Better politics requires better reporting

If politics really is to be done differently, as Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has promised, then the way politics is reported will need to be done differently too.

Cast iron facts about tin-foil hats

It may seem like more and more people are falling prey to increasingly bizarre conspiracy theories such as QAnon and flat Earth ‘theory’, but such beliefs may actually not have increased over time, according to US and UK researchers.

Post at your professional peril

What people post on social media in their private lives can affect their professional reputation and, rightly or not, even cost them their jobs.

TikTok Australia should come clean about its data

TikTok is a Chinese company and it remains very evasive about whether user data is handed over to the Chinese Communist Party – which means it probably is.

Who’s afraid of the big bad advert?

Advertising which plays to our fears is a favourite of public health agencies as well as politicians, but how effective are hard hitting campaigns in changing public behaviour?

Images and distorted facts

Social media has made it easier to spread information – and lies – than ever before, and understanding how we comprehend the world is the key to sifting facts from fiction.

How the media lost the election

While the Murdoch press campaigned stridently for Morrison, the rest of the media failed to cover the election properly, focusing on meaningless photo-ops with the leaders rather than the issues they didn’t want to talk about – such as climate change, integrity, local concerns and women’s issues.

Journalism in the age of Twitter

Traditional journalism has an uneasy relationship with social media sites such as Twitter, which can both promote and undermine their work.

ACCC v big tech – Round 10

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission is taking on Big Tech again – this time in the form of Meta – to dismantle one of the main excuses major technology firms use to disclaim responsibility for their actions.

Journalism under attack

Today is World Press Freedom Day, but outnumbered and outgunned by authoritarian propaganda machines, independent, public-interest journalism is under threat around the world from toxic polarisation, imprisonment, cyber bullying and automated attacks that hinder or halt their work.

How will Elon change Twitter?

Some twitter users have responded with dismay to the news that Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, is buying the popular social media platform, but why does he want it and what will he use it for?

Auditing the algorithms

The powerful algorithms used by major technology companies to track phone and internet users shape our consumption of news, media and advertising, and now the veil of secrecy which surrounds them is being lifted.