The week of Monday 9 to Sunday 15 March 2020 saw a shift in Australia’s reaction to the COVID-19 coronavirus, with the first warnings to start “social distancing”. My burst of productivity will be hard to keep going. I’ll write more about this virus thing another time.
Podcasts
- Not my podcast, but I was guest co-host on “A Fast-Moving Situation”, this week’s episode of Well May We Say, an Australian politics podcast by Jeremy Sear-Pirko. We had many opinions about things.
Articles
- 5G marketing echoes the hype around 3G and 4G: ICANN CTO, ZDNet, 9 March 2020.
- Seeking diversity in Australia’s spook and cyber workforce, ZDNet, 12 March 2020.
Media Appearances
- On Thursday my tweeted photo of the “WASH HANDS” skywriting over Sydney was used by The Guardian‘s Coronavirus Live. Also, Pedestrian TV, at least one Ukrainian outlet, and via the Press Association at the Belfast Telegraph, Evening Express, Metro, Somerset Live, This is Money, and this one in Hong Kong. As well as quite a few others.
Corporate Largesse
None.
The Week Ahead
This is the first week in which coronavirus precautions will directly affect me. I’ll start a bit of this “social distancing” thing, though to be fair it won’t be a lot different from my normal introvert existence.
The two Lowy Institute events for this week, Indonesia: A tough road ahead and China’s Xinjiang detentions have been cancelled. I’ll still be in Sydney until Tuesday afternoon, though, because my accommodation booking was non-refundable.
On Wednesday I’ll attempt some shopping in Katoomba. It should be fine because new stock seems to be arriving — apart from this ridiculous run on toilet paper and other paper goods, and hand sanitiser.
I’ll record an episode of The 9pm Edict podcast on Thursday, probably without Nicholas Fryer, and post it that night. [Update 19 March 2020: It won’t be happening for a couple of days, given the chaos of the week.]
Apart from all that, I should get a couple of things written for ZDNet. Life is still normal for me so far. For some value of “normal”.
Further Ahead
It remains to be seen how many of these events will still be happening, but here’s the current list.
Ethics of data science conference 2020, Sydney, 25–27 March 2020 (TBC).Cancelled.- Turning up the heat: Australia’s climate challenge, Lowy Institute, Sydney, 3 April 2020.
- Australian Cyber Conference, Canberra, 6–7 May 2020 (TBC).
- AusCERT 2020 Cyber Security Conference, Gold Coast, 2–5 June 2020 (TBC).
- Australian Cyber Conference, Melbourne, 27-29 October 2020 (TBC).
Please let me know if there’s anything I should add. Send airline tickets if it’s outside the Sydney region, yeah?
[Photo: Under the Bridge. The curved brick bridge that forms the railway underpass on Bland Street, Ashfield, in Sydney photographed on 12 March 2020.]