|
Facebook has followed through on its threat to ban news on its Australian platform. It’s an aggressive move, a muscle-flex clearly designed to say “we don’t need journalism, journalism needs us”. The larger aim is to scare the Australian Government into a retreat on its proposed media bargaining laws that would see Facebook and Google pay for journalism.
In the short run Facebook’s move will have serious consequences, especially on the eve of the country's COVID-19 vaccine rollout. The decision has been analysed from various angles by academics based in Australia. Diana Bossio argues that Facebook might have shot itself in the foot, David Tuffley explains how users can disengage from the platform while Maryke Steffens warns of the implications of banning newslinks just when credible information about COVID-19 vaccines is needed.
|
Michael Reynolds / AAP
Diana Bossio, Swinburne University of Technology
Facebook pulling the plug on Australian news will cause short-term disruption, but readers and media will recover.
|
|
|
David Tuffley, Griffith University
If you're fed up with Facebook, there are many options to step away, from taking a deactivation break, to a digital spring clean of how the platform accesses your data, to a full divorce.
| |
Maryke Steffens, University of Sydney
Facebook's decision to ban media organisations from posting links to news articles on the social media giant's platform comes under a week before Australia's COVID vaccine rollout begins.
|
|
|
Business + Economy
|
Ross Harvey, University of Johannesburg
A new book explains the manifestations of the oil curse in Nigeria and Angola since independence.
| |
Gaaitzen de Vries, United Nations University; Emmanuel B Mensah, University of Groningen; Hagen Kruse, University of Groningen; Kunal Sen, United Nations University
Industrialisation was key to long-term economic growth in the west and Asia. After years of going in the wrong direction, new research suggests that many African countries have seen a turnaround.
|
|
|
Health + Medicine
|
Ian A. Anderson, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences; Wendy Wood, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences
People often worry about whether they may be addicted to digital devices, but addiction to a substance is far different from the habitual behavior that typically underlies digital usage.
| |
Steven Smith, Brunel University London
Maintaining antibodies in the blood requires creating certain long-lasting immune cells – but this doesn't always happen.
|
|
|
