Rod Jackson

CEO. Technologist. Occasional optimist. Observations on Britain, business and the elaborate machinery we build to avoid simple decisions. Personal views.

[Rod Jackson @RodJackson]

I’ve spent years running businesses and quietly observing public life.

I’ve decided to continue observing it, but less quietly.

Britain, business, technology—and the gap between the announcement and the outcome.

Personal views. Constructive disagreement welcome.

[Rod Jackson @RodJackson]

Facebook and Instagram suffered a brief outage.

For several minutes, people had to form opinions without first checking whether strangers agreed with them.

Fortunately, civilisation survived.

[Rod Jackson @RodJackson]

Putin has accused Ukraine of interfering in Russia’s elections.

One can understand his irritation. It’s terribly rude to interfere in something someone has already organised so thoroughly.

[Rod Jackson @RodJackson]

Spurs and Villa meet today, both still looking for their first league win.

In football, this is called a poor start.

In business, we’d have a slide explaining that the transformation remains on track.

[Rod Jackson @RodJackson]

@BBCNews In other news, the sources from the Air Traffic Control body are looking for ways to shrink their noses

[Rod Jackson @RodJackson]

@NickpxJ Yup. Started yesterday. Will dig in, expecting a long slog. My 2nd time around with X. This time around will focus on following interesting people / content rather than the mainstream.

[Rod Jackson @RodJackson]

@TobiasTaylor @BBCNews Or, we could anticipate that areas with greater population density / network congestion might need better infrastructure to help ensure we can all use our phones reliably.

[Rod Jackson @RodJackson]

@AFP The King has warned AI leaders about the existential danger of the technology falling into the wrong hands.

Somewhere, a chatbot is drafting a reassuring statement confirming its unwavering commitment to constitutional monarchy.

[Rod Jackson @RodJackson]

@CityAM British retail sales unexpectedly rose 0.5% in August.

Consumers have once again ignored the economic forecast and behaved like people rather than a spreadsheet.

Economists are said to be coping bravely.

[Rod Jackson @RodJackson]

@BBCNews So the King has warned AI leaders about the existential danger of the technology falling into the wrong hands.

Somewhere, a chatbot is drafting a reassuring statement confirming its unwavering commitment to constitutional monarchy.

[Rod Jackson @RodJackson]

Fuel prices in France have gone into orbit. Have seen petrol at €2.50 per litre.

AI me has lost about 5 stone from the shock !

[Rod Jackson @RodJackson]

A 15-year-old sports car on an empty Spanish mountain road.

No touchscreens. No driver-assistance committee trying to participate. Just an engine, a gearbox and the growing suspicion that progress may have taken a wrong turn somewhere.

[Rod Jackson @RodJackson]

£500m into UK manufacturing and up to 1,000 jobs is excellent news.

McLaren building an SUV is also proof that, eventually, every sports-car strategy meets a spreadsheet.

Purists may object. The finance team will cope.

https://t.co/6vq29UoYjH

[Rod Jackson @RodJackson]

Every government promises “tough decisions”.

The useful questions are: tough for whom, decided by whom, and measured against what result?

https://t.co/GwhW6fiX5a

[Rod Jackson @RodJackson]

Every modern public service now offers three ways to contact it.

An app that cannot help, a chatbot that cannot understand and a phone number experiencing unusually high demand since 2007.

[Rod Jackson @RodJackson]

I’d like a political interview where every answer is followed by:

“Who will do that, by when, and what will you stop funding?”

Bring back #accountability