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TikTok, the most widely used social media app among teens, attracts its fair share of problematic content. Whether it’s porn performers trying to bring users to their other openly explicit accounts, or Andrew Tate fans infecting young minds, navigating TikTok can feel more like a battlefield than a playground.
But as Sonja Petrovic and Milovan Savic explain, moderating this content isn’t easy – especially as TikTok’s algorithms are designed to prioritise profits over user safety. And while the platform can be used to share positive sex education, young users often don’t have the digital literacy skills to stay away from harmful content.
TikTok’s inability (or unwillingness) to effectively self-regulate means parents and regulators need to step in, the authors say.
Meanwhile, it’s almost a year since ChatGPT burst onto the scene. Generative artificial intelligence – which can create new content such as text and images – has become easily accessible to everyone, including young people.
Researchers Kathy Mills and Christian Moro are highly enthusiastic about the potential for AI. However, there are risks as well as benefits. Today they give advice to parents on how to navigate AI technology with their kids.
“It is important to learn about and try these technologies for yourself so you can help your child,” they write. “Start by logging in to a free generative AI tool, and experiment together by asking the bot some questions and reflecting on the answers.”
One bizarre corner of the internet many of us remember is the strange video series known as Salad Fingers. It may make you feel old to learn it was released nearly two decades ago. But as our experts describe today in the first published paper on Salad Fingers, what struck many of us at the time as strange and hard to explain has gone on to influence many animations in the “weird part of YouTube”. In this anarchic corner of the internet, there are no ratings systems such as G and PG, and no need to decide on the genre or the intended audience.
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Noor Gillani
Technology Editor
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Sonja Petrovic, The University of Melbourne; Milovan Savic, Swinburne University of Technology
Many TikTok creators, including creators of pornography, use the platform to promote themselves and their explicit content on other platforms.
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Kathy Mills, Australian Catholic University; Christian Moro, Bond University
It is almost a year since ChatGPT burst onto the scene. Generative artificial intelligence has become incredibly assessable to everyone, including young people.
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Jessica Balanzategui, RMIT University; César Albarrán-Torres, Swinburne University of Technology
Do you remember the bizarre Salad Fingers videos from the early 2000s? They inspired a whole genre of genre-less online videos.
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Anastasia Powell, RMIT University; Jacqui True, Monash University; Kristin Diemer, The University of Melbourne; Kyllie Cripps, Monash University
While it can feel like little progress is being made to stop women being killed by their partners or ex-partners, the data show a steady decline in recent years.
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Helen Louise Berry, Macquarie University; Francis Vergunst, University of Oslo
Climate change is seeing more of us with mental health problems and harmful substance use. So we need to start planning now.
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Jürgen Knauer, Western Sydney University
Climate modelling that best accounts for the processes that sustain plant life predicts plants could absorb up to 20% more CO₂ than the simplest version predicted.
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Michelle Grattan, University of Canberra
In federal parliament, there are “friendship” groups for almost everything, from AUKUS to arthritis, and for many countries. Three groups are particularly relevant at the moment – Friends of Palestine…
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Gemma Ware, The Conversation
From the frontline battle against antibiotic resistance in Nigeria, to the techniques being used to find new antibiotics. Listen to The Conversation Weekly podcast.
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Giselle Bastin, Flinders University
When The Crown debuted in 2016, the quality of the story lines, acting and impressive production standards were striking. What happened?
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Monique Rooney, Australian National University
Amanda Lohrey’s new novel, The Conversion, poses questions that matter to how we read, write and live now – through a couple’s renovation of a church into a home.
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Politics + Society
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Adrian Beaumont, The University of Melbourne
The Labor Party continues the poll slide it has experienced since the failed Voice referendum in October.
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Travis N. Ridout, Washington State University
Targeted campaign advertising in Australia is very different from the United States. Here’s why.
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Nicole Kalms, Monash University; Charishma Ratnam, Deakin University; Gill Matthewson, Monash University; Murray Lee, University of Sydney; Rebecca Wickes, Griffith University
Women are most likely to feel unsafe in their cities or towns, but planning authorities have rarely listened to them. Here’s what we can do to change that.
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Health + Medicine
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Jennifer Power, La Trobe University
Asexuality remains widely misunderstood. Here’s what it means and how this sexuality became a social movement.
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Science + Technology
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Jennifer Medbury, Edith Cowan University; Paul Haskell-Dowland, Edith Cowan University
Prolific and highly profitable, LockBit provides ransomware as a service. Aspiring cybercriminals sign up to the scheme, and the group takes a cut. Here’s how it works.
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Environment + Energy
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Muhammad Rizwan Azhar, Edith Cowan University; Waqas Uzair, Edith Cowan University
Electric vehicles get all the press – but it’s the smaller unsung two wheelers cutting oil demand the most.
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Arts + Culture
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Catherine Campbell, University of South Australia
Anna Goldsworthy’s lively writing deftly captures the joy and wilful naivety of a first pregnancy, followed by the overwhelming love and sleep-deprivation-induced anxiety of the first months.
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Alexander Howard, University of Sydney
Eamon Flack gives Bulgakov’s classic epic novel a riotous interpretation.
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