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samuelwa.de
@samuelwa.de
2.8K followers 1.1K following 1.5K posts
Vancouver-based editor at @chinadigitaltimes.net, a Berkeley-based nonprofit publishing news and translation about human rights and censorship in China.

Knows changes aren't permanent, but change is. Will stand on the ocean until I start sinking.
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samuelwa.de
📷 Vernon Yuen www.theguardian.com/world/live/2...
A firefighter on a ladder silhouetted against an orange wall of smoke, flame, sparks, and burning masonry and scaffolding.
November 26, 2025 at 10:15 PM
samuelwa.de
I mean, come on. I wouldn't normally wear anything with this much カタカナ, but *surely* this is a worthy exception.
Sony T-shirt, retro style: ソニーのメタルポジション Metal-ES EXCELLENT SUPER METAL PERFORMANCE TYPE IV (METAL) POSITION 46 MINUTES (23 MIN. EACH SIDE)
November 26, 2025 at 9:18 PM
samuelwa.de
tbh, the System class is cooler
Iain M Banks sketch of System class General Systems Vehicle
November 25, 2025 at 6:49 AM
samuelwa.de
Introduce yourself with four spaceships
Iain M Banks sketch of a Plate Class GSV. The other three are inside, with 90,621 others.
November 25, 2025 at 6:45 AM
samuelwa.de
The Liet Kynes minifig with maker hooks could make part of an excellent Halloween costume for a dachshund.
Lego Liet Kynes minifig with maker hooks
November 17, 2025 at 6:51 AM
samuelwa.de
千里之行始于足下。
First page of the instructions for the Lego Atreides Royal Ornithopter
November 16, 2025 at 2:36 AM
samuelwa.de
The ghouls—all of them, Labour too—talk about "contribution" …
Shin, originally from the US, came to the UK as a medical student in 2015. She had barely left medical school when the NHS was paralysed by Covid. As a newly qualified doctor at Croydon university hospital, south London, she found herself battling to save the lives of those floored by the virus – and comforting the dying as they said goodbye to their loved ones on video calls. Five years on, Shin, from Boston, is now an emergency medicine registrar at the Princess Alexandra hospital in Harlow, Essex. Despite the sacrifices she has made for the NHS – she didn’t see her family for 18 months while working 12-hour shifts treating patients on ventilators – she wonders if she has a future in Britain.
November 15, 2025 at 7:40 PM
samuelwa.de
Though still not as funny as this restofworld.org/2025/china-e...
Chinese media have hailed DeepSeek for saving the day in the city of Wuhan. When the police received a report that five stray horses had been wandering around at night, they asked the chatbot for information on nearby horse farms. Officials were able to locate the owner by visiting the farms DeepSeek suggested.
November 15, 2025 at 2:33 AM
samuelwa.de
This one's an absolute bastard. I can't get anywhere.
Killer Sudoku grid (Guardian, Nov 4) I've done the obvious locks (3, 4, 23) and a few things that follow from those, but beyond that my usual tricks are failing.
November 14, 2025 at 6:35 AM
samuelwa.de
People knock AI, but before Rufus came along I'd have had to read nearly the entire product name to find that information.
Amazon page for "Hasbro Scrabble Board Game, Classic Word Game for Kids Ages 8 and Up, Fun Family Game for 2-4 Players." Suggested AI queries: "What is the recommended age range? Can more than four people play?"
November 12, 2025 at 9:09 PM
samuelwa.de
Great short story from a great collection: www.amazon.com/dp/B0C4TJRRRV (The Corey is, unsurprisingly, *brilliant*)
No human is an island. They are rarely even peninsulas. Slow Time Between the Stars John Scalzi
November 12, 2025 at 5:16 PM
samuelwa.de
I don't know why this is in my Kindle highlights, as I'm pretty sure I've never read it, but I like this line anyway.
laws that force us to confine our worst impulses to socially useful areas like the economy, while forbidding them everywhere else. The Dawn of Everything David Graeber and David Wengrow
November 12, 2025 at 5:09 PM
samuelwa.de
My dude, the UK's domestic emissions peaked in 1972.
First world countries like Australia, the USA & UK are increasing their carbon emissions each year but China reached a peak in 2024. The result? Polling by US-based polling organisations like the Pew Research Center & Harvard University show that 87% -95% of people in China like their govt.
November 11, 2025 at 7:47 AM
samuelwa.de
Tempting.
After half a lifetime battling the forces of oppression, he'd spent the second half revenging himself on a world that had fucked up anyway. London Rules Mick Herron
November 10, 2025 at 10:30 PM
samuelwa.de
If you see this, post an album cover with a motor vehicle on it
Loyle Carner’s hugo: reimagined — a red car crushed into a cuboid, sitting on a green surface with a parental advisory label in the lower right corner
November 8, 2025 at 6:25 PM
samuelwa.de
OTOH, “effective” *might* rescue VV here, but also, 1992 was a while ago. And it’s fiction. (Very, very good fiction.)
The OOB's computer was a lot dumber than it had been in the Middle Beyond. She couldn't ask it to sift through the messages looking for nuance and insight. In fact, if an incoming message didn't have a Triskweline text, it was often unreadable. The ship's translator programs still worked fairly well with the major trade languages, but even there the translation was slow and full of alternative meanings and jabberwocky. It was just another sign that they were approaching the Bottom of the Beyond. Effective translation of natural languages comes awfully close to requiring a sentient translator program. The Zones of Thought Series Vernor Vinge
November 7, 2025 at 4:20 PM
samuelwa.de
This is so obvious when you think about it, and so not until you do.
the difference between visible light and invisible light is purely biological: Waves in an Impossible Sea Matt Strassler
November 7, 2025 at 4:02 PM
samuelwa.de
@nickharkaway.com onto something here (2017)
She's never comfortable with that "I"_ not because she thinks it augurs some sort of awakening, but because she knows it does not. The Chinese room is empty. There is no god in the machine, just a very sophisticated card index. It should not pretend to experience. Gnomon Nick Harkaway
November 7, 2025 at 3:58 PM
samuelwa.de
#protoblogging
Lu Xun favored short essays because they could be written quickly and thus respond with urgency to the social and political issues of the day. Many of his essays were first published in literary journals and newspapers before being anthologized, and their appeal lay in their spontaneity, immediacy, and intimacy. Written in the moment, they convey, with emotion, personal reactions to external events: the death of a friend, a suicide, a massacre. Lu Xun described his essays as "signs of the times" (shidai de meimu), 12 contemporary chronicles of the fleeting and ephemeral events of history as they transpired; they give literary substance to a historical moment, making it immediate, tangible, and relevant to his readership. Jottings Under Lamplight Lu Xun, Eileen J. Cheng, and Kirk A Denton
November 7, 2025 at 3:56 PM
samuelwa.de
I never looked at Ground News before because I think the emphasis on left vs right is fundamentally misguided, but this is amazing: grouping @hrw.org and @hongkongfp.com together with Xinhua and China Daily as “the left,” then generating summaries muddling their perspectives even further. Sublime.
HKFP “leans left”; HRW is “left”. Excerpt from HKFP: UK university caved to China pressure over Xinjiang forced labour research, professor says A UK university halted research into forced labour in China following pressure from Beijing, a professor who has spearheaded the work and successfully fought the move said Monday. Sheffield Hallam University. Photo: Sheffield Hallam University, via Facebook. Laura Murphy, recognised globally for her academic work on contemporary slavery, hired human rights lawyers to fight Sheffield Hallam University's decision to curtail her research and forced... Xinhua (“left”): Xinhua Commentary: Xinjiang advances modernization with unwavering determination China Daily (“Lean Left”): How UK university's reports spread Western propaganda on Xinjiang. The series of Xinjiang reports, produced by the Helena Kennedy Centre of Sheffield Hallam University, are some of the latest in … AI summary of coverage trends: • Left-Leaning outlets frame China's actions as "pressure" halting "forced labour research" or "Uyghur Oppression," emphasizing human rights and academic freedom. • Conversely, right-leaning coverage generalizes this to a "China problem" for "British universities," focusing on broader threats to "free inquiry and free expression. • The left employs terms like "Threatens" and "Oppression," even presenting China's view of "Western propaganda" and "shoddy researches," while the right uses "problem" and "threat" to describe CCP "influence. • Center-Leaning reports use "intimidated" and "ditch," but uniquely highlight the university's apology for restricting "academic freedom. • A key divergence is the left and centre focus on specific university details versus the right’s generalized critique.
November 6, 2025 at 2:29 AM
samuelwa.de
ha
NYT screenshot: BRET STEPHENS Do Dumb Ideas Ever Die? 🤡 4 MIN READ
November 5, 2025 at 3:21 AM
samuelwa.de
*What is he talking about?!* This could be straight from the intro to Getting Things Done (2001). You could probably find something pretty similar in cuneiform.
Cal Newport quote from Slow Productivity: "We are overworked and overstressed, constantly dissatisfied, and reaching for a bar that keeps rising higher and higher," writes Celeste Headlee in the introduction to Do Nothing. A few years earlier, this sentiment might have seemed provocative. By the time the pandemic peaked, however, she was preaching to the choir.
November 3, 2025 at 8:36 AM
samuelwa.de
wait what
Star Trek: The Next Generation listed under Award Winners in Netflix search results for Taiwanese
November 2, 2025 at 9:57 AM
samuelwa.de
e.g., here: go to album, shuffle, play, play, play, shuffle
Apple Music pinned music widget: The Necks’ Disquiet album, Mastodon Essentials playlist, Prince’s Dirty Mind album, Blawan’s SickElixir album, Radiohead’s Hail to the Thief Live Recordings 2003-09 album, Jack DeJohnette Essentials playlist
October 31, 2025 at 10:52 PM
samuelwa.de
Still my best (2020)
Hello Kitty jack-o’-lantern, horns instead of ears, Batman logo instead of bow. The most ambitious crossover event in history? Maybe, maybe not.
October 31, 2025 at 6:44 PM