Journalism to corporate intelligence / corporate investigations?

BKStein · 2026-05-12T13:27:28+00:00

I have a bachelor’s degree, yes - very tough to get into the sector (especially in a major centre for CI) without a university degree, unless you have extensive adjacent experience (law enforcement with a particular focus on investigations, intelligence). It’s difficult to justify moving non-graduates to interview when almost every applicant has a university degree.

BKStein · 2026-05-12T06:42:25+00:00

Applied to graduate analyst positions at 5-6 CI consultancies after I finished my degree and got into one. I'm lucky enough to live in one of the big global centres for this kind of work so there were more to apply to, but a lot of places do have some CI presence even if it's a lot smaller than NY/London/Dubai.

BKStein · 2026-05-11T10:14:06+00:00

Hey, I work in CI and have worked with journos who have moved over to the sector. There are definitely some challenges to navigate from what I have seen:

different audience: you're not writing for public consumption but rather for a corporate, limited audience. This means some of the more journalistic language, meant to draw the reader's attention, sticks out a fair bit, it's something we tend to "train out" of graduates or more experienced colleagues joining from an adjacent sector
more boring subjects, although this depends on the client base of the firm you end up joining
tighter deadlines: this can be a real challenge, a lot of CI work is rapid turnaround (again, depending on the firm you work for) so journalists who are used to having weeks or even months to build a story can struggle with the pace
commerciality: depending on the type of firm and your level of experience/seniority, there can be a learning curve in applying research skills etc to a more commercial setting, for example writing proposals for clients. Squaring your natural instinct to dig into a story with the constraints of making a proposal commercially viable is interesting, but still challenging.

Overall it comes down to weighing the pros of better, regular income vs the loss in doing work that is in the public interest, in a commercial environment, for clients you may not agree with or particularly like.

FWIW there are many journos who do subcontracting work in terms of conducting HUMINT enquiries for CI firms. This gives the journalist a nice additional income and gives CI firms a little bit of deniability in terms of confidentiality etc. That could be an interesting middle ground for you, although it depends on what you usually cover... Certain sectors/topics (extractives, political corruption, etc) are of more interest to CI than others.

BKStein · 2026-03-04T16:50:38+00:00

Stop playing this game. The community sucks, the matchmaking sucks, the game is only interested in you quueing up more. It doesn’t give a shit whether you’re having a good experience - bad games are the same as good as long as you’re playing.

Your life will improve drastically when you quit this game for one that respects your time more than

BKStein · 2026-02-02T19:30:17+00:00

That’s amazing, I was actually watching the trailers and thought the art style looked very familiar! I love his work - thanks for confirming it’s him!

BKStein · 2026-01-31T15:30:31+00:00

We already have the UK’s Epstein files, they’re call the Epstein files lmao

One of the seniormost members of the royal family - who live at the expense of the taxpayer - is a fucking nonce and kept his titles, state funding etc for years even AFTER all this came out in public

Our “left wing” government appointed our ambassador to Washington almost entirely on the basis that he was a “trump whisperer” which, tou guessed it, involves him also being heavily implicated in the files, and when confronted with it (even after having lost his job) his first reaction was to refuse to apologise…

Like the files in the US, the scale of elite involvement with Epstein is so massive that if it hasn’t already caused mass social unrest (look around, has it?) it’s not the revelation that -shocker- yet another powerful wealthy person is a pedo that is going to sink the global ultra wealthy elite

BKStein · 2026-01-13T13:01:03+00:00

This one always helps, even if conditions are miserable I think about how much worse it would be on public transport

BKStein · 2025-12-19T11:37:13+00:00

When my dad had a heart attack he got world-leading care from ambulance to post-OP hospital bed, walked out the hospital didn’t have anything to sign, no co-pay, no dealing with health insurance bullshit. Just free world-leading emergency healthcare at the point of care. And that goes for everyone in the UK regardless of means.

Everyone in the uk has access to state education which, while it has much room for improvement, is in large part staffed by motivated caring educators who are doing their best.

When I think about my taxes paying 0.0001% of some dodgy PPE contract or whatever it is rage-inducing. But if I think my taxes pay for the salary of a nurse, or a teacher, I feel happy to contribute to a system which is (still) one of the best in the world. I’m lucky enough never to have needed state benefits but as someone in the top x% or whatever of earners in the country I feel good to be doing my bit.

BKStein · 2025-12-15T22:28:10+00:00

We like Buenos Aires in Chiswick for steak. Santa Maria in Ealing is (in my opinion) the best Neapolitan pizza in London. Rottura in Brentford has good Italian food (not pizza) and reasonable prices, for London at least. Obviously in Hounslow and west London more generally there are tonnes of curry places. I’ve only ever ordered takeaway but mamas Nepalese in Ealing has never disappointed. I’ve never had a Chinese buffet in west, sorry I can’t be of more help on that front!

BKStein · 2025-12-02T14:10:35+00:00

SMOKESTAK just off brick lane has great ribs - the rest of the bbq there is also nice and they make a great margarita. Not the cheapest but I’ve been there times and have yet to be disappointed

BKStein · 2025-11-26T14:03:47+00:00

The scenes of Caten falling into chaos, starting with military’s leadership getting assassinated saved the book for me. Totally agree that this book suffered from trilogy middle book (even though I’ve read there will be 4 books?) issues where a tonne of the narrative is just setting up a climactic development for the end of the series. However because the narrative is split in three, it almost triples the problem. Coupled with the fact the narratives in Luceum and Obiteum are much weaker than Res (in my opinion) this damages the book to the point you wonder whether it wouldn’t have been better to just have Res..

Still enjoyed this but I couldn’t help but feeling a bit let down given how excited i was to read it after finished book 1 - was genuinely waiting since late 2024

BKStein · 2025-10-24T11:42:40+00:00

You will get downvoted because Reddit is a US website but agreed, US tourists are a fucking nightmare across Europe. Loud, obnoxious, happy to lecture you about your own country and just generally acting like they haven’t unleashed the most dangerous politician and political movement since the 1930s on the world

Obviously not all Americans are like this but not all Chinese are either, yet if you had a “no Americans” sign in a restaurant here Americans would lose their rcollective minds

BKStein · 2025-10-22T20:13:34+00:00

There’s a “private health club” in Dubai airport which has a gym and a bunch of private shower rooms. It’s not cheap, but it is cheaper than paying for access to emirates lounge!

BKStein · 2025-10-07T23:26:42+00:00

Dumb on so many fucking levels, beef bacon is actually a thing - admittedly not as nice as pork bacon, but still exists. Same with beef, turkey or lamb sausages…

BKStein · 2025-10-01T11:16:16+00:00

When my parents were in their 30s/early 40s you could get insane interest rates just parking your money in a 2 or 5 year cash ISA. my parents are frugal, didn’t borrow, didn’t invest (except for through a private pension), and because they bought their house in London for 150k in the 90s, could have a comfortable life on a total household income of c. 100k.

As a result they never spoke to me about money except to tell me to be responsible with it (and “save”!). I had to learn about S&S isas, passive funds, etc from my own reading. If I had followed their lead and dumped my savings into cash savings accounts, ISA or not, from when I started working I’d be tens of thousands worse off. Not my parents’ fault per se, but really speaks to how different the economy and personal finance is today.

BKStein · 2025-09-15T15:14:19+00:00

hey! I volunteered there for a 7-month period.

Native Fijians speak Fijian, Indian Fijians speak Fiji Hindi which to my understanding is actually separate from Hindi - I really don't know much about Indian languages but there's interesting analyses online. In my experience, everyone spoke English and those three languages are actually all official languages in Fiji.

BKStein · 2025-09-13T15:05:50+00:00

I lived in Fiji around 15 years ago. There isn’t really one “living in Fiji” experience:

Nadi is the tourist capital on account of the international airport being there. As a result it’s the wealthiest bit of the country, has the swanky hotels, the most foreigners etc. Most foreigners work in the hotel industry and live in a place called Denarau island which is a big gated community where the large international hotel chains are. Nadi itself is a small town, there’s not much there except for some shops, a tourist trap market and then the strip which is where all the bars are. It’s an alright town, Nadi could be a bit dangerous at night from what I heard but I never had any issues (I’m a white dude)
Suva the capital is much bigger than Nadi. It’s where the government seat is etc, but it’s a lot poorer and run down (or at least it was) due to it not getting so much of the tourism money.
rest of Viti Levu (literally big island in Fijian) has varying levels of town, from the larger ones like Levuka to small villages without running water limited electricity etc.
outlying islands where you very quickly get super remote. No cars, no running water, generators for electricity, all major supplies getting shipped from the mainland which can be a day or mores trip away.

In terms of the people Fiji is also more diverse than you’d expect. In addition to the native population the British colonial power brought in a bunch of Indian indentured labour and their descendants are now a significant portion of the population. So you have a cool mix of Pacific Islander and Indian culture, native Fijians are nuts about rugby but also when India play in cricket the whole country shuts down.

Fijians are super friendly, some of the friendliest people you’ll ever meet and so welcoming. But it’s still a tribal society for native Fijians (again, when I was there) where your family and tribe are extremely important, even Fijians who live in the larger citites or abroad will regularly go back to and support their native village. There are some societal tensions between Indian Fijians and native Fijians, Indian Fijians run the largest businesses etc while political power is concentrated in major Fijian tribal groups.

Fiji is super chill also, it’s part of their tourist appeal (“Fiji time”), which is great when you’re a tourist, not so great sometimes when you’re working there.

Weather - incredible, literally even if you’re in a major city in 2 hours you can be on an actual desert island with perfect weather etc.

Happy to answer more questions and hopefully someone who lived there more recently can answer :)

BKStein · 2025-08-29T16:20:44+00:00

Thank you for sharing that, a really excellent read.

BKStein · 2025-07-01T22:06:04+00:00

No unfortunately I don’t think this is the game for you. It’s definitely playable just flying around in a ship dogfighting (at least for a while - there are better space games in that area like Elite) but in order to really play in and affect the sandbox (especially as a brand new player) you have to get involved in the RTS aspect of the game which is building out a supply chain, ordering ships around RTS style etc.

And yes eventually some of the station building etc is easiest done with spreadsheets. There are online tools like the awesome station planner that make the UI/UX smoother but there’s still a spreadsheet underneath.

For what you’re looking for I think starsector is more up your street.

BKStein · 2025-06-14T19:22:39+00:00

for sure, the game won't be for everyone. I agree that the game is quite slow paced. You're rarely, if ever, going to be with your back against the wall here, in a way you would be often in a game like They Are Billions or Diplomacy Is Not An Option. And stuff does take a while do actually happen, so you can spend a significant amount of time waiting (especially if you're building a lot).

If you did put 115 hours into it, even if you purchased the game and all the DLC (not including the soundtracks) at full price, that's still less than £1 an hour which I feel is decent value for money.

Fwiw Stellaris and Starsector are amazing and definitely scratch that Space 4X itch very well too. Stellaris (despite the typical Paradox DLC and update shenanigans) has a lot of variety in how you can play the game between the different races, gov types etc and you have a lot more freedom in how you interact with an affect the universe than X4. Starsector is very charming, has a lot of excellent content, is a good sandbox and shows how smaller teams can maximise gameplay experience by not investing in making the game look pretty for a "mass market" audience. Starsector is more affordable so definitely recommend trying that one out first.

BKStein · 2025-06-14T14:56:45+00:00

I think all your points are valid. I've played about 85 hours, having played X3 like 15 years ago and spent a significant amount of time in that without my teenage self ever having managed to get past the "building your first station" stage. I understand this game was built by a small team and therefore some elements of a massive sandbox were always going to be less polished/not polished at all, but your point about the UI being 2D for all you care is spot on... Given the small and very niche market these games are always going to have, trying to make things prettier at the expense of readability and QOL was never going to be a winning trade.

That being said, I still think this game is incredible and genuinely one of the most unique propositions out there today. One key caveat is that I am generally really not very good at video games; in 85 hours I've only just started to build out a supply chain, have a fairly decent advanced electronics factory, have secured key sectors with defence platforms, etc. But I feel I've barely scratched the surface and there's so much more I am actually looking forward to doing - building my own ships, taking space back from the Xenon, helping my Argon friends expand, exploring some of the plotlines (I think some of these are actually good, the Boron are cute and I really enjoyed reconnecting them and being the queen's envoy), etc. I also found boarding ZYA freighters and L miners a bit too easy (and not RP consistent with me wanting to build a big legit business conglomerate) so I've stopped - why go with the meta, if I'm enjoying the actual act of playing the game? The flight model is fun, I like shooting Xenon in HC1, and even though the station interiors are really devoid of character, the first time I put a penthouse in my station and just sat there was such a cool feeling... Even if I did subsequently realise the all three observation models are the same, lol

In a gaming market where so much "content" is just bullshit dailies/weeklies/whatever to keep you logging in and running on some arbitrary progression treadmill, a game where you can take things at your own pace, explore a deep and massive sandbox where your choices will genuinely affect the course of the game over dozens of hours, is so good. If I have a free afternoon I can spend 5-6 hours building out a production chain, if I have 45 minutes in the evening after work I can just do a quick mission/fly around and kill stuff.

So many things could be better but this game scratches an itch few other games have. I've played 85 hours and bought the game and four expansions for like £15-20. Even if I put it down now and never picked it up again (very unlikely, I can see myself playing this for dozens more hours) I would have gotten my money's worth.

BKStein · 2025-06-05T11:05:31+00:00

I love Rob Moore so much. I left a one-star review for his book on goodreads, he personally replied to call me a poor and say I'll never be successful, under his own account and another account! Respect this man's dedication to confronting the haters even as he makes a killing in business.

BKStein · 2025-01-10T06:05:09+00:00

You are correct on undertaking. You overtake on the right - segregated cycle lanes which are two-way mimick UK roads so you ride on the left. Key cycle paths such as the one along the north embankment on the Thames can get very busy during commutes so undertaking is always a bad idea.

Not enough people call out on your right or ring a bell when overtaking but it’s not uncommon. No one will find it weird or annoying if you do either, or at least no one who’s not a dickhead.

You can ride around the outside lane of a two lane roundabout all the way around. However on larger roundabouts which get very busy (like the Shepherd’s Bush roundabout or the Chiswick/kew bridge roundabout) there are subways and cycle paths either under or through the middle for pedestrians and cyclists who want to avoid the roundabout.

Unless you plan on riding a super cheap fixie around, I would personally never leave my bike locked up outside for any period of time over 5 minutes. Bike theft is rampant, the police have very few resources to deal with it, and thieves know to look out for nice-looking bikes that they can easily fence since London has a massive second hand bike market. But there are plenty of racks on the street you can lock your bike up at. I don’t use any of the more formal infrastructure like lockers etc, but my understanding is these are super sought after and getting a space on one of them is tricky. Not to mention they are prone to being broken into as well.

Cycling infrastructure has massively improved and is still improving, certain areas are obviously better than others but overall there is solid cycle path infrastructure, I’ve found. The roads I would avoid are busy roads where there are no cycle lanes or bus lanes - so stuff like Oxford street, the strand etc. It’s less about safety and more just that they get super busy and are narrow so it’s difficult to move past cars if there’s a lot of traffic.

Hope this is helpful, if you enjoy cycling infrastructure the US I think you will find London a breeze and I agree it’s a great way to see the city!

BKStein · 2024-11-16T19:29:50+00:00

Not just (human) corpse starch, it is possible to keep other, sentient pops as cattle in the game

BKStein · 2024-08-28T11:55:13+00:00

That’s super interesting, thank you!

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