Are we at a crossroads with social media? Joanne Orlando, who has spent 15 years researching young people’s use of digital technology, believes the answer is yes.
Orlando acknowledges there is a lot of community concern at the moment, but says “some of our responses are not based on evidence”. Calls to simply ban young people’s access to these platforms means they won’t learn how to use or manage them when they get older. It risks driving them underground, where they will be less likely to ask an adult for help if they need it, Orlando writes.
A ban also fails to recognise some of the benefits young people get from social media, such as social connection, support and inspiration. “A ban seems simple, but to really keep our kids safe online we need to do more complex work to reclaim control on social media,” she says. This means acknowledging the good and the bad of social media, and educating young people about how algorithms work and how to identify and respond to harmful content.
Meanwhile, the New Zealand government has now scrapped the previously planned reforms to online safety regulations, which would have tackled bullying and harassment and aimed to curb the spread of harmful materials such as child exploitation and self-harm content. As Fiona Sing and Antonia Lyons report, the government now says stronger regulations would be subjective and run counter to free speech – despite tech platforms being in favour.
These principles might be difficult to stomach when you consider the increasing prevalence of AI-generated child sexual exploitation content. Australia is the third-largest market in the world for online sex abuse material.
As criminology experts Terry Goldsworthy and Gaelle Brotto write, it’s a central concern of police across the country, whose investigations risk being slowed down by having to figure out whether content depicts a real child at risk, or an entirely digitally created one.
And speaking of digitally created people, last year Snapchat influencer Caryn Marjorie trained a chatbot to imitate her and then gave her fans the chance to interact with “CarynAI” for the bargain price of a dollar a minute. However, as Leah Henrickson and Dominique Carlon write in a cautionary tale for the AI era, the users (and the chatbot itself) took the conversations in such weird, sexual and unsettling directions that Marjorie shut the project down after just
eight months.
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Judith Ireland
Education Editor
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Joanne Orlando, Western Sydney University
A social media ban only delays young people’s exposure to these platforms. It does not help them learn how to deal with them.
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Fiona Sing, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau; Antonia Lyons, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau
The government says the online safety framework infringed on free speech. But some of the world’s biggest tech companies have said they aren’t opposed to some form of regulation.
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Terry Goldsworthy, Bond University; Gaelle Brotto
Police efforts to sort through online child sexual exploitation material are being hampered by the rise in AI-generated imagery. Here’s how they’re working to combat the problem.
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Leah Henrickson, The University of Queensland; Dominique Carlon, Queensland University of Technology
Caryn Marjorie made $70,000 a week from her AI doppelgänger – until things got weird
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Becky Freeman, University of Sydney
From October, people who vape for therapeutic purposes will be able to purchase them from pharmacies without a prescription.
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Allan Fels, The University of Melbourne
The Emerson review could have recommended binding arbitration and giving courts the power to force supermarket chains to divest stores, but what it has recommended will put the big chains on notice.
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Diane Sivasubramaniam, Swinburne University of Technology; Samuel Wilson, Swinburne University of Technology
The Coalition is sending mixed messages on community consultation when it comes to nuclear power. If the community never has the authority to influence the outcome, is it actually “consultation”?
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Calum Cunningham, University of Tasmania; David Bowman, University of Tasmania; Grant Williamson, University of Tasmania
An analysis of 88 million wildfire observations over the past 21 years shows a strong increase in the frequency and intensity of the most extreme fires around the world.
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Hilary Bowman-Smart, University of South Australia
Australia is recruiting more overseas-trained doctors to fill doctor shortages. But when a high-income country like Australia does this, we risk causing a ‘brain drain’ elsewhere.
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James Nguyen, Monash University
Spirit Houses are a part of daily life – and we can understand them as a form of Land Acknowledgement.
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Cameron Shackell, Queensland University of Technology
Knowledge, for Foucault, is not just what we know. It is who we are. It defines our options, not just intellectually, but in all respects.
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Politics + Society
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Joanne Spangaro, University of Wollongong; Jacqui Cameron, University of Wollongong; Jeannette Walsh, University of Wollongong; Nigel Spence, University of Wollongong
Women who have moved to Australia, particularly from traumatic settings, are particularly at risk of gendered violence. Here’s what our research found helps them to speak up.
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Michelle Grattan, University of Canberra
Kean has poured cold water on the Opposition’s nuclear power plan, pointing to experts who have said it doesn’t make economic sense and would take too long to implement.
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Yasir Arafat, Edith Cowan University; Muhammad Rizwan Azhar, Edith Cowan University; Waqas Uzair, Edith Cowan University
Formula One has announced some significant changes aimed to reduce the sport’s environmental impact. Will it make a difference, or is this an example of ‘greenwashing’?
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Health + Medicine
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Phoebe Williams, University of Sydney; Joshua Osowicki, Murdoch Children's Research Institute; Yara-Natalie Abo, Murdoch Children's Research Institute
Strep A usually causes a relatively mild infection or no symptoms at all. But in rare cases, it can cause severe illness.
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Ian A. Wright, Western Sydney University
It is difficult and expensive to effectively remove ‘forever chemicals’ from your drinking water at home. And you also don’t want to get rid of the health-giving minerals water contains.
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Science + Technology
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Amelia Johns, University of Technology Sydney
Young people use social media to connect with culture and community, and to have a voice on political issues that concern them.
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Environment + Energy
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Samantha Hepburn, Deakin University
Last week, Victoria’s main gas storage facility was worryingly low. It’s another sign of the flaws associated with leaving gas supply to the market
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Arts + Culture
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Alison Carroll, The University of Melbourne
In a recent two-week tour of China, I was aware of just one major exhibition of foreign art. What does this mean for Australian artists in China?
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Books + Ideas
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Deborah Pike, University of Notre Dame Australia
In Miranda Darling’s feminist fiction, Mrs Dalloway is a Sydney wife and mother who refuses to be tamed, despite her husband’s attempts at coercive control.
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Business + Economy
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Steve Worthington, Swinburne University of Technology
By declaring cash an ‘essential service’ the government would secure its future for those Australians who still use it.
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