Internet – Page 21 – Stilgherrian

12 May 2014

Talking mobile app privacy on radio 2MFM

Here’s the final of this week’s media spots that was triggered by Privacy Awareness Week, a chat about the privacy issues relating to mobile apps on Sydney’s Muslim community radio station 2MFM.

This interview was recorded on Tuesday 6 May, and this 23-minute edit was broadcast the same day. The presenter is Nadia Zahr.

2MFM has made the audio available on SoundCloud, but has not allowed for the file to be downloaded, so I’ve just embedded the SoundCloud link immediately below.

[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/148141679″ params=”color=ff5500&auto_play=false&show_artwork=true&show_playcount=true&show_comments=true” width=”100%” height=”81″ iframe=”false” /]

10 May 2014

Talking internet security on 2SER’s “The Wire”

The Wire logo Last week I recorded an interview on the state of internet security with The Wire, the current affairs program for Australia’s community radio network produced by 2SER in Sydney. It went to air on Monday night, 5 May.

This year has seen some major internet security breaches — from Heartbleed to iOS. But between these headline grabbing flaws there are numerous smaller bugs that pop up every day. As our devices and services become ever more ubiquitous, and flaws continue to popping to, we take a look at internet security.

I spoke with journalist Josh Nicholas for maybe 15 minutes, so this 4-minute edit is very much a condensed version. However we did manage to cover such subtleties as Apple’s secretive approach to security vulnerabilities, Heartbleed, bug bounties, and calls for better disclosure of vulnerabilities — that last link being to a story I wrote this week.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 4:31 — 2.7MB)

The audio is ©2014 2SER-FM 107.3. It’s also available at The Wire program website — that’s exactly the same as what you can hear here, it’s just that the audio file here has my branding — and you can also listen to the entire episode.

08 May 201408 May 2014

Talking digital metadata on 3RRR’s Spoke

I always enjoy the opportunity to explain some of the subtleties of the politics behind the digital surveillance debate, so I was glad to get the chance to discuss the concept of “metadata” on Melbourne’s 3RRR this week.

This interview with Michelle Bennett on Spoke is from Tuesday 6 May, and we cover much the same ground as in two of my recent pieces for ZDNet Australia, It’s time that ‘metadata’ met an end and Plibersek loses our privacy in a haystack of envelopes, both first published in March.

I was very pleased that the 18-minute conversation wandered through some of the grey areas. It was neither tinfoil-hat “surveillance is bad” nor simplistic “we must fight the terrorists”. Thanks, Michelle.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 18:24 — 12.9MB)

08 May 201408 May 2014

Talking digital privacy on ABC 891 Adelaide

ABC logo This is Privacy Awareness Week in Australia, so most of the media I’ve been involved in making is focused on privacy — although of course that’s a common topic for me in any event.

First cab off the rank — or do these days we day “first Uber off the app”? — was ABC 891 Adelaide, a radio station I worked at 1985-91, and which I still have links to.

This quick interview with drive presenter Michael Smyth took place on Monday 5 May 2014.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 4:26 — 2.3MB)

30 April 2014

Announcing the Return of “The 9pm Edict”

My crowdfunding project, The 9 O’Clock Resurrection, has been successful. We have resurrected the finest goat-oriented political and social commentary podcast in the galaxy, The 9pm Edict. Haha. What have we done?

What we’ve done is fund two episodes for May.

First up, “The 9pm Shire”, by which I mean Sutherland Shire in Sydney’s southern suburbs. Our Minister for Immigration and Border Protection, Scott Morrison, said last month:

“I get so much encouragement when I walk through Cronulla mall, go down the beach, or up to Miranda Fair… On Australia Day we were at the fireworks at Cronulla and I was walking through the crowd and people were coming up to me to say ‘g’day’ and encourage me and congratulate me on what we had done so far, and basically saying ‘keep giving it to ’em and don’t back down’.”

He said residents weren’t against immigration or asylum-seekers but wanted a process that was done “the right way”.

That episode is being recorded this Saturday 3 May, and should be posted on Sunday 4 May.

And because I’m in San Francisco and San Jose later this month, the following episode will be “The 9pm Caltrain” — the Caltrain being the train that runs through that part of the world. That episode should be posted on Tuesday 20 May.

I’ve recorded an announcement, which you can listen to below. But if you want all of the episodes, now and in the future, subscribe to the podcast feed, or subscribe automatically in iTunes, or on SoundCloud.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 7:02 — 5.1MB)

If you’d like to comment on this (non-)episode — or suggest people, places or things that I should check out — please add your comment below, or Skype to stilgherrian or phone Sydney +61 2 8011 3733.

You can also check out the progress videos I made on the YouTube playlist.

[Credits: The 9pm Edict theme by mansardian, from The Freesound Project. Photograph of Stilgherrian taken 29 March 2009 by misswired, used by permission.]

21 April 201412 December 2014

Announcing (belatedly) The 9 O’Clock Resurrection

Screenshot from The 9 O'Clock Resurrection video for Day 1 I’ve decided that my podcast The 9pm Edict should be a thing again, and so yesterday morning I launched a Pozible crowdfunding campaign entitled The 9 O’Clock Resurrection to make it happen.

This post is “belatedly” because it’s already more than a day since I launched the campaign, and already people’s commitments are more than a third of the way to the initial target, which is to fund two episodes in May. Thank you.

I’d really like to do the podcast weekly, however, and beyond May. So that’ll mean more funding than the initial target, and more of the supporters to commit to a monthly subscription. It’s much the same model as that used by community broadcasters here in Australia, or public broadcasters in the US, as I said when I spoke about my first Pozible campaign on ABC Radio National’s Media Report.

This new Pozible campaign runs until 29 April. I’ll be making a video each day to report progress. The first is watchable on YouTube, and the rest will appear in the YouTube playlist, and I’ll figure out some other methods tomorrow.

Continue reading “Announcing (belatedly) The 9 O’Clock Resurrection”