This piece was first published in Green Agenda, an online publishing project of the Green Institute think tank. It was never going to go well. Attempting to prop up the media sector while reigning in the tech giants with one bill was always going to be chaotic, but even then…

This is a piece to inform a discussion at Virtual Progress 2020 https://australianprogress.org.au/event/virtual-progress-2020/ Written with Peter Lewis, Director of the Centre for Responsible Technology As progressive political activists we are all committed to running and winning campaigns that make our world a better place. This involves striving to understand the…

I’ve read a few million posts about it, written several thousand words on it myself for Digital Rights Watch and others, and I’ve been rustled by some festering nonsense amongst some genuinely good commentary from experts in particular fields, so to prevent any further word vomit from me in conversation…

A year or so ago, only a couple of weeks after the madness that was the resignation courtesy of the constitution, Scott Ludlam and I fronted up to ‘People of Letters’ in Melbourne. For those unfamiliar with it, People of Letters emerged from Women of Letters, a love letter to…

The movement has a massive problem and we need to talk about it. It’s men clicking links like this seeking to furiously agree with anything that absolves us of any responsibility. Stop it. Stop clicking links like this. Stop looking for reasons to blame victims or put all the responsibility…

Yes, Facebook. In response to the Cambridge Analytica scandal, Mark Zuckerberg’s PR panic tour has produced nothing more than vague platitudes, or promises to do better. It’s the same game he’s been playing for years. Most infuriating is the determination that the considerable improvements that the European Union’s General Data…

The extraordinary revelations from the Observer/Channel 4 investigation into the practices of the digital marketing firm Cambridge Analytica have, like many a great internet controversy, produced great outrage but few answers or ways forward. People are rightly horrified at the prospect of such comprehensive personal information being used to manipulate…

The Cambridge Analytica revelations have spawned outrage across the world, as well they should. The mass manipulation of millions of individual Facebook users, psychometric profiling to reveal potential pressure points, micro-targeted advertising and black-ops electoral interference are certainly something worthy of the headlines. As the full impact of this washes…