I've been following Ivor for about 4 years. There's not much he's wrong about.
I'm surprised he's gone all out on covid, tbh, but he's applying unadulterated rationality, as you'd expect from an engineer, to a crazy situation.
It's surprising how many people have gone all out on Covid, but it's also an easy way to continue to market your brand- people are deeper in this shit than anything ever, and reach is paramount when you're a self-facilitating media node. Someone like Ivor- and personally I disagree with the "rationality" of engineers, though I know more mechanical than chemical so who knows- is clearly very business savvy in the new media world and is doing quite well out of it, so good for him. But if everyone around you is twatting on about covid then why would you carry on tweeting ketogenic diets. You'd be lost in the mire. So he has took this lane now and ran with it. Covid is making experts out of all sorts of people now. Zeynep Tufecki was a technology sociologist a year ago and is now an aerosol scholar (not a slur, she's good). You adapt I guess. It's how you make your money.
This is the internet economy- it's all content, own your brand etc etc
I'm more in the middle on all this than most on here I think- I do believe it's real, I know someone who died of it for fuck's sake- but I think both extremes are quite odd tbh. You have people locking themselves away and in histrionics when people go the beach or a fucking beer garden even though it's clear at this point that indoor cold spaces cause the spread; air conditioning, poor ventilation. And then knobheads filming themselves with no mask on in Asda as if this is some huge life achievement. Mask or no mask you're still taking selfies in the supermarket mate. The internet makes everyone look like fools ultimately.
The fat emperor was never especially objectionable, but he has to be careful he doesn't get up in the social media histrionics now like a lot of people are imo. Is this such an admirable trait now? I had more respect for the niches. Days of feedback loops with retweets of obscure German doctors because they fit your narrative, either way. Then ultimately that becomes your world doesn't it. Some people become obsessed with this shit like Father Ted's Glinner did about transsexuals, it's not healthy
Why am I still typing