK homes are likely to overheat.'

Ben@benfields· May 14

Drew a Hexagon at 88% regularity on mino.mobi/draw mino.mobi/draw

A hand drawn Hexagon that is 88% regular

Ben@benfields· May 14

Anyone who thinks this isn't really a Streeting detractor, his media presence is terrible. Ranking it against Starmer is asinine, they are both clearly bad at that sort of politicing www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Screenshot from the Guardian. The text reads, 'But at the same time, such is the dislike of Starmer among some of his MPs that in a straight contest with Streeting, even some leftwingers would back the health secretary. “I’d pick Andy if we go later, but if it’s now, it’s Wes,” one said.

Some MPs and ministers say Streeting and his team have done the hard work on policy preparation, and would be ready to govern. [highlight starts] And even his detractors acknowledge that he is a significantly better media performer than Starmer. [highlight ends]

None of this matters, however, if Streeting either never launches a bid, or – like David Miliband – he enters a race and loses. Even now, some allies of Starmer argue there is more hype than substance, not just with Streeting but also possible contenders on the left '

Ben@benfields· May 12

And of course

The classic screenshot of a DM from Dawn Foster. Her message reads "I knew Wes when I was a student and he was the NUS president - always been a right wing lickspittle cunt" timestamped Jan 3, 2021, 10:49am

Ben@benfields· May 11

The "Is This... Butterfly" meme with text that reads
"is this" "butlerian jihad"
The butlerian jihad is an event in the fictional dune universe when all 'thinking machines' were destroyed

Ben@benfields· May 10

over and over again forever

meme format in which a character is shown telling his computer to say "I am alive," the computer says the line, and he responds, "Oh my god," as if shocked that the computer just admitted to being sentient.

Ben@benfields· May 8

really appreciate Orkney bringing their best Orkney to the election results announcement

a still from BBC Elections coverage showing the candidates for the Orkney Island Council, they look straight out of central casting.

Ben@benfields· May 8

whoa! greens take the Hackney Mayor by 12 points! www.theguardian.com/politics/ng-...

the results from the Hackney mayoral election, showing the Green candidate Zoe Garbett winning with 47.2%, the Labour incumbent Caroline Woodley in second with 35.5% of the vote.

Ben@benfields· May 7

I voted! In the country I pay taxes in!

A photo of a bearded middle age white man in front of a sign indicating a polling station and the Laburnum Boat Club. It is left-right reversed because it's a selfie and he's lazy

Ben@benfields· May 5

I don't know why, but this feels like the right thing to do

Ben@benfields· May 5

This is so deeply problematic. There are so many layers to the erasure here. Front and centre the erasure of Jews, but also this poem is a pretty direct response to The Holocaust, and so the vague reference to 'the horrors of WW2' is also very much erasure...

a screen grab of a post from Harry Eccles (@Heccles94) over on Xitter. It reads:
"First they came for the refugees, but I did not speak out - as I was not a refugee.
Then the [sic] came for the people of colour, but I did not speak out, as I was not a person of colour
Then they came for the disabled, but I did not speak out, as I was not disabled
Then they came for the Trans community, but I did not speak out - as I was not Trans
Then they came for the rest of the JGBTQ+ community, but I did not speak out - as I was LGBTQ+
Then they came for the socialists, but I did not speak out - as I was not a socialist
Then they came for the trade unionists, but I did not speak out - as I not a trade unionist
Then they came for me - and there was no one left to speak out for me.

This is a warning, take heed.

Adapted from the original poem by Martin Niemoller in 1946 following the horrors of WW2

Ben@benfields· May 1

An screenshot of what looks like a menu for flagging an image from Facebook. Black text on a whit background. The prompt reads "What's going on?" with 4 options:
- "It's annoying or not interesting"
- "I'm in this photo and I don't like it" (selected)
- "I think it shouldn't be on Facebook"
- "It's spam"

Ben@benfields· Mar 27

This is that classic patriarchal white supremacist definition of DEI: more than zero is too many for non cis white men. As horrible and shocking as it is utterly unsurprising.