Chris Adams

Chris Adams

@mrchrisadams.net

Science & justice. Also: coffee, cities, UX & code. Aghast at all the typos in my posts. A member of climateAction.tech, and I work at the Green Web Foundation. @mrchrisadams on most of the social networks

3.3K followers1.9K following747 posts

Can you imagine the stink around Meta’s name in the Lula government right now? After all the shenanigans where Meta was basically colluding the fashy little Bolsonaro spawn’s campaign for a result it preferred?

I swear, engaging in voter suppression should mean you automatically forfeit an election. It's always the worst people doing it, and it's like there's no real incentive to not do it. #brazil

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Finally, I appreciate the explanation of how the orthodox response to inflation, of raising interest rates, plays right into the hands of the far right, and how we actually have history of other responses that *have* worked, but aren’t in fashion with orthodox economists.

To be honest, it’s one the first books that has made me feel hopeful - as in the Rebecca Solnit “hope is an axe in a fire” sense - in ages.

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Also, pointing to real life examples at meaningful scale of what meeting these essentials looks like right now, made this feel like something that was replicable in lots of places. I could totally see how they would deliver tangible benefits to the people currently targeted by the far right.

(just a note for above gradualism does not mean moving slowly - it was framed as meeting very tangible, urgent needs first and then introducing some of the more strategic layers later once they’re demonstrated to meaningfully help people)

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I also appreciated the diagnosis of chasing profits as one of the key problems right now slowing down the transition from fossil fuels in our energy system, like The Price is Wrong by Brett Christophers. Actually proposing some plausible ways out of the current mess this time was v welcome.

Also reframing the purpose of the economy around meeting essentials for common people first then building up progressive layers made a lot of sense to me as well. The gradualism felt plausible in a way that introducing say… 21 different indicators of progress all at once in Donut Economics did not.

I really should write a blog post about it, because I was adding notes and highlights every page as I read it, but there’s a few things I really appreciate. First of all is putting this moment in context compared to events in the last century, like the examples in Germany.

I recently finished Adam Tooze’s Wages of Destruction, a book all about the rise of the Nazis in Germany, and the economics underpinning their war machine. So the comparisons to what’s happening now are uncomfortable, sure, but we’re particularly pertinent.

Chris Adams reposted

I too would appreciate being fed nice snacks to distract me from medical procedures

Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium@ptdefiancezoo.bsky.social

A little extra TLC for Moea! 🦦💖 Our rescued sea otter receives PEMF (Pulsed Electromagnetic Field) therapy to help manage age-related arthritis. This treatment may help reduce inflammation, improve circulation and support tissue health, helping Moea stay comfortable as she gets older.

Chris Adams reposted

If you can substitute "hungry ghost trapped in a jar" for "AI" in a sentence it's probably a valid use case for LLMs. Take "I have a bunch of hungry ghosts in jars, they mainly write SQL queries for me". Sure. Reasonable use case. "My girlfriend is a hungry ghost I trapped in a jar"? No. Deranged.

Chris Adams reposted

Last year, the IEA brought back the CPS (current policies) scenario into their World Energy Outlook after discontinuing it in 2020. It expects India's EV share of car sales to reach 5% in 2035. That's right...2035! September 2026 was already over 8%. CPS can retire again.

This thread is quite something - 20 Bell Labs worth of invention is a pretty stark thing to compare the money going into the AI buildout so far.

Kevin J. Kircher@kevinjkircher.com

By my napkin math, total Bell Labs research expenditures from 1930-1980 were on the order of $50 billion in 2026 dollars. AI companies have spent ~$1 trillion so far: The equivalent of ~20 Bell Labs histories. In its history, Bell Labs researchers discovered the transistor, the solar cell, the laser

I was transfixed for the whole 3m vid - I had no idea there were so many steps in making these things! I don’t want to spoil it for others, but it’s worth your time.

max power 🌌@sneptech.bsky.social

Airships as an alternative to Starlink, for remote access to the internet? Oh hell yeah. It's only a trial, but it was month-long trial, with 9000+ mile trip to send an airship to act like a floating cell tower over Japan, dodging typhoons and recharging via solar. arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026...

arstechnica.comStratospheric airship flew from US to Japan to test sky cell tower conceptTests showed Sceye’s high-flying platform can deliver connectivity in disasters.

Wow, I hadn’t realised just how low the fees were that electoral commission hits parties like this with. Read the thread to see how it’s (much) less than single digit percentage of the donations coming into them. It’s farcical.

Josiah Mortimer@josiahmortimer.bsky.social

The Electoral Commission has fined Reform UK and Britain First. Britain First for "failure to deliver its 2024 statement of accounts by the statutory deadline" Reform UK for "failure to comply with imprint requirements". The Reform fine was increased after they missed the payment deadline.

Antifascist Economics was published today by @isabellamweber.bsky.social. Honestly, in a country where you see parties like the AFD rise to power, and when they get hacked, emails about members going on *Hitler pilgriimages* being unearthed, this opening chapter hits pretty hard.

Chris Adams reposted

Replying to @pugetgold.bsky.social

Building a movement requires organization, and there's nothing better for organizing than fighting specific projects. It is also important to demonstrate that the industry is worth fighting because climate change is a real emergency. If we don't fight, people get the wrong idea that it's not urgent.

Chris Adams reposted

There is still controversy over the question of whether supply side interventions can make a difference to greenhouse gas submissions. If you understand that the fight for climate stabilization is a political process, it becomes clear that fighting supply side projects is essential.

Kevin J. Kircher@kevinjkircher.com

"the permitting processes for oil pipelines sparked unprecedented levels of citizen engagement in climate and energy policy-making, which in turn attracted the involvement of diverse constituencies, ... shifting the goalposts on what is considered ambitious climate action."

Chris Adams reposted

F-Secure's new showcase of our latest research about people's digital lives&cybersecurity, exploring the messy realities of trust, deception, & online resilience in the AI era. V proud of the team bringing care, rigour&expertise to this multidisciplinary research 💖 www.f-secure.com/en/partners/...

f-secure.comF‑Secure Illuminate – human-centered research for the AI age | F‑SecureF‑Secure Illuminate studies people and technology as they actually interact — trust, deception, and online resilience in the AI era.

I had no idea FediDb gave these stats of usage like this, and it’s fascinating. It really highlights how much photo sharing is used compared to microblogging. Entire fediverse is 14m accounts & 1.3m monthly active users Mastodon is ~8.5m accounts & ~700k MAU Pixelfed? 1.2m accounts & ~400k MAU

bryan newbold@bnewbold.net

interesting how popular pixelfed is in the fediverse: 407k MAU vs 672k MAU (summed across many instances of each) microblogging is only half of overall MAU. forums, video, and blogging are in the mix, but much smaller than photo sharing fedidb.com/software

Wow, I knew this was the case with EVs, but I hadn’t realised it was the case with heat pumps as well. Even if you didn’t care about climate and living on a safer Earth, you can make argument to use them just to reduce reliance on volatile fossil fuel prices for your economy.

Jaap Burger@jaapburger.eu

“we show that even if HPs and EVs were powered solely by gas-fired power stations, they would use half as much fossil fuel as modern gas boilers or combustion-engine vehicles.”

Chris Adams reposted

After allowing xAI to build Colossus, the Memphis City Council is doubling down on its deal with the devil, banning the most knowledgeable and committed campaigners for the people of Memphis for attending the next city council meeting about data centers.

This thread is a good read, but is also infuriating to see how large European automakers have been fighting so hard against making smaller affordable EVs people have been saying they want for absolutely YEARS, that they got caught totally off guard when they actually made one available.

Chris Adams reposted

New study: Pollution from industries in Louisiana's Cancer Alley, include oil refining and petrochemical processing, increases risks of congenital heart defects for infants born in nearby communities. BAAJA, the federal permitting bill, would make it easier to build such polluting facilities.

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North Americans: “this is enshiffitication” English ppl: “I’d like more things if they were better” I’m a big fan of Careful Industries’ work, and I *love* this sticker

Rachel Coldicutt@rachelcoldicutt.bsky.social

Also, coincidentally, the "I'd like more things if they were better" sticker is now available to buy. Cat is only slightly convinced