jocanib

Buses are awful for long journeys. Trams for longer journeys make sense. You need the buses to get you to the tram stop.

How Oxford Street is being reclaimed from American candy shops

Westminster Council has been cracking down on US sweet shops after many were discovered to be fronts for illegitimate businesses. In November 2022 one third of the stores had been shut down and by March 2023 the Met Police had seized £1 million worth of goods from the shops.

The solution is pretty sweet (pun intended):

A new initiative by Westminster Council called Meanwhile On: Oxford Street will allow up-and-coming businesses to open in the sites of closed-down candy shops without paying rent, while also having their business rates cut by 70 percent. The free rent will last for the first six months of the stores opening. It comes as part of a scheme to regenerate central London’s waning high street.

“90% of content moderators are foreigners. What we have experienced during the process is very hard… spending three months without receiving a salary, in a country that isn’t yours. You cannot pay the rent, you cannot buy food,” Nkuzimana explains. Cori Crider – co-director of Foxglove, a British organization that is supporting the workers in this process – adds that this situation “forces [the content moderators] to continue accepting insecure jobs to remain in [Kenya], despite the serious risk to their mental health.” Moderators have resorted to crowdfunding, so that they can support their families as the legal fight unfolds.

Just highlighting the exploitation of migrant workers here, like much of Twitter's remaining workforce, apparently. It also reminded me of this story: The fishermen:

On November 22, Joanne circulated a letter among the migrant crew. “I have been made aware the crew members are contacting an outside representative,” it read, possibly referencing a call Quezon made to Stella Maris seeking help for Susada. “I am also aware that crew members have been leaving their port without permission or making our office aware. Sadly the actions by these crew members are beginning to ruin the trust and faith we have placed in our Filipino crew.” It concluded by noting they would make reports to local police and UK immigration authorities “if necessary”.

These people are fucking sick. The whole system that denies people the legal right to work just so they can be more easily exploited is fucking sick.

I'm going to go and punch some walls. Laters.

Then you're in a perfect position to help him out.

Make sure he gets a say in it. Invite him into your life, don't just make sure you're the next dumping ground for him, if that makes sense. Kid needs a sense of agency, I'm sure. And he needs to know that someone wants him around.

And make sure he has trusted adults outside your household he can talk to if things get difficult at any point. Your brother sounds perfect for that. Weekly phone calls or something to check in with him. It's important that he knows he can tell someone if he's being treated badly. Not that you will, but he needs to know that f anything goes wrong, he has someone he can tell about it.

This will not be easy. But if you're in a position to do it, it'd be a great thing to do.

Good luck.

I used to live round the corner from a strange little place that sold cassette tapes (what we used for music and sometimes even data before CDs, for those too young to know). Everyone was convinced it was a front but it turned out it was a world famous tape supplier. Just happened to be based in my quiet little back street.

The newsagents next door to my last place have to have been a front though. Shelves were half bare, only ever stocked with stuff that doesn't go off. Always two or three guys hanging out in the back room, looking slightly surprised if you wanted to buy something. Cash only, no cards (not that unusual round here but they usually have a minimum purchase rather than just no card machine at all these days).

They were absolute sweethearts. Took loads of deliveries for us, always really nice about it. And that's more evidence that it's a front. Proper criminals are the best neighbours anyone could ask for because the last thing they want is complaints bringing the police to their door.

Do you live close enough to his school to offer (effectively) childcare during the week plus any time she is working at the weekends?

If so, you don't need to take him off her or present it as that kind of threat. Just give her some space to get her shit together without forcing the kid along for the ride.

If you don't live close enough to his school, it gets a lot more complicated.

(Apologies if I've missed this detail somewhere.)

Exactly. "Alternative use" of a listed building where said listing is extremely inconvenient to the developers. They didn't even wait until the ink was dry.

It's an unpaid role. He was just saying he'd not leave them in the lurch by continuing to the end of the year.

Wiley doing a Reddit here. As are many other academic publishers. Popcorn time, the sooner these parasites kill themselves off the better.

There's only so much time in the day. And far too easy to waste it arguing pointless things with random strangers on the internet.

In this case, their motive does not matter. They did you a favour shutting it down before you wasted any more time thinking about something that does not matter at all.

You could try something like Phone Link so you can access all your phone apps on your computer.

I also use Dark Notes (a free app for Windows). It's basically just a grid of post-it notes. I have one for "today" which lists the tasks I really should be getting on with right now, plus one with more detailed notes for every project, and one for things that need to be ticked off eventually. That and a glance at the calendar helps keep me on track. Obviously it needs updating regularly enough to be useful but that in itself is a handy task to kickstart the day.

The thing that really helps is having a laptop with a small screen next to the keyboard (big phone, small tablet sized). Not cheap but I don't need a separate desktop (because that is just asking for trouble, for me anyway). I use it like a dashboard so that this stuff is always in front of me.

Rebuilding this would be impossible, I think. But listing the ruins to ensure they are preserved rather than redeveloped would be fitting, as would prosecuting the fuck out of these arseholes.

Neither will happen, of course. As a semi-local, I hope the locals find ways to make sure any redevelopment is a loss-making disaster for the new owners.

15F is a huge difference?