Novara Media

Novara Media is an independent, left-wing alternative media organisation based in the United Kingdom.

Novara Media was founded in 2011 by James Butler and Aaron Bastani, who met in the same year during the protests against the increase in UK university tuition fees. Novara Media is a trading name of Thousand Hands Ltd, and its office and studio is in south-east London.

Hey @TonyParsonsUK - do a voxpop on this question on a high street of your choosing outside of London for @novaramedia?

That would be the definition of ‘getting out’, no? I’m pretty sure what the results would be….but always worth testing a hypothesis…. https://t.co/yyvQ9oSN8y

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) October 3, 2022

That tweet is pretty much what they do. Create noise outside mainstream media circles, say the mildest dissenting thing in the hope that it gets invited for a 'debate'. Creating more noise, recognition and subs so they can pay themselves.

https://novaramedia.com/2022/10/03/kwarteng-performs-screeching-u-turn-lula-faces-bolsonaro-in-brazil/

AB: "I do at the moment think that Labour would broadly govern like the Tories ... somewhat better, obviously".

"I do love our Friday shows, Michael - they're quite sacred to me"

Sweet.

fwiw I doubt Novara will go full on "hooray Starmer" in the near future because, aside from everything else, it's not a good business decision - the vast majority of ppl who give them money can't stand the guy and would withdraw if the site became that

more likely to have an era of conflicted back and forth ending at a "regretfully, we still encourage you to vote labour" message when elections come around

as I said before, my personal problem with the place is less about its ideological dodginess than the emphasis on low effort punditry which you could get from many free sources

Was Michael "sweet" when he supported an immigration points-based system?

Daniel RF: I agree with most of your comment - it would not be pragmatic for them to alienate their own base. I also think there does seem to be a 'conflicted' attitude emerging, or rather: to my surprise, Walker for instance seems quite keen on a Labour government.

I don't much agree about low effort punditry: as far as I can see, they use experts and people who are based on the places they write about. Brazilian commentator this week one of dozens of examples.

Getting experts on isn't actually high effort tho! I mean it's fine, a necessary part of the picture, the low effort punditry I was refering to was the novara host's own, not the interview sections. As I said, what's missing is actual research based investigative journalism, which is in v short supply in the UK from any corner and near non existant from a leftist pov.

I accept the explanation that they don't have the money for that yet but I do doubt they'll ever be interested in going down that avenue.

hard to trust them not to melt with any proximity to power - they sold out everything else for corbynism when it was big and will sell out corbynism for some kind of "critical" starmerism if that's all there is going in terms of mainstream relevance. I'm sure they do some good reporting but punditry-wise they seem to aspire to be the leftmost mainstream or most mainstream left media and will punch left if that helps them get there

my language sounds a lot more disdainful than I intend it I know it's just a job for most of these people and a huge part of my problem is just bastani

you just *know* they would have supported the british war effort in WW1

Is there not room for an alternative to Novara? That can reach similar or larger numbers of people. Maybe there already is/are, it seems there should be more than enough room for a range of choices in this sphere (whatever this sphere is). They don't really seem to have much competition (unless they're competing with US channels, which I guess they probably are)

I agree with most of your comment - it would not be pragmatic for them to alienate their own base

The low effort comment, maybe, it feels quite...comfortable? like they are coasting. I don't really know who their base is though

I guess Tribune would be that? I will say the Politics Theory Other podcast is consistently more illuminating than Novara for me.

Tribune has a better set of writers and is more consistent with their opinions.

THE OWEN JONES SHOW or Youtube channel is roughly parallel to Novara. I think he talks to relevant people, but I don't think he is as good at this particular job (hosting, anchoring, interviewing, etc) as his Novara counterparts.

Daniel RF: I don't share your impression that Novara don't do investigations, though accept it's not their #1 activity. They claim to have 'broken the Labour Leaks story'; they disclosed new information about the mistreatment of Apsana Begum MP; etc. Rivkah Brown is the main reporter on that front I believe.

Bastani also wrote an article in c. January 2020 questioning the funding and personnel of KS's campaign, issues which were ignored by the people who went on to vote for KS as LOTO.

Novara are kind of first entrants ito being populist leftist media that does social media and attempts to reach young and youngish people where they are. Personally can’t stand any of the men except James Butler. Ash Sarkar I will nearly always defend despite her being daft more often than not cos she gets huge amounts of racism, but I’m reminded of a leftist I follow whose take when she first started to become prominent was “finally there’s someone on TV as left wing as me…but why does it have to be Ash Sarkar?”

Somebody that listens as little and interrupts as much as Jones shouldn't be taken seriously by anyone

Novara aiming at younger and first entrant audience sounds right on paper, but I don't see how it works in practice. They don't really stream, they don't do debates or have people call in, their funnel seems to be mainly from TV stuff, arguing with the likes of Piers Morgan, and its not that clear there's much in the way of insight

They feel like a recreation of legacy media. I think the only reason they're any kind of first step is due to the free advertizing they get on TV shows, and name recognition out of that. And does their audience even skew younger? (not saying it does or it doesn't so if stats show it does fair enough)

I mean they don't do debates on their channel (as far as I'm aware). I don't mean their TV appearances

They didn't break the Lab leaks story, did they? The Begum story isn't theirs either (though Rivkah seems an ok reporter on it). Overall, these stories are widely reported in this left crank ecosystem and they are no better at commentary than a loud twitter account with a Mario avatar.

I don't know if Politics Joe counts as left, I've no idea what the rules are, but just has a quick look and view counts are killing Novaras (off marginally fewer subscribers)

Again, if you curate your twitter it was widely known who Starmer was hanging out with in 2020. These deficiencies are now being turned by Bastani, who is calling Starmer Machiavellic in 2022, when things have turned around purely because of timing.

yeah the Starmer aftertiming by Bastani last week just sums up what a self-serving muppet he is. There are plenty of non-affiliated nobodies on twitter who can comment on politics in a more consistent manner without all the grandstanding that comes from being involved with a content factory or doing all that "watch my video" bollox!

a lot of them seem like the kind of people who have always harboured an ambition to pursue a media career, so precisely the chirpy "influencer" types who are not aimed at grumpy old bastards like me. But I feel like anyone self-assured enough to upload videos of themselves talking shite every day is going to be politically dodgy and compromised because they love doing this shit so much!

This is pure guesswork on my part, but I'd imagine the "younger" demographic Novara targets is probably like thirtysomething millenials. Which is still younger compared to the rest of the UK media, sure.

Thats more or less my reading too, its difficult to see them as any kind of entry point for younger audiences and I don't see the effort or drive to do that. Which leads to its kind of cozy existence effectively advertized by guest slots on breakfast tv shows, and this generally coasting feel

Any left-wing landlords about?

Do I know any London estate agents and/or landlords who would be up for being interviewed for a podcast?

— Michael Walker (@michaeljswalker) October 5, 2022

like he hasn't got the contact details of LRM on his rolodex, the fooking tool. How many of them there are would an interesting subject. From a '21 audit there are 18 Labour MP/Landlords - seems to way too low to me.

Michael Walker has previously stated that all landlords should be abolished.

once you've previously advanced the class struggle by some weak lip service ya get a free pass on NOT advancing the class struggle, sounds pretty solid tbf!

Michael Walker has previously stated that all landlords should be abolished.

How would this work in practice?
(I know one answer is "have a revolution", but within the context of a parliamentary democratic framework, how would it happen?)

It doesn't. From what I can tell, in Germany (not Italy) you have rent controls, restrictions on landlord eviction and standard regulations but even then I don't think this is the case throughout Germany (just from the fact we see a lot more about Berlin in the media here...basically because a lot of writers spend their time in Berlin).

And Walker is a social democrat, he believes in regulation rather than forced land redistribution.

And land is the key fact of life here. The Royal Family are landlords, Universities are landlords, as are many bosses who buy a 2nd home. Many people who grow up by the sea/scenic areas cannot afford to live there as prices are pushed up by air BnB landlordship. It must all be destroyed and the last thing they need is to be talked to and understood in any way.

I agree with Grandpoint Genie - I was not sure what MW was actually proposing.

Was he saying that all housing should be social housing?

I assume that when MW talks to the landlords he will be critical. Or perhaps, as he's interviewing them, that won't be a viable strategy.

tbh my guess is that MW wanted a very specific "unmediated" reaction-shot response from a.n.other landlord(s) specifically to the mini-budget -- you don't set up an interrogation stroke show-trial of an entire social layer and political-economic structure by trawling thru yr own follows (which will at best supply the view from a novara-adjacent sub-niche of the class in question) and for a general whitewashing of the landlord perspective you can just pick up any other paper

i'm not going to say this is NO different from the old far-left nostrum that revolutionaries should read the financial times and ignore the guardian -- not least bcz conflicted dynamics within the hostile forces is useful to know and a reconfiguration of some sort is possibly unfolding right now -- but the differences are more abt the pay-offs of public performativity of yr craft technique than the wisdom the nostrum does contain (which is where you gain the most solid info to help shape tactics and strategy)

the pitiless panopticon of soc-med has actually made tactics and strategy much harder in all political quarters (left AND right), a point that's going to be historically very interesting if we can live thru to a point where histories get written

"the pay-offs of public performativity of yr craft technique" -- i.e. these are self-evidently mainly negative hence our response in this thread

transparency is good not bad but also bad not good to put it in ddd-speak

"the old far-left nostrum that revolutionaries should read the financial times and ignore the guardian"

Bastani repeats this frequently.

worth noting those same "far lefties" are *absolutely banjaxed* by the arrival of the internet and now subsist as tiny grumpy ageing sects

not that the nostrum directly entails this outcome BUT

the pitiless panopticon of soc-med has actually made tactics and strategy much harder in all political quarters (left AND right), a point that's going to be historically very interesting if we can live thru to a point where histories get written

always hard to predict the future but imho the current situation w.r.t. social media makes it harder, coz as far as I can see "social media will be dead within 5 years and the likes of Zuckerberg, Musk etc will be recognised as pernicious more widely" and "social media will continue to burgeon and be developed technically so we all* have (non?)invasive direct brain-to-site interfaces"** are pretty much equally likely outcomes.

* prolly actually not all
** and if you think things are bad now, that's when the sh*t really hits the fan!

"Predictions are a fool's errand" -- Dr Aaron Bastani

"It'll go higher"

my prediction

this:

Everything happens so much

— Horse ebooks (@Horse_ebooks) June 28, 2012

but more of it

I've often heard left people say you should read The Economist or the FT because you get into The Capitalist mindset. Well done Bastani for regurgitating this stuff, he'll probably get to work in his beloved media if the world doesn't burn first.

when we are mining asteroids so 15 billion people can take a crap on a 24 carat gold toilet and during adverse El Nino seasons there are no famines because ppl can make synthetic steaks on a 3d printer, then people won't be laughing at him then

If Bastani haggled ppl to read Trotsky I'd respect the trolling.

I get put off by the dissonance between their modern presentation (i.e. pretty good website and slick youtubing) and old fashioned content (not much changed since Tribune of the 80s, ie. on-point but poorly sourced and edited). That said the sweep of reporting on the site was surprisingly broad to me - I had written them off based on Bastani et al’s obnoxious screen presences and the gloomy sense that they’re all en route to being future Parsons and O’Neills

"the gloomy sense that they’re all en route to being future Parsons and O’Neills"

What is the cause of this sense?

yeah I could imagine Bastani going totally Brendan in later middle age.

not sure precisely what i wanted to prove with this but i went off and checked their relative ages:
parsons b.1953
o'neill wikipedia doesn't say but since he wrote for living marxism my guess is not later than 1980; probably somewhat earlier (he edited spiked! from 2007)
bastani b.83/84 (unsure why wikipedia is unsure lol)
sarkar 92

butler doesn't have a wikipedia entry at all but i think he's much the same age as bastani

my half-baked point is that by now the novara kids are all some way older and set in their ways than TP and BoN were when they became entirely unreadable (i suspect BoN was always entirely unreadable)

i guess sarkar still has time to do a tony parsons but this seems quite unlikely

I think that gets closer to the problem, they're just not all that interesting. Why would you watch one of their videos? What would you learn from it?

And it shows in their view counts. Their videos on Ukraine are averaging around 30K views. This is terrible for a channel with 250K subscribers. Similar sized channels are getting 10x, 20x, 50x that, and don't have the advantage of free marketing from the BBC or Sky. High(ish) subscriber count and low view count tells its own story

They're not really adding anything, what is the reason to watch them? Who is watching them? They need to be more interesting, get better guests, show some insight. Having the 'correct' opinion on anything is irrelevant if people aren't watching

Don't really agree with that. I think if they were exploring communism, or what would make for a better world, in an interesting way I might tune in.

I think Sarkar shouting "I am a communist" at Piers Morgan is v good. If they, as a collective, explored some aspects of this, it could be better, whatever the viewing figures.

Right, and there are other channels where you can watch that, you don't need Novara for that. And there are other channels that do other things better than Novara, so we don't need Novara for that either

Which then leads to the question, who needs Novara, and for what?
And I think this is what their view counts are showing

Sakar was decent when talking about the German communists on the bbc Hitler program, it was a refreshing change to hear a perspective from someone who isn't Applebum. But then they dropped her for the chess clown Kasparov in S2, because the USSR were as bad as the Nazis etc...

"Right, and there are other channels where you can watch that, you don't need Novara for that."

Even if there are, they could do it. Instead we Luxury communism, which a dead on arrival concept.

i know we all had fun with the meme but did anyone actually read the book? (i did not)

As I've mentioned before on old UKpol threads, I don't really understand the ILX downer on Novara. Tysky Sour is really good, has excellent and informed guests on everything from Brazilian politics to macroeconomics to Covid policy - I don't think there is anything similar broadcasting regularly on UK current events. Especially during lockdown it felt quite vital?

The Downstream slot has had outstanding extended interviews with people like Andreas Malm, China Mieville, Kojo Koram etc. And now they have some funding they are actually doing useful investigative journalism - see Polly Smythe as the new union/labour movement correspondent, and apparently more to follow?

I really enjoyed China Mieville's October book

I think he is a v bad writer but Ash's Novara interview with him was outstanding!

Even if there are, they could do it. Instead we Luxury communism, which a dead on arrival concept.

I don't know what Luxury Communism is, but why does it matter whether Novara create this type of content or not when other channels are already creating it?

Lol I did hear good things about that interview! xp

well I am now tempted to watch that interview now

He’s awful, and has somehow not been visited by the MeToo fairy.

mieville or bastani?

always bet on the bad one being the baldy!

Mieville.

I never heard this before about CM, but it is never surprising.

one of the things I like about Ash is she's not afraid to ask "what does senescence mean?" because I sure as hell didn't know either!

I think one of the elements about class identity that writers and commentators are bad at understanding is that it isn't totally a conscious or intellectual stance, it's something ... erm different, borne out of decades of being shat on from a great height and never seeing things getting better. I'm not saying that criticism applies here, there was some good stuff about the latte sipping/mushy peas false dichotomy

senescence is my lived experience!

I'm definitely feeling the deterioration and loss of power

I agree with ILX poster Piedie Gimbel.

"As I've mentioned before on old UKpol threads, I don't really understand the ILX downer on Novara."

Surely it isn't hard to understand. Bastani, Walker don't sound v good on twitter. Their political positions are poor, so it's not like I want to engage with Novara's offering. Same with Owen Jones.

Butler has some nice interests in lit and I like what he says on that. I engage with him in a different way, and it's cool he found a niche in the LRB but even then how does he square his politics with the piece they published on Grenfell?

As councillors and MPs are removed, not through deselection but by undemocratic & bureaucratic measures, it’s no surprise that the New Statesman publishes a plea by a has-been broadcast journalist to become an MP. Brought to you by BT/Uber & God knows who. pic.twitter.com/J6lK8BmFun

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) October 6, 2022

nobody is really taking Mason seriously though. His half a million + twitter followers are obviously fake as well. Even the people who PM wants to take him seriously have realised he's a moron and publicly said as much. it's not exactly Big Game Hunting!

Tom Watson going to the Lords after the Carl Beech saga is absolutely extraordinary. If you think the Labour party is anything other than a vehicle for patronage for some of the most useless people in public life I've got news for you.

These people will never introduce PR. https://t.co/zUmOPpyvuT

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) October 6, 2022

"nobody is really taking Mason seriously though."

Bastani has done for longer than he should have.

He'll criticise Lab every day but come election time I will even give Bastani a follow, revive this thread and link to his tweets telling you all to vote the Tories out because they are "evil".

how does he square his politics with the piece they published on Grenfell?

Frankly all UK media does evil shit and LRB publishes more leftist thinking than anything else within that sphere, don't really think the fact that that they also publish tons of right wing guff should be a dealbreaker for ppl looking for writing gigs. It's not a situation like Novara where it advertises itself as leftist, no one picks the LRB up thinking they'll get the Socialist Take on Things.

I do.

They publish 20-page essays by Perry Anderson.

Yes but they also publish retired US generals explaining why Hiroshima was no biggie. I'm not saying there's NO socialist takes in the LRB, I'm saying the LRB is not a socialist publication.

Who are these generals?

You don't mean Edward Luttwak? He is truly right-wing, I believe. But rarely appears now.

It would be misleading to imply that the LRB has a 'balance' of right and left. The truth is that it is a liberal-left publication and, within that term, much more 'left' than most comparable 'liberal' publications.

That still makes it quantifiably different from a explicitly leftist project like Novara, which was the point.

"don't really think the fact that that they also publish tons of right wing guff should be a dealbreaker for ppl looking for writing gigs"

Except many of these writers go on social media and say they would never write for The Mail. The Grenfell piece was a low, and it should be acknowledged in time as such.

"they also publish tons of right wing guff"

Do they?

The only concrete examples I can think of just now are David Runciman and David Bromwich, who are arguably 'liberals', and one offensive US liberal type who wrote something vile about Bernie Sanders in 2020.

These are not typical, and they are not even right-wing by most people's standards.

"Tons" seems to suggest that a large part of the paper is "right-wing guff". I can't remember seeing it.

Amusing that a Novara thread has turned into an LRB thread - I feel like Mark S would have a theory for this, viz. "all threads are ultimately about the LRB and Perry Anderson" or the like.

ru thinking of this?

the moral arc of an ilx thread can be long, but it bends toward rory mcgrath

Quite.

Though my own arc, as you know, is usually towards Perry.

Except many of these writers go on social media and say they would never write for The Mail.

Well one we weren't talking about "many of these writers", we were talking about one writer in specific.

But also there is an obv difference between the two, as the Mail is unlikely to publish lenghty pieces of leftist analysis. Flattening it so they are equally bad doesn't scan to me.

If Butler should worry about squaring his politics with writing for it, shouldn't those of us who buy and read it also make that calculation?

I don't intend to flatten them (though I did pull out "the tons of right-wing guff" bit), but given we are talking about a leftist project I am wondering about where a founder goes onto another ship that can publish that Grenfell piece. This is where the people coming from it aren't trustworthy.

this is moralising shitlib nonsense alph

Yeah, looking at the UK media landscape I do think that the only place he could go that hasn't done far far worse than the LRB is unemployment.

Still unsure as to why leftists buying and reading the LRB is ok in that case tho?

I am not the one pushing guff like Luxury communism.

no you're just talking brainless anti-politcal nonsense

I am not the only one in the thread pushing the "they only want a seat in the media table" angle here. Sorry if this offends.

https://novaramedia.com/2022/10/05/trusss-conference-speech-heckled-by-greenpeace-update-on-chris-kaba-killing/

Tysky Sour this Wednesday. Bastani unusually in the anchor role. Dalia Gebrial quite good.

Good factual analysis of Truss speech and its lies. I hadn't realised it had been so awful - predictable as that sounds.

Funny rhetorical thing about Tysky Sour is that whenever they disagree they say "I'm going to push back on that slightly".

you would love the rhetorical convolutions of the office workplace pinefox. 'That generated some pushback' = 'people disagreed with what we/they/i said'.

couldn't sleep and actually got up because i thought i had something to say on this thread, but it turns out i don't.

...a few minutes pass...

so anyway.

mark's comment upthread on the pp of soc-med making tactics and strategy harder was nagging away at me, and i'd like to get into that a bit more, but it turned into a tangle of content distribution, the economics of journalism and epistemic health in my head, and now i'm too tired to untangle.

i did think at one point 'how do you solve a problem like comrade alph'. sorry not sorry though because what i was actually wondering is what is the publication model that works for xyzzzz here. I think 'loud twitter account with a mario avatar' is a good baseline, and to xyzzzz's point, if your content doesn't get above that floor, then what's the point. Also I can legit see that Novara doesn't pass that test for alph (or me for that matter, probably for slightly different reasons), tho Sarkar is good not bad and boils the piss of the right people, even if it is a bit of a gig, and Butler's writing and thinking is good enough in other places to pass that test.

that 'other places' needs testing in 'the content publication and distribution model that works for xyzzzz' world.

assuming briefly a very compressed narrative

• newspapers were more or less congruent and part of the liberal project (this is open to argument, i think mainly on the edges though, and it seems to me obvious, socially, technologically, to such an extent that i find 'how can x publication present content of different editorial positions!' a bizarre... or maybe better, a very *modern* criticism.)
• i was going to say: despite self-perception, their market value turned out to be in the distribution model, not the editorial model, but that's not fair. that *was* where their value was, and the internet smashed the distribution model and broke the editorial+ads commercial value *and* the self-perceived (by journalist, editor *and* reader) value of the newspaper*. subscriptions are a fairly desperate and unsustainable attempt to manage this (you never had a model before where you tried to buy a paper and they said sorry you've got to pay for a year).
• content creation rapidly unbundles, with writers and readers able to have a direct relationship
• the commercial model across content creation and distribution, of writers being able to sell their articles directly to readers while still retaining the rights, is still turbulent however - the most popular writers ('a steady output of journalism for which readers are willing to pay') are able to make far far more than they ever would as part of a newspaper (someone estimated that, say, Bill Bishop Sinocism newsletter on China: 70,000 subscribers, $1 million dollars per year as a writer). But of course there is no cross-subsidisation of writers in that model. if you don't want to read other writers, that's a good thing - you're not paying for them - but equally it reduces the range you're able to access for your dollar.
• medium, substack, still haven't shown themselves to be durable models for content.

But to take xyzzzz's baseline as a starting point.

if your platforms are free publication (mario avatar), then you have a problem of curation, gatekeeping and epistemic health - a fairly significant burden on the individual. it also gives you problems of increasing your knowledge at the margin - you may be able to curate your core interests successfully, but what's your quality filter for adding to that - i guess this is sometimes referred to as the bubble, though that is really used politically rather than epistemically. editorial bundling is/was ofc in theory a higher grade solution to that quality problem.

ultimately soc-med/twitter to me doesn't seem to me desirable for mainly for reasons of its unhealthy mimetic and memetic dynamics, which I think play directly into the mark s point that was nagging away at me.

there's also the vexed question of platform 'we're not publishers!' responsibilities, which I imagine will become very visible if Musk's purchase of twitter goes through. Right now, the same opprobrium isn't levelled at twitter in the way, say, it would be at any publication that shared similar content.

so, let's see if there's a model we can run which enables us to get above that unsatisfactory (to me, maybe not to xyzzzz) baseline.

let's assume the basic unit of value in this unbundled world is the article (accepting this may need to include 'tweet or twitter thread' though it's extremely rare that any of these of value don't refer to content outside of twitter). the question then becomes 'what articles would xyzzzz pay for?'. If the answer is 'none' then, sorry writer of cogent left-wing analysis and mobilising principles, to Daniel RF's point, you're unemployed, or see you at the LRB, Tribune or Guardian or whatever. And accepting the soc-med challenges above, it's game over - there's no model that works for our Beloved Comrade.

If the answer is 'I will pay price of a cup of coffee (or whatever) for articles on certain subjects, or by certain writers', then ok, we can move on, turn to page 254 etc.

there are organisational challenges (this I think is the flip side to mark s's tactics/strategy point) in the unbundled model. particularly from a political point of view. so the next question becomes, what organisational/aggregation editorial model of publication would create a sufficient level of article quality density for xyzzzz to pay for either a subscription or the regular purchase of a publication. We know it's not Novara - that doesn't have any density of quality that breaks the mario avatar baseline, (apart from maybe the China Mieville piece). Tho he, as has been pointed out correctly, sucks. One model *might* a political organisation with a sufficiently strong set of editorial principles that would make sense in terms of 'politcal donation + editorial output' value for xyzzzz. I liked xyzzzz's point about something that would interest him would be if the shouting 'I am a communist!' at Piers Cunt got expanded. So let's assume that's its editorial principle. Tho 'whatever the viewing figures' caveat to that is surely the problem here.

I'd like to think it is actually a reasonable assumption that with sufficiently low production costs there is enough interest in teh UK and beyond to generate enough cash to sustain this as a viable model. After all, and Mark S will set me straight here, left-wing publications have either had extremely low production costs, and still relied on content creator goodwill, or have had patronage (the LRB model) that enables them to endure.

However, given the baseline, the problem of generating income across bundled content is far far harder than it's ever been, and requires consistent levels of quality that are hard to achieve. I think at most we tap out at individual article purchases, which leaves organising principles a big challenge. Probably time to dig out the copy of Twitter and Tear Gas: The Power and Fragility of Networked Protest that I never read. Mainly, I think we're stuck with Novara for the foreseeable.

* i guess one view much of the journalist as campaigning, investigative corrector of social justice floods out from this loss of self-perceived value, leaving a scum of journalistically self-satisfied opinion on social justice correction.

oh look, dawn.

Fizzles: it's not that I am unfamiliar with 'pushback' or 'pushing back' in general, just that in Tysky Sour's case it is the *default* term for 'disagree', to a possibly amusing extent.

As you can tell, I don't share your view of Novara Media. I think it's good. While other media organizations do indeed have historic crises of funding, etc, it doesn't currently appear that Novara shares this problem, and I think that's good too.

We need to genuinely consider the possibility that the Tories are now actively trying to lose. https://t.co/bWNN1PZMjF

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) October 7, 2022

Dr Bastani makes identical observation to ILX.

ILX expresses contempt for Dr Bastani's judgment.

It was already reported on the bbc that some Tory MP's at the conference expressed the opinion that the party might benefit from a period of opposition to rebuild their brand. They might well be preparing to lose and perhaps some on here might agree. That doesn't mean when Bastani starts telling people that it may be a stark choice, but they HAVE to vote for Kieth he will be any less of a wanker!

There are many opinions on ilx. ILX doesn't think one thing, for one.

I don't think they are trying to lose. A wing of the Tory party that doesn't care for veterans has taken over.

"That doesn't mean when Bastani starts telling people that it may be a stark choice, but they HAVE to vote for Kieth he will be any less of a wanker!"

I think that's a reasonable statement, but it's hypothetical - he hasn't said it yet.

What he has repeatedly said is that he will vote for a party that promises PR, and not for one that doesn't. He has also said that KS would never introduce PR.

He is not always reliable so may change his stance in some way, I agree.

I didn't expect this. Oliver Eagleton, on Novara, on the need for a peace deal in the Ukraine war.

https://novaramedia.com/2022/10/07/liz-truss-doesnt-care-about-stopping-the-war-in-ukraine/

Elon Musk was proposing something similar in Novara the other week

To generally answer the points Fizzles raises, and looking back over yesterday's discussion on Butler and his joining the LRB in the aftermath of Grenfell, I think the word I am looking for is...integrity.

wrt Butler he is -- as Fizzles says -- a good writer, analyst and commentator. He wrote very good criticisms of Corbyn's time at the head of Labour, and I guess since Butler joined the editorial board they haven't made as bad an error as Grenfell. I don't think (as Daniel first said) it was unemployment or LRB. They are making enough money to pay staff @ Novara, but I think that's enough speculation on one person and we all have to eat, pay rent and the like.

But overall this is where Novara fall short. In the main they really lack integrity if you look at Bastani and Walker especially they really are chancers and I think what I look for in this left-wing ecosystem is integrity, a sense that this is serious (none of the Luxuru Commnunism claptrap), that these people have things I want to read and learn from.

The folk at New Socialist (https://newsocialist.org.uk/) seem to have that except it falls down on a second criteria in that the writing and editing are just lacking. I find the pieces over-long or not organised well enough but I think the people at the helm sound really good to me. They also run collective sessions where you can talk to the board and debate/agree on future direction and content. But, they are very much crawling, by the sounds of it.

I hope that this isn't taken as cheap cynicism or the "no ethical consumption under capitalism" get out of jail free card, but I don't think I've ever expected integrity from leftist media, or at least not in the sense xyzz is using it here. Which is to say, I take it as a given that any for profit venture that has the reach/media savviness to penetrate into the mainstream (even to the very small degree Novara has) will contain its fair share of chancers and opportunists (I think this also holds true for political parties, i.e. labour under Corbyn of course still had enormous amounts of these types). So I look at left media as a tool, and judge it by how efficient it is at throwing the ideas I'd like into the mainstream; the motivations of the writers I always take as suspect, I don't think of them as my parasocial comrades.

Within that point of view, I think Novara's obviously had some success, but as per anvil I think the problem is they're blithe and complacent. They seldom manage to cut through in a way that goes beyond the (admitidely enjoyable) "get Piers Morgan angry" stunt. I can't imagine anyone who isn't already a leftist being convinced by much of what they publish, and for those who already are, I don't think they have that much to offer. I know pinefox disagrees with me on this point, but I've stopped listening to their shows because I almost never get any info or insight that I didn't already have from them; what I do get is a strong emotional charge of anger at whatever right wing fucks they're talking about on any given episode, and while that can be cathartic ultimately it just leaves me with a lot of impotent rage, which I imagine is what right wing ppl get out of LBC or whatever.

New Socialist is an interesting counterpoint because I do agree that they probably have this integrity xyzz speaks of but fail completely in terms of cutting through anywhere, really, their audience is made up entirely of those knee deep into academic leftist circles and the writing seems designed to make sure they never ever go beyond that.

I send money to both, lol.

I liked xyzzzz's point about something that would interest him would be if the shouting 'I am a communist!' at Piers Cunt got expanded.

fwiw this shows up in my recommended feed a lot. It's labelled as the kind of expansion asked for, but alas I do not think I am up for spending an hour and a half on a sunny Saturday finding out if it is indeed that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p53yVAD4n1s

re: Mieville: "He’s awful, and has somehow not been visited by the MeToo fairy."

sorry something like this needs some follow up.

There was a public accusation but I heard it was "lawyered off the internet", seen little bits about his behavior on forums but not much.

The public aren’t stupid. Labour are on course to form the next government. And as I’ve said previously Starmer has executed an effective strategy. But he comes across as dishonourable & dishonest (he is). In office that would become v toxic, very quickly. pic.twitter.com/giRXLJf3K7

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) October 8, 2022

The public aren't stupid.

lol what "effective strategy" is he talking about? he's been less than useless for 18 months and if the Truss bomb hadn't blown up the other lot there wouldn't be any serious talk about the inevitability of a Labour govt

I am assuming the effective strategy has been to sideline the left-wing of the party and (so they think) making them ok for Tories to switch.

It's odd how the focus group people can't easily say 'smarmy' and say 'swarmy'.

I think if I were being filmed for a focus group I would try to make an effort to talk clearly and incisively. I might fail. But the people who actually get filmed for these things don't even try.

it's not even worth calling a strategy if it's success is almost entirely dependant on the Tories imploding

I mean to know what he means we would have to click on and read an Unherd link which

Bastani's emphasis in that post is not that KS has been effective, but that KS is seen as dishonest and this could be a problem for him if he does get into government.

Is that true?

It appears plausible.

AB can be relied upon to say things that are hilarious as well as insightful.

Here he is seriously saying that William Shatner is "worth reading".

(He's right.)

“Grief”. This is worth reading by Shatner on his flight to space.

I think it’s likely any attempted colonies on Mars or the Moon would create a renewed sense of how extraordinary our planet is, & how we have a duty to protect it. Analogous to seeing Earth from Space as a moment. https://t.co/7YzVnOyld9

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) October 9, 2022

I mean to know what he means we would have to click on and read an Unherd link which

― Daniel_Rf, Sunday, 9 October 2022 bookmarkflaglink

Not really, he's not like a deep thinker. Quite happy to assume based on his tweets.

Deep thinkers are the only ppl you should assume the positions of without reading them, actually.

That's right

"There was a public accusation but I heard it was "lawyered off the internet", seen little bits about his behavior on forums but not much."

I read the wayback archive of the essay that was removed and TBH, it is practically incomprehensibly overwritten, and at no point does it seem to actually outline what I think the courts would call 'abuse'. it sounds like he was dishonest and perhaps fucking around. maybe I'm missing something.

Good post. AB often strong on housing.

The thing driving unaffordability is rent-seeking by the ultra rich who, in a context of low returns elsewhere, view real estate as the golden goose. This mindset below just ends up basically accepting slums and doss houses. https://t.co/9974HDHdwr

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) October 9, 2022

All we need to do is fix the tax codes lol

Tax cuts which save ordinary people a few hundred quid but the ultra rich a few hundred thousand don’t leave everyone better off.

Why? Because the rich put that money into assets, which appreciate in value, and make ordinary people comparatively poorer. pic.twitter.com/1eIBYQGqIg

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) October 9, 2022

Strangely Novara also hosts this recurring audio series about ... music? ACFM. I don't know what it stands for.

https://novaramedia.com/2022/10/09/acfm-trip-27-magic/

Not my scene but demonstrates how much Novara Media offers.

ACFM is a podcast: FM is the old-tiems radio frequency indicator, AC apparently stands for "Acid Corbyinism"

Getting back to the parallel CM discussion:

"There was a public accusation but I heard it was "lawyered off the internet", seen little bits about his behavior on forums but not much."

I read the wayback archive of the essay that was removed and TBH, it is practically incomprehensibly overwritten, and at no point does it seem to actually outline what I think the courts would call 'abuse'. it sounds like he was dishonest and perhaps fucking around. maybe I'm missing something.

― akm, Sunday, October 9, 2022 7:38 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

Serial headfuckery probably isn't illegal but it's still wrong, and people that do it need to be called out otherwise they just continue making other's lives a misery. Assuming it's true of course, which I'd guess it is.

A tweet on Eagleton's piece (I'm not reading it).

I think this is a really crass and insensitive piece to have run. I'm aware that many of the dissenting responses are from liberal/centrist types, so it makes this seem like an issue of left versus centrist. I think it's worth saying (as a left voice) that's not what this is https://t.co/v1tR3roBB7

— Rachel Connolly (@RachelConnoll14) October 10, 2022

Sarkar will broadcast from Mexico.

I’m back on #TyskySour (reporting from Novara’s unofficial Oaxaca City desk) tonight! Tune in from 7pm, as me and @michaeljswalker dissect the day’s biggest news. pic.twitter.com/pspC1UorWm

— Ash Sarkar (@AyoCaesar) October 10, 2022

Not my style generally to say things like this, but I write for this outlet too occasionally and frankly I'm embarrassed by the association

oof! I'm not interested if British people have strong opinions on the Ukraine War and the support they are getting from the UK govt. I'd be more interested in what people who live there have to say.

zombie brezhnevism in the guise of anti-imperialism vs imperialism in the guise of liberal humanitarianism is such a dismal debate to be trapped in and the left needs to do *much* better (because the right/centre never will)

for a start forget about what "britain needs" for a moment ffs

Serial headfuckery probably isn't illegal but it's still wrong, and people that do it need to be called out otherwise they just continue making other's lives a misery. Assuming it's true of course, which I'd guess it is.

This is essentially what happened and the person who it happened to was once a very close friend, so I did not appreciate ~boys~ weighing in on how my old friend wrote about the way she was unwillingly turned into this creep’s victim, and the fallout that continues to haunt her interactions to this day. His MO seems to be to target women who are intellectual or professional equals and then act to diminish them. Another friend of a few of us here who knows him but who has never been involved with him *like that* said, after I mentioned knowing his victim, ‘that’s how he rolls…’

Looks like a good demolition of Eagleton Jr.

This is complete shit. Yes there are pro-NATO liberals in a tizzy about it, but this doesn't detract from the mundane realpolitik liberalism of the article itself which barely, if at all, sets out an anti-war perspective. https://t.co/JGOOuj7gRN

— libcom.org (@libcomorg) October 10, 2022

Seems accurate.

That means I don’t trust a thing he says. But there’s also a lesson there for the labour left and soft left: a laser like focus on ends (democratising the party, vanquishing toxic enemies, ensuring a permanent policy legacy). Without knowing what’s necessary you will rarely win.

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) October 11, 2022

This amounts to "Corbyn wasn't ruthless enough" which is hardly a novel take. And also imo ignores that achieving your ends when your opponents have just suffered a huge defeat and you have the entirety of the media establishment on your side isn't all that impressive.

Feel like I hear these kinds of criticisms every now and then about the right being pragmatic and strategically sound in a way that the left isn't, and you just can't compare ppl trying to change the system with ppl whose mission statement is to maintain the status quo, the challenges aren't equivalent.

The polling wasn't shifting much till Kwarteng's budget. To say that Lab is 30 points ahead today because Starmer pounced on a faction of the party is Labour brain worms.

Also ethically it isn't right to simply copy the Lab right. And anyway it isn't as if the right were good at doing this, as the Left took the leadership in 2015.

xp

Also going on about 'power' when the policy amounts to re-arranging the decks chairs on the Titanic is not using your brain and asking what is it all for.

I really like this short piece from @Maoskyist on what NS should be doing in the current context - and I hope it can open up wider discussion of what a left publication ought to be doing. https://t.co/5xN4WofPOB

— Tom Gann (@Tom_Gann) October 12, 2022

Look who's going.

The Strasser Brothers memorial festival pic.twitter.com/EQHwvDYivN

— Sunlight bathed the golden glow (@mypalfootfoot7) October 13, 2022

Why would anyone go to hear SPIKED! nonsense at the 'Battle of Ideas'

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) September 29, 2012

lol should've known xyzz would be quicker than me in posting this one

🤗🤗🤗

fucking glinner tho, I had the impression that even the terf-sphere had decided he was a liability/not the best messenger for their Reasonable Concerns.

He’s a liability alright but there’s always the chance he screams the quiet part loud

he is hardly the only liability there tho

Disappointed in Coppola, The Conversation is still a banger tho.

This is pretty good.

canal-boats, garment factories, sugar production & consumption, & the bourgeois machismo of the contemporary british left: presenting the ~director's cut~ of my talk at TWT!https://t.co/T9mBSw6Pro

— josie sparrow (@ofthesparrows) October 14, 2022

Slightly surprised by implication that Sarkar has strong views on Coltrane's extensive back catalogue of work.

I mean, *this* is the best Robbie Coltrane bit isn't it? https://t.co/QD7cjbnnL8

— Ash Sarkar (@AyoCaesar) October 14, 2022

Obviously this is not a good way to win hearts and minds to activism or the climate movement, but it does get people talking about oil. I'm more interested in getting people talking about new oil than the reputation of climate activism, so I have some respect! https://t.co/NR0X8Gtq9O

— Michael Walker (@michaeljswalker) October 14, 2022

Unsure that this protest did "get people talking about oil" as MW hopes.

I've heard a little. less so than talk about the action itself (which is whatever) but the cynical reaction bothers me more

I hate to half-agree with michael wanker who's been the most blue labour of the lot as far as I can tell

it did get manage to get people talking about oil paintings

I'm touched by this statement from a noted art critic.

I’m totally on protesters’ side on this. VG can take it. The planet can’t.

— matthew collings (@matthew51691936) October 14, 2022

Recent Shaun video on JK Rowling's mates casually mentions the Big Brane Festival Bastani went to is funded by the UK branch of the ADF, a US christian right org dedicated to stopping "the homosexual agenda".

https://www.paulmason.org/vote/

if the big brane fest is the spiked event, bastani has said he *didn't* actually attend in the end

I don’t agree with myself 12 years ago on lots of things. One of which is speaking to people who disagree with you. Nothing is more rewarding than reading feedback about how NM content changed someone’s mind. In any case I’m not doing this as my dad has had a stroke.

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) October 14, 2022

p sure spiked is koch- if not thiel-funded these days -- tho (if it hasn't already been written somewhere) a deep dive into the various dark moneys funding of all such projects, complete with receipts, wd be a welcome thing (we shd be working to get the opposed wings of evil fighting one another more)

Sorry to hear about your Dad, Aaron. I wish him a speedy recovery.

— John McDonnell MP (@johnmcdonnellMP) October 14, 2022

"I've grown up" = I am talking to right wingers = you are a melt!

Yeah that was the one, was it an official Spiked thing? I know it's got that vibe.

I don't really buy Bastani's stance because being the Token Lefty on a long bill of reactionaries means accepting a wrong framing from the get-go. Also, I'm sure most posters itt are familiar with this, but there's this thing certainb types of right wingers do where because they believe themselves to care about Free Speech and the Exchange Of Ideas above all else they enjoy being able to debate leftists within a genteel context because it makes them feel like they're open minded. Zero chance of anyone who'd buy a ticket for this walking away thinking "actually that Bastani guy made some good points", but they sure would have left patting themselves on the back for having heard a leftist out, flattering their self-image as free thinkers.

Re: financing, might as well post that Shaun video. It's specifically about funding of TERF movements from the US right, I'll admit I didn't know how far these connections extended. Fair warning his style is, err, not for everyone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ou_xvXJJk7k

battle of ideas is a spiked thing yes. they've been running on absolute-freedom-of-speech since the early 90s at least, when they were still (sortakinda) marxists (RCP) hammering a USP / branding that distiguished them from all the other trot groupuscules, and their platform was "living marxism" (the other marxisms were DEAD bcz the working class was dead iirc etc)

not at all endorsing bastani's argument here, just noting that he apparently didn't actually attend (the ad listing him was of course signed off days or weeks in advance)

Wow. @novaramedia has hit a quarter of a million subscribers on YouTube. 250,000. That’s:

2.7 x Wembley Stadium
4 x Tottenham Hotspur Stadium
25 x Bournemouth Vitality Stadium

A lot of people!

Congrats to the video team, who want to redefine what mainstream news looks like 🙏🏽 pic.twitter.com/PLT5KMlIb8

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) October 17, 2022

"4 x Tottenham Hotspur Stadium".

I'm touched.

much less than half the amount of people who subscribe to Paul Mason on twitter!

Absolutely fascinating number of ghost QTs here... pic.twitter.com/ehtAbkgcIr

— Tom Gann (@Tom_Gann) October 17, 2022

not at all endorsing bastani's argument here, just noting that he apparently didn't actually attend

No I understand, but dropping out due to a family emergency means he would've if he could've.

There in spirit some might say

The only one worth bothering with.

A few points on this argument: (1) British politics *has* had 'political' - i.e., non-technocratic - leaders for the past few years; in particular its main opposition party was helmed by the most anti-systemic British politician in living memory. https://t.co/7vRgdMbblh

— James B (@piercepenniless) October 18, 2022

Tony Adams, alongside Rio Ferdinand, is the best centre back I’ve ever seen play for England.

Even more impressive: he hasn’t really aged since 1998? pic.twitter.com/1c9D3N1ml8

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) October 18, 2022

Not AB's best tweet. Yes, TA has 'aged well', but he isn't really unchanged since 1998 (no-one is), and even that wouldn't be 'impressive' as an achievement; mostly just an accident.

But is Adams really one of the very greatest modern ENG centre-backs? AB isn't old enough to remember some of his worst performances (this is a standard AB flaw when talking of soccer). Think I'd be inclined to put Sol Campbell above him; maybe Butcher; Ledley King a better player but injury-hit; and I'm not sure that Adams was really a better player than Gary Pallister, Des Walker and others.

Adams was strong in a good side in Euro 96; I expect AB is really just lazily referring back to that memory.

Suella Braverman: "I fought the Quorn, and the Quorn won".

— Ash Sarkar (@AyoCaesar) October 19, 2022

That would be a good pun if 'Quorn' sounded more like 'Law'.

Should @novaramedia start a line in anti landlord merch? Is it time to bring this much needed message to your nearest high street?

Please RT this for better feedback!

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) October 19, 2022

Not AB's best day online.

xp

bad puns are absolutely fine, leave all the good puns to cunts like Gyles Brandreth imo, lol

Novara would very likely agree with Monbiot.

These comparisons (“Xi’s China”) totally obfuscate things. They can be situated within the history of the British state, of the role of repression in the accumulation of capital. https://t.co/eJXfsfoDon

— Tom Gann (@Tom_Gann) October 20, 2022

A communist speaks.

If you want a General Election, get out on the streets and demand one.

— Ash Sarkar (@AyoCaesar) October 20, 2022

disappointed penny's gone for the novara media aesthetic here rather than the tried and true, much-beloved brand identity of Good Manners Emojis. game's gone. https://t.co/w77VB9zrML

— josie sparrow (@ofthesparrows) October 20, 2022

Getting more Bastani tweets on my timeline. Inanities like this.

The Peripheral is really good. London circa 2090 has replaced building lego-esque skyscrapers with statues several times larger than the Shard (!)

Sci-Fi is such a powerful genre in 21st C, when every political & economic impulse demands the future *must* look like the present. pic.twitter.com/dY9Wcs0sA4

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) October 22, 2022

Last night I finished watching Tysky Sour from 8 days earlier - that is 1 PM, 1 Chancellor, 1 Home Secretary ago. It featured a good nuanced discussion of the Van Gogh oil protest. I was quite convinced by MW's statement that "these people have made the sacrifice of being thought ridiculous by most of the country". A discussion of undeclared donors to neoliberal think-tanks was also good.

Then I started watching one from a mere 5 days ago, with Sarkar. I now only have about 4 hours of this to be up to date again.

Thank goodness for Novara Media's coverage of current events, which can help our understanding and also sometimes give us entertainment or encouragement.

What a silly person.

this reads like copy from a property developer who wants to put a load of shipping containers full of street food vendors on brockwell park https://t.co/EcUUBymHKM

— Peregrine falcon fan (@nrgsrhc) October 24, 2022

lol this tweet was harrumphed at by the full-spectrum professional twitter grump gang (from joe k3nnedy to qu4ntick)

I have quite often said before that while I like lots about the Novara people, they are different from me for various reasons, above all that they are young.

I feel that Sarkar's statement reflects this. I don't like it at all.

If parks are open and spacious then leave them that way. It is probably better for what limited wildlife exists in them. The idea of wanting to cover this with 'street food stands' is very wrongheaded.

I reflect that Sarkar's statement also reflects a general tendency among these people to go somewhere and say it's better than the UK. In some cases, in some ways, it might well be. But the gesture also seems naive, too much the reaction of the thrilled tourist who didn't want to come home.

I would say all kinds of bullshit if I had their kind of platform tbh

I think in this particular case you're both getting hung up on the food stalls and ignoring the two other, non-profitable, activities listed.

I do find London public spaces, be they parks or squares or whatever, sorely lacking in Old People Just Hanging Out Talking Shit, which def is an important sign of civilisation.

Of course London weather doesn't make this very easy but I notice Caribbean immigrant populations give it as much of a go as they can, when they are not being dispersed by the cops for anti-social activity that is.

West Ham Park and the Olympic Park are full of people chatting on benches, having kids' birthday parties on the grass, walking their dogs, playing table tennis, doing open-air workouts.. Maybe Ash doesn't live in the right part of London for this stuff?

there is a giant outdoor chess board outside Hudds library and two branches of Greggs, a largish piazza where couples can canoodle. Total Mexico ripoff.

As someone who lives near Brockwell park I see couples in parks. I do see old people walking. I see people going for a run or playing some sport.

In summer I see the festivals being put in the park, so it is actually being criminally well used for profit. She is talking nonsense xxp

If she was suggesting urban golf courses be compulsorily purchased and turned into parks then I could get behind it, hate those fucking things

Ok but "this is untrue" is a diff argument from "thid would not be good".

Simon Jenkins, a person who people on ILX probably do not like, has written many times that London's parks, which should be simply public, are repeatedly sealed off and used by private corporations to make massive profits, and that this is wrong.

I agree with this view.

you could also replace "London's parks" with "land"

let's take back st george's hill from the golfers and millionaires

Ok but "this is untrue" is a diff argument from "thid would not be good".

― Daniel_Rf, Monday, 24 October 2022 bookmarkflaglink

I mean it's just inaccurate as a reading of the situation in regards to London parks.

If Sarkar had said things about minorities being excluded from parks by police then fine but she is not.

Also putting down Bastani and Sarkar's bad takes on their youth seems wrong to me. They are old enough.

They do just tweet stuff with little thought, in that they aren't very different from a lot of journos in legacy media. But they should know better, right? They are communists with a different set of politics, they should be looking at stuff from a different angle.

bastani is nearly 40

i mean we're all still "learning to use" social media as a political tool of various valencies -- which seems to be the issue here -- but AB was early to it and tbh has *more* experience than most

I mean it's just inaccurate as a reading of the situation in regards to London parks.

So say that instead of posting a "this is what a property developer would say" bad faith take. :)

Well it's one of the three things she talks about. We all know what a bunch of street food stands in London would be about.

I don't know if spaces for Chess in parks have been abolished. I feel that's not what she's talking about.

In London "Street food" now means "£12 burgers" afaict

Paul Mason is already threatening to defy whip - he’s not even an MP yet!

He’s absolutely right tho, Labour will likely adopt Sunak austerity. To even sort GPs & ambulance waiting times, let alone create national care service, will require ‘McDonnell-esque’ tax rises on rich. pic.twitter.com/5EFZu96Bys

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) October 25, 2022

Tweeting from Barcelona this week.

Sunak infinitely more likeable at the despatch box than Starmer. Not good given the latter was meant to be Señor #PMQs.

The facts are: Starmer did try to overturn Brexit, did lie to members and did support a man (Corbyn) who he now claims isn't fit to be a Labour MP.

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) October 26, 2022

agree that Starmer no es bueno

He lied to members, he lied about Corbyn but surely that's ok because winning power is good. Machiavellic.

Also, why pay attention to PMQs, unless an announcement on policy is made?

Señor Starmer, es un gran mentiroso !!

posting like excitable kids whilst on their 6th holiday of the year, that's "luxury communism" in a nutshell for you!

Bunch of grifters

Who said it better? @michaeljswalker gets my vote pic.twitter.com/D2hWRu96mN

— Novara Memia (@NovaraMemia) October 26, 2022

Tysky Sour from 1 week ago.

https://novaramedia.com/2022/10/20/liz-truss-resigns-as-prime-minister/

Bastani emphatically stating that he expects the Con party to be decimated at next GE and it would take extraordinary, unprecedented leadership to prevent this.

I find this very incautious. We are two years from an election. The Con party is a corrupt machine that is dedicated to power and can count on lots of corporate and media support. Not many people like the LOTO. Seems intuitive that there is now a good chance of the Con party recovering to something like parity, though not winning a huge victory next time.

Rishi is already polling higher than Starmer in at least two "best pm" polls. It is a completely inane thing to poll like, but nevertheless I think we can safely say Bastani is much more interested in having a career and profile rather than seriously thinking bout what is really going on in UK politics.

I don't think I can predict whether the Tories will explode or implode at the next GE but it seems unlikely that anything Labour do will determine the outcome

Isn't that true of all UK elections? That they are lost by the incumbent party rather than won by the opposition, though its still on the opposition to some extent to be able take advantage of those mistakes

The thing about the tories is their gaslighting ability to always pretend they've somehow only just got in. I don't know if the constant leadership changes are necessarily perceived as negative when it comes down to it

tories have this legitimacy bias that seems to persist regardless of all unpopularity and incompetence and corruption and brutality it's like even if you hate them they feel like the sort of people who'd be in charge you know

tories have this legitimacy bias that seems to persist regardless of all unpopularity and incompetence and corruption and brutality it's like even if you hate them they feel like the sort of people who'd be in charge you know

I was thinking this a while ago when they went out on the street to interview Steve from Mansfield (64) every day for months on end, and one of the things that kept cropping up was 'Labour hadn't done this that and the other I'll never vote for them again'. And you could kind of read it as 'oh they didn't do that years ago when they were in power'. And you could also read it as referring to Labour councils too, both of these things are more than viable

But tying in to what you just said, I also got the feeling of Labour as CURRENTLY in power, as part of the government, as a kind of a Department of Opposition. And that you're not supposed to actually vote them in, they exist to keep the Tories in check and they had been failing at doing that.

I don't mean in a 'controlled opposition' sense, more a kind of conflating of they're part of parliament with they're part of government, and in more of a subconscious way

I don't know if the constant leadership changes are necessarily perceived as negative when it comes down to it

Reminds me of the model of management turnover that has been very successful for Chelsea FC.

It's entirely true about "legitimacy bias".

A while ago someone posted a Perry Anderson analysis from 60 years ago that showed the same thing.

This is also a factor in why the Con party will probably not emerge very badly from the next GE, contra Bastani.

I shouldn't say "probably". Truth is I don't know, but I think his predictions are oddly incautious this far out.

This is a much better assessment of the situation than "It'll go higher/lower".

https://newsocialist.org.uk/centrism-suppression-politics/

This person's gonna be on Novara next week pic.twitter.com/7TYW1HdkOC

— Hywel (@hywelroberts12) October 28, 2022

I know you want to cultivate that UnHerd “thoughtful” anti-liberal make you think world, with various the left wing case for something conservative, but come the fuck on. https://t.co/09egAVrnzW pic.twitter.com/tnUDOWCPBK

— Tom Gann (@Tom_Gann) November 1, 2022

bastani is only really useful as a sort of ideological weather vane but if this is the way the wind is blowing on the anglo left we are extremely fucked

Another case of green room poisoning…

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FgkVqvfXgAEDk17?format=jpg&name=small

corgi registered hot takes

If you don't like noise don't live in a city centre. And if you can afford to buy in a nice location you can afford to buy secondary glazing and a white noise machine. This stuff does my head in. They've already destroyed Brick Lane at night. https://t.co/az7csjPDZl

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) November 2, 2022

I am not sure I have ever heard of 'secondary glazing' before.

And ... a white noise machine ?!

you can buy white noise machines for £20-30

I've never heard of secondary glazing but have heard of double glazed windows, which I assume is the same thing.

there is actually such a thing as secondary glazing, you can have it installed additional to your double glazing for extra insulation.

it cuts out noise as well

Well I say I never learn anything new from Novara but!

It gets used a fair amount for listed properties (because you don't need to remove the windows) - so it's sometimes instead of double glazing.

This is useful stat on Paul Mason if becomes a Lab MP: “He has proposed an increase in military spending by Britain from the present two per cent to “between 3 and 5 per cent of our GDP”, an increase of around £65 billion a year.”

£65 billion! A year! https://t.co/B8c65pRPps

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) November 3, 2022

there is nothing useful to be learned from lazy grifters commenting on Paul Mason, he's never going to be a Labour MP and nobody takes him seriously in the PLP these days, despite him rim jobbing Kieth in 2019. He's a marginal joke figure. Bastani should take another holiday or maybe just spend the money on some secondary glazing rather than posting, at least then he might not notice when kids throw conkers at his window!

Amusing!

Bastani is a lot more like Mason than he would like to think.

Am I on drugs? The guy who was the face of ‘stop Brexit’ now says ‘we had a vote on it’.

If he’d said that after 2017 we could well have had no hard Brexit, and dare I say no Tory government.

Personal ambitions within Labour trumped what mattered. pic.twitter.com/Uhn6nDumiA

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) November 6, 2022

Am I on drugs?

Good, perceptive tweet.

Updated branch nominations in the race to be Labour’s next candidate in Sheffield Central:

Abtisam Mohammed: Broomhill & Sharrow Vale, Walkley, Manor

Rizwana Lala: Broomhill & Sharrow Vale, City, Walkley

Mike Buckley: City

Eddie Izzard: Manor

Jayne Dunn: 0

Paul Mason: 0

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) November 7, 2022

Obsessed.

Pure alternative world here but I reckon Bastani would've stood for Lab MP under a functioning left wing Lab party. And lost like this.

He can't help himself.

Wigan MP Lisa Nandy fires back at bizarre speech by journalist Paul Mason trouncing the town. https://t.co/CVkBuOsYOw

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) November 7, 2022

“When you get off the train in Wigan the streets are dead and the only drinking places are standing places and the only people drinking are young men,”

is he concerned there are not enough old people drinking? He should check out one of the 'spoons in the north. The old boys are usually in there before 9am and they don't start on coffee.

AB is literally

a) posting early results from PM's attempt to be an MP in Sheffield
b) reviving old videos of PM, from years ago, that most of his followers have seen before
c) then posting the outraged response to the revival.

PM must feel like he is "living rent-free in AB's head". But also that AB is sabotaging his - seemingly already unsuccessful - attempt at a new career.

Last month Labour MPs clapped @ApsanaBegumMP after she spoke about the domestic violence she's endured and which she says the party has enabled.

Tonight she can't attend her local Labour fundraiser bc the party won't provide the necessary safeguards.

Claps don't protect women.

— Rivkah Brown (@RivkahBrown) November 9, 2022

Its a great loss to comedy that Paul Mason probably won't be a Labour MP (unless Starmer stitches something up for him).

"The constituents are blaming councillors for pot holes & late bin collections? Don't they know that's a Moscow talking point?" pic.twitter.com/dFRuHBKFPH

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) November 11, 2022

His constituency selection is seemingly based on throwing darts at a map of the UK, with a blindfold, pissed. Maybe he'll go for the Isle of Wight next?

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) November 11, 2022

Forgot the existence of this riff.

my personal favourite take from an all-time Twitter takemaster. the big lad's brain became pure worms by the end. pic.twitter.com/qyxFTQ6fB8

— michael richmond (@Sisyphusa) November 18, 2022

Novara watches the WC

Souness and Keane have wildly different political views. Souness hung the Queen's portrait up in the Rangers dressing room, Keane sung rebel songs playing for Ireland.

But they get on because each knows the other was a 'good pro'. We could all learn from that!

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) November 22, 2022

That's quite a contortion.

There's a problem when the question of "Should there be a boycott of the World Cup in Qatar?" only properly takes off in the fortnight running up to the tournament. The sporting boycott against South Africa took years of organising – there isn't a shortcut to this stuff!

— Ash Sarkar (@AyoCaesar) November 20, 2022

This is why the World Cup is amazing. pic.twitter.com/2K5VvcJDe4

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) November 22, 2022

I was glad for Saudi Arabia, but unsure why fans celebrating a win is amazing.

Theft & assault have largely been decriminalised in London, because the police don't do much beyond giving you a crime reference number.

But don't worry, instead of responding to crime the MET decided to create a fake record shop and recording studio. https://t.co/EYupGO1Mlh

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) November 22, 2022

"Theft & assault have largely been decriminalised in London"

Interesting statement.

he's already transforming into a grumpy old bourgeoisie reactionary and he hasn't even hit 40 yet... predictable.

4 years coffee free! Think I’ll have to quit tea soon though, smallest caffeine now really impacts my sleep. No more hair gel, lamb or black tea, my Iranian ancestors would be bereft.

Any tips for completely quitting caffeine?

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) November 23, 2022

Novara would say yes to oil money

This is why the World Cup is amazing. pic.twitter.com/2K5VvcJDe4

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) November 22, 2022

AB and Sutton both correct. (Though resting Bale might have helped.)

Weirder still was Eni Aluko saying Wales might rest Bale against Iran? 🤣 https://t.co/uKTHJ8hZMW

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) November 25, 2022

Just bizarre to have two Welshmen and a German on this game? If not an Iranian at least get a pro with experience of football in the Middle East? Klinsmann has played and managed in Europe & the US. If Iran ‘worked’ ref it’s because Queiroz coached them to. No need for racism! https://t.co/JI7VI5vIFc

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) November 25, 2022

Agree, though I usually like Klinsmann.

It’s happening again for Jordan Henderson tonight. pic.twitter.com/BgpTX4ZN2q

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) November 29, 2022

Dog goes the weasel.

Meanwhile ‘left wingers’ who criticised Corbyn of ‘Stalinism’ (because they didn’t get jobs or seats) like @paulmasonnews - stay silent during a process which borders on outright corruption.

If you want a friend in politics, get a dog, but my goodness what a weasel.

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) December 2, 2022

how many dogs are there that are currently active in UK politics? I'm afraid he's talking out of his pawsterrier again

Viva hate.

Get in loser we’re joining a renters union. pic.twitter.com/SRGPJ2p8sc

— Gary McQuiggin (@ggaaarrryyyy) December 3, 2022

I had zero idea of why Saka started ahead of Rashford before kick off and I have even less now. It’s like watching a team on sedatives.

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) December 4, 2022

As someone who has also done it here and there, I feel that this isn't quite the strong qualification she seems to think it is.

I used to teach Victorian literature at university level lmao https://t.co/ZRsy3ia4hC

— Ash Sarkar (@AyoCaesar) December 5, 2022

People are putting too much on the RMT.

The media elite is desperate for this country to continue to get poorer. We’ve had a disastrous 15 years as a country & they seemingly want to repeat that.

Working people have had enough of getting poorer. The truth is that if the RMT wins, we all might. pic.twitter.com/ZnorOTt78C

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) December 13, 2022

Mick Lynch of the RMT just served me the finest cup of coffee imaginable during my 10:05 @novaramedia shift,
- which finished a minute early. First class! pic.twitter.com/fXLExREvHG

— Gary McQuiggin (@ggaaarrryyyy) December 14, 2022

The left: please learn to be racist.

Lot of liberal/leftish accounts are way off national sentiment re migration on here.

The sad truth is a popular front was possible in 2017-19 that, yes, could have led to a far more progressive policy on asylum. Many people decided to reject that because they wanted everything >

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) December 16, 2022

Peter Hitchens on Trade Unions, Tony Blair and the End of the Monarchy.

Early 90s vibe shift: middle aged guys virtuously (self aggrandisingly) shouting in court rooms/legislatures/in front of committees. The good guy wins. pic.twitter.com/qVPBfP6mmA

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) January 20, 2023

Well... https://t.co/Yv4n6QlWDx pic.twitter.com/vf1h2NP6Xu

— 2000 AD Comics (@2000AD) February 9, 2023

re: big boy bastani's sudden enthusiasm for the death penalty because polls say lots of voters want it, I wrote about this nearly six years ago now pic.twitter.com/BQSyEBzu1G

— migra falko (@migrafalko) February 10, 2023

there was a Bastani vs Hitch debate on the death penalty? Oh gosh how do I end up missing all best stuff.

I see.

.@markedasred. My late brother was (rightly) challenging the claim (made by some of his then pooitical allies) that waterboarding was not torture. I have in fact *witnessed* two executions. https://t.co/RUzivXSYQP

— Peter Hitchens (@ClarkeMicah) February 10, 2023

Isn't it great that you can have a honest and frank debate with a sick freak who watches executions and then say afterwards that you learned a thing or two and it's not as black and white as you previously thought.

AirPods are brilliant for remote working and taking calls. One of the best products Apple has released in recent years.

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) February 13, 2023

It's true.

Training teachers to act as judges in a court. I’m sure that’ll help productivity!

This stuff would be laughed at in private sector. It’s like saying ‘let’s have the HR people do the accounts and have the security guards run marketing’. Can’t make it up.

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) February 17, 2023

Surely the more Bastani thing here would be to say that all of the jobs will be done by AI and that we must nationalise the robots and the wealth they will bring!

Going on GB news, bcz well what else can they do now Corbyn is in the dust and you have no principles?

I can't wait until they start preaching: that even with all the pain and mental health damage and outright despair the last few years of your association with UK Labour Party has wrought on you - that we really feel it too, honest (inbetween cheques from GB tv and TimesRadio), you've still got to stick with the Labour Party and vote for Kieth as I previously stated in my piece for Unherd.

This looks v good.

The system doesn't work. Its funding is collapsing, and sectoral wages scrape along the bottom quintile of the economy. Exploitation of migrant workers has seen cases investigated by the Gangmasters' Authority. https://t.co/H1PXmCnV0I pic.twitter.com/AF20oBd99K

— James B (@piercepenniless) February 21, 2023

Whoop am trending because Putin's apologists are fed up with me, Keir and Labour ✊🏼🇺🇦🎻🚩

— Paul Mason (@paulmasonnews) February 23, 2023

this is where he is now is it

✊🏼🇺🇦🎻🚩🦑🔜📎

his dynamic chart that showed how everyone who has ever took the piss out of him or fallen out with the Labour Party neatly fits into a network of Putin/CCP stooges was as a clear an illustration of someone losing their fucking mind as you can get

it's hard to tell if he's deluded or a factionally-motivated liar, i guess he can be both

I think even the people who he declares as his allies see him as an unserious clown

at the very least Mason and his ilk have thrown around "Putin apologist" so cavalierly as to render it meaningless

I don't see many actual Putin apologists in the wild. Some people have some thoughtful and considered opinions on Ukraine that aren't the usual kneejerk liberal hawk takes that are the only the ones Mason finds acceptable. But it's a grey area for me - I just stfu about it!

that's Putin apologist talk

"Putin apologist" is the new "apologist for terrorism".

world could do with a bit more unapologetic terrorism amirite?

more Real IRA, less led by donkeys!

a lot of people from a broad section of the centre + the right have been calling Hitchens a Putin apologist for years, even before the Ukrainian invasion.

Quit coffee 4 years ago and its honestly one of the best decisions I've ever made. Better sleep, mental clarity and emotional regulation. I used to drink 15 espressi a day (!) but as I got older I just...couldn't.

If you have anxiety or insomnia really give it a go.

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) February 24, 2023

Better mental clarity is when you appear on right-wing media.

if i was on 15 espressos a day it simply would not occur to me that this might be related to my anxiety and insomnia

this Big Boy Bas post was sponsored by Horlicks

ugh Horlicks

That was the ad slogan in the 70s

wrongly bcz it's delicious

It was only widely available in seaside caffs in the era when I didn't like hot drinks

It's my goto option when I've already had 6 coffees and need hot drink. You can make it very strong and add a bit of honey and it's as good as a meal.

it's rich in *checks label* anti-caking agent

That's the best kind of agent

I love that malty aroma. like when you are walking past a huge factory brewery

A heaping teaspoon of Horlicks into a chocolate milkshake is the closest thing there is to a drugstore malted milkshake.

'Mental clarity and emotional regulation'

It is quite an odd thing to claim, implying that he was worse in these regards 4+ years ago.

Still, he is sincere in his tip. I'm afraid I won't take it as I like coffee.

That was the ad slogan in the 70s

― satori enabler (Noodle Vague), Friday, 24 February 2023 bookmarkflaglink

wrongly bcz it's delicious

― mark s, Friday, 24 February 2023 bookmarkflaglink

I assumed Horlicks went bust as I can't see it in the supermarket. Maybe I blocked its existence out.

Or remember the last I saw it, that is..

I ordered some from Morrisons and it was unavailable + substituted with vegan Horlicks. It remains unused in my cupboard because it's bloody awful and will no doubt remain there until it turns into a solid block. But honestly, the real stuff is good.

I can vaguely remember Horlicks sweets a long long time ago. I don't think they make them anymore.

http://futuremuseum.co.uk/imageGen.ashx?image=%2fmedia%2f6395%2f8051.jpg&width=356&constrain=true

obv not these ones!

https://www.warrelics.eu/forum/attachments/equipment-field-gear/108961d1275159418t-british-horlicks-tablets-ration-tin-horlicks-tablets-tin..jpg?s=c2ec3f3b7a101ed36ad1b68a90b8d47a

or even these

I think they used to sell tubes of Horlicks tablets in Boots in the 70's or this might be a phantom memory

I remember asking Paul Mason why he was fascinated by defence and security policy (it surprised me given his books had covered labour movements and technological change). The answer included “I liked playing with toy soldiers as a kid”.

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) February 26, 2023

This is why I think the government needs to do more about dungeons and dragons

it seems Ash Sakar is now a regular on The Moral Maze, that show where idiots and bigots feign intellectual curiosity about this week's hot right-wing talking points. I bet if there was Radios back in the 1850s then her apparent hero, Karl Marx, would have found better ways of paying for his cigars than helping to legitimise ideological enemies like this!

She’s been on there for a couple of years!

I thought she was just an occasional guest rather than a weekly regular, but I do tend to switch to a music channel as soon as it comes on.

*engels the cheque-writer gritting his teeth and sighing every time karl turns down a lucrative media slot*

he could have purchased some decent chairs then. I was reading a quote from a report from a Prussian spy on the state of KM's filthy flat. Apparently every chair in the gaff had a three legs and the only unbroken one was reserved for guests!

The people who own the Kentish Town house once lived in by Marx refuse to have a blue plaque for it because: tourists and Insta.

A wealthy Englishman wants to be the MP in a rural Welsh seat with 29% child poverty.

His link to the constituency? He has a second home there. You honestly can’t make this stuff up. pic.twitter.com/v3UTXtRxJ5

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) March 3, 2023

https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2020/11/23/09/35996002-8977149-image-a-5_1606123788582.jpg

I think a third selection failure for Mason might be a sign that he should put his parliamentary aspirations on hold for now, it's getting a bit desperate and the chances don't look too good for him. Not even a case that the CLP might not be too enthusiastic for a 2nd home owning English guy, they will almost certainly hate the fucker!

His Twitter bio is now half in Welsh.

he will soon be disclosing the discovery that he is in fact descended from Welsh peasantry, a humble clan of weavers who lived in the same cave for generations.

@stoya dewch i canolbarth a de sir benfro -- mae'r chwyldro yn digwydd!

lol.. Stoya .. come to Rhyl ... I'm about to get me head kicked in by some Cardiff fans

@ paul mason news pic.twitter.com/N55FASyEqk

— wariotifo (@wariotifo) March 3, 2023

Good commentary on PM from the Calzino / Sinker double act here !

And what did Campbell do to the BBC?

Finally some honesty about the disgusting treatment Jeremy Corbyn received from figures at the BBC. And it’s coming from…Alistair Campbell. pic.twitter.com/sBhNOMFrIL

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) March 10, 2023

Obv it's a knowing tweet - it doesn't mean you promote it.

Damn I’m really glad my ‘left’ media platform didn’t give this guy an exclusive interview in which he was presented as authoritative, reasonable and agreeable pic.twitter.com/TJ6KCfx8PH

— tom (@tomrade_) March 13, 2023

Wow! Coming in and out of London yesterday was quiet. Empty trains, emptyish tube.

Today, by contrast, it’s packed. I guess the phenomenon of ‘TWAT’ workers (who go to the office on Tuesday, Wednesday & Thursday) is real. Sadly I’m not one of them! 😅

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) March 14, 2023

pic.twitter.com/hoxIjc0BzU

— Michael Rosen 💙💙🎓🎓 (@MichaelRosenYes) March 15, 2023

booming tweet, not sure why it's on this thread, is it the hitchins connection?

it's madness that Hitch is saying a regime that was murdering and putting trade unionists and commies into concentration camps was left-wing, he's off his bloody rocker these days!

First they came for the people with legitimate concerns

😴

Only one person can host this. It’s time for @michaeljswalker - the ‘sober judge’ of British political journalism.

Let’s get it on @rustyrockets!!! https://t.co/w1FgBeBYJ6 pic.twitter.com/LzGlQTfhwd

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) March 14, 2023

The hits keep coming.

I once asked Alastair on @novaramedia and he refused the offer because I’d used unsavoury language on twitter (it may have been something like ‘war criminal’). But at least he had the kindness to respond.

The offer still stands, by the way. https://t.co/h9RvyHoXnB

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) March 15, 2023

And if the green movement gives up on that it will lose, and lose badly. The task isn’t just highlighting issues, we need new people (literally in the future) to build different kind of energy and social systems. This absolutely requires thinking & deliberation! (8/9)

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) March 20, 2023

"we need new people (literally in the future)"

nice for alumni of the 2010 student movement to reunite at right wing events, held by fash-adjacent publications, alongside a patriotic labour style reactionary trade unionist leader turned shockjock dweeb. what a few years it has been. pic.twitter.com/hCFsKFWizv

— michael richmond (@Sisyphusa) March 20, 2023

Really pathetic.

An absurd position for Bastani to take! Obviously the position of the imperial core in relation to Asia and Africa plays a significant determining role in how their relationships to capitalism and climate change evolve! So we have responsibilities to fight it here! pic.twitter.com/8X6CKsBF8R

— John Duncan (@Johntheduncan) March 20, 2023

I don't know who the older guy is but in a few seconds he seems to have the measure of this tool. I can't even tell what Bastani is trying to say, perhaps clumsily trying to put his own spin on what some of his right-wing Malthusian discussion panel buddies have been saying recently.

It's the XR guy, who is actually worse in terms of actions. Amazing how he just calls Bastani out on his grift.

Why did people take Bastani seriously in the first place? Genuinely curious.

bastani put a lot of energy into reasonably entertaining twitter memes at a time when ppl were feeling very low and defeated (early 2017), when his affect (roughly speaking) wasleft-corbynism-for-the-lads-wahyey! afterwards he gave us fully automated gay space luxury communism etc, tho i don't think anyone took his line on that especially seriously, they just enjoyed the phrase (it's a good phrase). the book itself wasn't particularly well reviewed and i actually don't know a single person who read it lol (maybe it's great!)

as sysiphusa sourly notes he's a 2010 student-movement legacy kid (tho he was active then as aaron peters; he switched from his mum's to his dad's name for some personal family reason i don't recall)

anyway i feel that's the beginning and the end of the time ppl had for him?

wahyey s/b wahey

Unlike Mark S I think it's a bad, not good, phrase.

I own the book. It starts with a series of speculative fiction vignettes about how technology could shape the future.

I never did to the extent I've ever watched Novara, paid subs, but he was hard to avoid during the Corbyn years as the thing has been taken in (at various degrees of seriousness) across "left twitter". And I think James Butler is a serious person, a good writer and fairly solid commentator.

I think it's worth watching how (though not too hard, this is stuff I see in passing), as Corbyn and many of his supporters have been hounded out of mainstream political life,he has given up any pretence of "luxury communism" (that clip is basically don't even look at the West) as a thing altogether and is now being assimilated by the commentary class.

xxxp - maybe that's something Mark s has seen a few times but I haven't, much.

not really no (if you mean have i seen many ppl take AB seriously): i think he's always largely been treated as "our knockabout buffoon", with some apparently thinking "but it's probably good we have one of those" and others routinely saying "ffs get a grip u clown"

in the abstract -- in terms of building a robust left media project -- i'd probably include myself with the first set* (with the instant caveat "this buffoon tho? really?")

*that abstract is i guess a version of mark-fisher-encounters-rusty-rockets: our project shd include battalions that we hipsters are inclined to disdain etc, but i can't pretend that episode ended well (mark's dead and r.brand is whirling wildly off in QAnon-world) and it's not an instinct (of mine) that i've ever interrogated, beyond "we need more than just the chaps the LRB will publish"

"not really no (if you mean have i seen many ppl take AB seriously)"

No I mean ppl who start in left-wing media/projects and then you see them turn right, or be assimilated in to the right-wing media ecosystem.

This is such a disingenuous figure. Sure, if the global financial crisis never happened, & preceding (& unprecedented) boom in financial services had continued (literally impossible) we would be this much wealthier.

If I kept growing like I did from 10 to 16 I’d be 20 feet tall. https://t.co/aEs6xTJP57

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) March 20, 2023

"If I kept growing like I did from 10 to 16 I’d be 20 feet tall."

ppl who start in left-wing media/projects and then turn right or be assimilated

oh right, yes, i've seen that happen quite often -- and am very interested in it historically (john ganz has written abt it illuminatingly in the french third republic, viz from the 1870s to the 1930s; christopher hitchens wrote a long and i think still good 1980s essay* on it in re conor cruise o'brien before himself -- hitch i mean -- taking the exact same floor-crossing path)

(the latter perhaps suggests that "taking an interest" soon betokens "doing it yrself" so let me just dispel yr doubts now… !!)

*it quotes tom paulin in the form of the excellent phrase "creon's think-tank" (which is a very effectively weaponised ref to sophocles' play antigone)

Yeah I haven't seen it happen in real time much but the history of the left is littered with those people really.

Tom Paulin is one of Mark S's most cited authorities. I suspect you could find Mark S referring to Paulin on ILX in 2002.

i love him!

first ilx ref: 4 june 2001
post by: mark s

:)

This demonstrates that I am to Mark S as Mark S is to Tom Paulin.

❤️

Superb deep dive on the Met and police corruption from @trillingual in the next @LRB, published early online and of screaming, appalling relevance today: https://t.co/M4DQPyeqt9

— James B (@piercepenniless) March 21, 2023

Not that Bastani is an intellectual but thoughts bits of this are relevant to today's discussions

Here's a bar https://t.co/gro0tVkW3e pic.twitter.com/iyJwijYjX8

— Adam Serwer 🍝 (@AdamSerwer) March 21, 2023

I finally watched the whole Bastani / Hallam interview. It's a different experience from a brief clip.

It's quite disturbing, a bit of a painful experience. Why?

1: What they're talking about is so serious and bad. It has no upsides whatever till in the last moments, quite inspiringly, RH talks about 'the joyfulness of resistance'.

2: RH is maybe a disturbing figure. The grey prison sweater, the Gandalf beard, the intense eyes, the accent, the intense delivery. A strange combination of utter insistence on action here and now ('Praxis') and reference to academic research (which he says tells him the truth about human nature - this usually seems simplistic).

3: The fact that it's so combative; simply, watching people so antagonistic is uncomfortable.

4: AB, unfortunately, mostly does a bad job. I could describe this at length but will stop at saying that he interrupts far, far too much - something cited by most of the YouTube commentators.

I don't think that AB quite grasps that RH doesn't want to conduct an interview on AB's terms, but to stage an intervention, reach the Novara audience - and, repeatedly, to request that AB himself 'lead a march' (would that be popular? Not very; AB is for once wise in realising this) and potentially get arrested. AB's diversions from these demands are, again, embarrassing in a way that's painfully awkward. It's as though Novara Media has been 'called out' and can't respond.

And yet, the intensity and unusual character of this conversation does make it different from almost anything else I've watched for a long time.

The Port Vale speech is the most effective blow @Keir_Starmer has ever landed on the Tories and will resonate in every working class community 💥 pic.twitter.com/AFIGeyRqi5

— Paul Mason (@paulmasonnews) March 23, 2023

cutting crime and more bobbies on the beat pledges might sound impressive if you've had a frontal lobotomy and are hearing a politician speak for the first time in your life

I didn’t make the longlist in Labour's selection for Mid & South Pembrokeshire. Thanks to all here in the CLP who pledged their support. If you’re in St David’s tonight come and hear me talk about the cost of living crisis...and why I will always stand with workers on strike✊🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 pic.twitter.com/X1ognHYrom

— Paul Mason (@paulmasonnews) March 25, 2023

loool! where next, Paul? "I've always felt an affinity with the people of The Outer Hebrides and have decided to stand for..."

does he have any other caravans?

This is Jeremy Corbyn defending Ralph Miliband a few years ago.

We won’t see another leading U.K. politician with this much integrity and backbone for a long time pic.twitter.com/xDUcxtZphL

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) August 2, 2019

enjoying Bastani's latest incarnation, Charles Windsor stan

A point not often mentioned about AB is his Catholicism.

Where are you going with that?

oh come off it Aaron

— James B (@piercepenniless) March 31, 2023

bookmarking for future use

"Nice voice, Drake's ties, radical green politics in an understated way, a quiet internationalism"

lol, is this cunt for real? His droning voice is awful. Well yes they are very quiet and polite when they need to be these days (including his German uncles who were members of the SS) and this isn't through choice. Yes, radical green politics from a hypocritical old rich cunt who flies everywhere in private jets and helicopters.

AB is a very traditionalist thinker in some ways. Religious, community-focused, very family-oriented. Maybe his appreciation of the King goes with that. He also opposes much modern architecture, as does the King.

I think AB's latest praise for the King may be somewhat naive, though.

I don’t think those things are related.

A general rule that will never steer you wrong is that when someone starts saying shit like “bleating about how everyone who disagrees with you is racist” you pretty much know what path they’re on and you can safely dismiss them as anyone worth paying attention to

there's an entry in Chris Mullin's diaries where he meets Charles and effuses about what an insightful thinker and great humanitarian he finds the prince to be.

I don't he has any deeply held convictions on anything, he's just a weathervane prick playing a calculated game to get numbers on twitter and maintain a career.

That's no way to talk about the King!

I know Big Bas has some very regal qualities about him: his nice voice, his muscles rippling under his expensive fitted shirts as he takes another *brave* foray into classic liberalism and his fluid hottakes in his debates with Hitchens ... etc etc ... but "King" is a bit of a stretch!

apologies I have flea-bombed my house this morning and I think the left-over toxic fumes are making me high!

If you run something with any kind of principles you are more likely to face closure

We are incredibly sad to announce that gal-dem is closing.

Several factors that have contributed to this difficult decision, including numerous challenges with running a small, mission-driven, independent media company. We’ve shared more here https://t.co/0jAK94fG55

— gal-dem (@galdemzine) March 31, 2023

Unusually weak edition of Novara Live on 31.3.2023.

https://novaramedia.com/2023/03/31/trump-indicted-awful-april/

Stories include AB discussing ... AB's tweets on the King. His defence of them becomes, itself, surprisingly weak - "the climate movement is going to need respectable people like the King". He wouldn't have dared to say that in his interview with Roger Hallam, who made him look rather a dilettante.

It's an oddly low quality AB - like watching an AB created by AI.

really feeling that luxury automated monarchism. He's been on a bit of a journey but if he can't see that so called respectable millionaires/billionaires need to be eradicated like the bloodsucking fleas that they are - then he's a fucking tool. If not for the sake of the planet then at least for some urgent social justice before it becomes uninhabitable.

"Respectable" millionaires all already pretend to be very concerned about climate change, but they're not gonna approve of any plan that eats into profits. Total waste of time to try to get them onside.

It would probably be easier just to liquidate the bastards rather than have pointless concerned royal guy campaigning for some weak gradualist greenwashing bullshit, when what he's really thinking is some Malthusian Africa/Asia blaming shit anyway.

When the Taliban were negotiating with the US installed regime, one of their leaders said why are even negotiating with you when we could overrun and defeat you much quicker than this is going to take. Not saying I'm a fan of the Taliban, but that's the kind of spirit I do admire!

AB has never been high quality. If he put in a prompt in AI on random opinions a socialist should hold it would probably give him a checklist which would improve what he's coming out with!

Issuing correction on my previous post about the taliban

Embarrassing.

I would have voted against that NEC motion but tell me how a man who has defied an instruction to withdraw his name from StW's pro-Kremlin BS, and named Lowkey as a patron of his foundation, passes our party's due diligence to be a candidate?

— Paul Mason (@paulmasonnews) March 31, 2023

"defied an instruction" lol I know the Labour Party is as anti-democratic as Putin, but you aren't meant to say that if you are a Starmer supporter

Inspired by Pinefox, I watched the AB/Hallam interview...what an oddly intense thing that is.

Yes!

Spare a thought for Paul Mason who is wrestling with the dilemma of how long to keep the redundant Welsh translation in his bio after not getting selected in Pembrokeshire. pic.twitter.com/CVKC6E4tSJ

— Rich Simcox (@RichSimcox) April 3, 2023

I thought this too.

Post an album without one bad song on it. https://t.co/xgTjwxLeEN pic.twitter.com/rwqYhyt6VA

— Grace Blakeley (@graceblakeley) April 3, 2023

I'd forgotten about the existence of Grace Blakely. Then again I don't watch any of the new right-wing news channels that aren't Sky or the BBC.

In previous eras it has been young people driving a culture of nihilism – think punk in the 1970s or James Dean in the 50s. Today it is the old. As the nation goes from bad to worse, our most powerful elders, part of an enormous age cohort, are more interested in their begonias.

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) April 13, 2023

Not his best-judged statement, I fear.

Good for them.

It gives me life to think that while "progressive" outlets take blood money from arms dealers to organise boring talks with anthropomorphic wet wipes, Novara is funded by regular people chucking us a fiver and is now #3 in the UK news podcast charts. I love my job.

— Rivkah Brown (@RivkahBrown) April 14, 2023

Young AB. The 'lad' that Mark S remembers.

Incredible this was 10 years ago
“Que se vayan todos!” pic.twitter.com/UySz3EOdvp

— ARTIST TAXI DRIVER (@chunkymark) April 15, 2023

taxi drivers that don't watch the road whilst driving ... dud

https://novaramedia.com/2023/04/13/our-elites-are-on-autopilot-and-i-think-i-know-why/

The brief blurbs for this article make it sound dire - that AB is blaming retired people in an M&S café for the state of the country.

Now I've actually read it, I see it isn't mainly saying that. It's saying, I suppose, 'the older generation is well off, hence the lack of a sense of crisis'.

But then the M&S setting is just a distraction, which raises the question: if it's decadent to be eating a bun at M&S, why was AB doing it himself?

He's also surely omitting the fact that a) many older people are *not* well off, b) the people in the M&S café are *not* the people with 'power' that he keeps talking about.

I think there is a serious point here somewhere, but lost in confusion and clickbait framing.

read that last paragraph in a parody Adam Curtis voice

"think punk in the 1970s or James Dean in the 1950s"

lol, what is he on about? seeing as though he is channelling Adam Curtis he might want to remember Airey Neave, the old bastard Colditz veteran who was a key player in making Thatcherism happen until he got a pressie in his car from the IRA. He wasn't a nihilist but this was conclusive proof that the elites have always in fact got older and they were not any younger in past eras!

I thought it was well established by now that the old poor tend to die earlier? Who survives to old age is class stratified like everything else in this cursed country.

I do find AB's argument here quite odd, at best.

Whatever serious point he has - there could be one! - is obscured by the fact that 'the elites' that he's interested in have nothing to do with pensioners at an M&S in Bournemouth.

But then the M&S setting is just a distraction, which raises the question: if it's decadent to be eating a bun at M&S, why was AB doing it himself?

Completely unfair misrepresentation, he had a chocolate flapjack. Totally different thing

Fair.

There's a vinyl stall in Lower Marsh playing Ian Dury songs, which all the Gen Z ppl in the street seem to know... the equivalent in the 1970s would have been playing Al Bowlly 78s from before the war. #Bifo 's slow cancellation of the future is alive and well pic.twitter.com/1IqQ2363UY

— Paul Mason (@paulmasonnews) April 17, 2023

I'm not convinced this is such a bad thing.

Enjoying this, and I have to some of it has surprised me (particularly who the ‘new elite’ are).

Obviously I disagree with a great deal - but that will make for a better conversation! I’ll be interviewing @GoodwinMJ for @novaramedia this week. pic.twitter.com/jJVdqGADoP

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) April 18, 2023

much to disagree with in the garbage book by widely ridiculed pseudo-academic Goodwin, who would have guessed?

so this racist book-eating clown has some enlightening insights for the big lad - he just needs get an honest job at the Mail.

Why do that? It's the most popular of podcasts.

New media.

Oh yeah, sorry I forgot that our left-wing new media is the envy of Europe, as stated by Talk TV's Grace Blakely

Novara should interview John Virgo

— Gareth (@g_f_red) April 18, 2023

Plus AB says he quite likes some of MG's thinking so..

After all, what's nine decades of the accumulated experience of antifascist activism and organising when you just might be the guy who's come up with the One Weird Trick for platforming these creeps without them benefiting by it https://t.co/xrayInqjBG

— Peter Mitchell (@pdkmitchell) April 18, 2023

Reflecting on AB's interviews and controversy around them, what strikes me is:

I have mixed feelings about AB himself as interviewer. He's intelligent, well read, and charismatic. But he is not a forensic interrogator.

If you're going to interview someone with controversial views, then you probably need to be ready to read their work out line by line, make them explain it, and stick with the text, repeating yourself if necessary (think Jeremy Paxman even!), and make clear if you are *not* satisfied with the outcome before moving on.

I don't expect AB to do this but rather a variety of a) be polite, bantering ingratiatingly; b) say 'and up to this point, I totally agree with you', overemphasising agreement; c) interrupt rather than let the guest finish their own statement; d) be drolly anecdotal about himself ('so my dad's a cab driver, and he says...'). Some of this might be fine in particular cases, but in a controversial scenario it will obscure the examination that needs to take place.

Admittedly AB interviews many different people, mainly from the Left; maybe he should be judged on his full record. Most of us have never watched half his interviews.

I didn't see all of his very long encounter with Peter Hitchens but PH was able to correct AB on facts a number of times.

With Roger Hallam, as I've said, AB's approach was troublingly bad, and he appeared out of his depth.

re AB's jovial interest in interviewing Campbell:

I think it's possible to interview someone without rehab-ing their reputation - so it really depends on the interview.

— Dalia Gebrial (@daliagebrial) April 18, 2023

Has an interviewer on a visual medium ever read a passage from a work out "line by line, explain it, stick with the text". Paxman certainly didn't. Reading the words out loud of someone's book could be an excellent approach though! I feel a lot of these 'thoughts' tend to collapse the moment they are merely read.

Paxman and Bastani certainly sound like one another (not that I am ever watching a full Bastani interview but I saw the clip with Hallam). Lots of interruption, aggressive repetition if the question might not be answered. When I started watching Newsnight I felt entertained, but looking back I don't know what was the point of it. How many insights did I gain on the topic on any given day? I do remember the shouting.

Mostly a waste of time.

I wish AB would just shame the devil and admit he has decided having ethics and standards are an inconvenience for his career ambitions. And if that means platforming horrible morons who are funded by shady right-wing thinktanks - then he's happy to be the UI benefitting from the extra clicks and views.

It's not a careerist move! You see, we are all different.

Thanks Jacob. I’ve got similar mindset - but of course we are all different!

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) April 19, 2023

Goodwin has literally trolled people into reading this shit

Bastani is a fucking rube

Matt Goodwin@GoodwinMJ21h
Maybe you could convince New Statesman to host? We asked. They declined. Then "ideas editor" (Jacobson) called for the cancellation of thinkers he disagrees with.

even the NS are reluctant to boost Goodwin

it's good that all the people who hate antisemitism have been calling him on this thinly-veiled antisemitism tho

Quite a day on the internet for the boy.

https://t.co/Hy0nMm6NUp pic.twitter.com/vjvqC4th39

— hippo king archibald (@SamuraiApology) April 19, 2023

this feels like the absolute moment of fucking himself forever

we see you, you sad twat

and now i've got "Everybody Wants to Be a Melt" stuck in my head, to the tune of that Aristocats song

Yeah, as I've said before on this thread, I don't expect integrity from left journalists, but I do expect enough intelligence not to become this useful an idiot.

I'd like a bit of integrity.

Anyway, saw a tweet that speculated that their subs base has struggled due to inflation/gas bills and hence this turn but idk I think it's just the way it's gone since 2019. Integrity (that word again) is not in the vocabulary anymore.

I don't think integrity is something journalism is structurally built for.

From that point of view very little functions...I agree to an extent though on a personal/small group level I reckon it's possible to exercise a bit of control about certain behaviours. I think with a left leaning platform it's not an impossible ask.

This is designed to troll me

This letter from David in Bristol didn't put landlords in a good light.

But @AaronBastani had a pretty incredible story about a landlord he and his mum had when he was a child. (3/5) pic.twitter.com/jN251yB7t1

— Michael Walker (@michaeljswalker) April 19, 2023

Imagine spending 1h and 40 mins of your time on this

love to hear uplifting stories about good landlords with hearts of gold, or it might not be that at all. But I don't feel a strong compulsion to find out either.

the mythical good landlord that gifts you a nice bottle of wine before hesitantly giving you a section 21 notice rather than just telling you to fuck off, scumbag

Actually it turns out that AB says his former landlord was good because religious and landlords are now worse because 'we live in a society that is moving away from the ethical anchoring of religion'.

Jesus didn't approve of black mold or greedy scumbags who make gain from their neighbours by means of extortion, imo

AB is doing a Pasolini style act!

From that point of view very little functions...I agree to an extent though on a personal/small group level I reckon it's possible to exercise a bit of control about certain behaviours. I think with a left leaning platform it's not an impossible ask.

The bottom line of any private media company, left leaning platforms included, is always going to be profit, what happens on a personal/small group level is irrelevant to that, you'll always end in "is mastercard a queer ally?" territory. So instead of individual morality, I prefer to think of left media in strategic terms, a little like the structures of the labour party: something that can occasionally be mobilized to the left's advantage, but not something you should ever invest loyalty in or expect loyalty from.

Like I was thinking of certain publications around libcom that I've read bits from. Small groups, publication is erratic at best and so on. A different set of problems there but at least they know what they are talking about wrt landlordism.

Of course the preening “Gary’s Economics”, the man in the know, telling unexpected truths to a reverent audience (look at Walker & Bastani’s faces) is incapable of this sort of argument though.

— Tom Gann (@Tom_Gann) April 22, 2023

Agree with this. I don't like the person being discussed.

"@garyseconomics thinks anti-landlord politics can - at times - look like middle class people punching down."

lol, what an utter prick

if you are going to defend the politically indefensible and haven't got any coherent argument, just accuse anyone from the left of being myopically middle-class.

I fear that 'preening' is correct. Not keen.

They’ve definitely got our vote Basti.#WorldBollardAssociation

— World Bollard Association™ (@WorldBollard) April 24, 2023

AB on GB News ... at Buckingham Palace!

The @Telegraph & others are campaigning for the U.K. taxpayer to subsidise Tom Ford shoes & Gucci handbags for tourists who come to the U.K.

If you buy a suit you pay VAT, but if a tourist buys the same suit your taxes pay for their discount.

WTF?! pic.twitter.com/oby739x8Qz

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) May 4, 2023

who even gives a flying shit about subsidising tourists? The eejit wants to be a spokesperson for the Taxpayers Alliance now

Novara is good now.

The thing the East German Communist dictatorship was most successful at was building a wall to prevent people leaving and shooting those who tried.

Disgraceful to think people who write this nonsense were welcomed by the hard left leadership that poisoned Labour under Corbyn. https://t.co/aMLPSVN4Es

— Ian Austin (@LordIanAustin) May 8, 2023

Stfu!

I have one real regret with Fully Automated Luxury Communism. I got something very badly wrong…

I didn’t have the courage to back my hypothesis as strongly as I should have. More & more people I speak to think an artificial general intelligence is possible in the next decade… pic.twitter.com/5FIX6qzb7P

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) May 18, 2023

My basic problem with FALC, tho I enjoy the style & general bravura argument, is that its economics are duff. Sure you can imagine Romer AK model will run forever and we can all be infinitely rich, but it is increasingly clear our core growth models fail to describe growth… 1/n https://t.co/07soTLxsyA

— James Meadway (@meadwaj) May 18, 2023

Ok this is actually good.

We’d pay a cleaner our freelance rate, yes.

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) May 19, 2023

Strong, though rambling, statement from Allardyce.

Big Sam on AI and job layoffs.

Mr Allardyce is welcome on @novaramedia to discuss automation and climate change any time @LUFC! pic.twitter.com/XqyY4LsnIt

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) May 19, 2023

William Blake said that the idea God would have ever have a singular voice was unthinkable because a voice is by definition a finite thing and God is infinite, and you've got ppl like this going 'ooohhh this one chatbot software knows my subway order, what have we done?' https://t.co/ApGmZCfBXX

— Nettles #ElbitIsGuilty (@problemcl0wn) May 21, 2023

Really outstanding answer from Arnold Schwarzenegger explaining the rationale of protest groups like Just Stop Oil. pic.twitter.com/pU4Z9cBNH3

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) May 21, 2023