A special FT magazine issue all about maps is out today, w great pieces by @okr.bsky.social and @theboysmithy.ft.com, plus maps by me on how glacial melt is redrawing Alpine borders, the battle to redraw America and more

Read it online here (though best enjoyed in print!) www.ft.com/content/efab...

If you're a data journalist using Python and you are going to be at NICAR, we are running an introduction to Polars workshop.

schedules.ire.org/nicar-2026/#...
bsky.app/profile/emil...

If you are user of the Python package Pandas, I cannot recommend switching to Polars highly enough. #astrocode

I'm doing some groupbys for some plots, and a complicated set of string & numerical operations on *25 million rows* takes just 3 seconds on my laptop.

The Pandas equivalent: 2+ minutes. 🤯

Looks like me and @eadehemingway.bsky.social are going to be running a workshop on data analysis with @pola.rs at NICAR in March. Maybe see some of you there!

Grade inflation in some UK universities? Lost myself in cool dataviz in great piece by @amyborrett.ft.com www.ft.com/content/6935...

Weeks after writing about how the best ideas bleed btwn R and python, I find out from @stephenturner.us 's excellent blog that the #rstats world is attempting their own Rust-based analog to `uv` (for deps mgmt not packaging)

Haven't tried but neat to watch

a2-ai.github.io/rv-docs/

This is an interesting essay on methodological weaknesses in computer science and machine learning, exploring the limits of trying to accumulate knowledge mainly by building things.

doomscrollingbabel.manoel.xyz/p/the-empiri...

Merry Christmas from North Wales, which is bracingly cold but beautiful.