Whenever scientists are in control of something, we get lazy and want to hire people to manage it for us.
It is worth comparing the relative situations between Oxford and Cambridge. At Cambridge, the Colleges are weak and not in control of very much anymore, and we are almost entirely at the mercy of University bureaucrats whose interests are not aligned with our own.
I gather the situation in Oxford is very different...
Both are great places, but if ancient institutions have an "enshittification clock", one of them is running faster than the other.
Jon Sterling
npub1hf…9ls8k
2026-01-16 09:13:00 UTC
Author Public Key
npub1hfga8wmley5fzqtttpeupd8hc6s92rykfmzktm8zfdhu9h8exvqsj9ls8kPublished at
2026-01-16 09:13:00 UTCEvent JSON
{
"id": "b32bbb9a9d6563b70a692b86913c5962859d1feef036156d3a3606c18c6630e4",
"pubkey": "ba51d3bb7fc92891016b5873c0b4f7c6a0550c964ec565ece24b6fc2dcf93301",
"created_at": 1768554780,
"kind": 1,
"tags": [
[
"proxy",
"https://mathstodon.xyz/users/jonmsterling/statuses/115904006085597177",
"activitypub"
],
[
"client",
"Mostr",
"31990:6be38f8c63df7dbf84db7ec4a6e6fbbd8d19dca3b980efad18585c46f04b26f9:mostr",
"wss://relay.ditto.pub"
]
],
"content": "Whenever scientists are in control of something, we get lazy and want to hire people to manage it for us.\n\nIt is worth comparing the relative situations between Oxford and Cambridge. At Cambridge, the Colleges are weak and not in control of very much anymore, and we are almost entirely at the mercy of University bureaucrats whose interests are not aligned with our own.\n\nI gather the situation in Oxford is very different...\n\nBoth are great places, but if ancient institutions have an \"enshittification clock\", one of them is running faster than the other.",
"sig": "f274724f9c05dd00fea4812002b5cf9a5b58b6684a98ffe59c01e304f416ad317cb859f2c8c1b667cb02f593534f73ed30ff48122a5a773e27d19797628951a8"
}