My week of Monday 3 to Sunday 9 July 2023 delivered few public results, but was wonderful on the inside. I didn’t get a podcast done, but I did some solid thinking about the future. Also, I pondered sausages.
Podcasts
- Not a podcast, but a blog post related to one. The 9pm Edict podcast: This is whaddyawant, apparently. For the last few weeks I’ve been collecting your thoughts about the kind of podcasts you’d like me to make. Here are the results.
The 9pm Edict is supported by the generosity of its listeners. You can subscribe for special benefits or throw a few coins into the tip jar. Please consider.
Articles
- Digital developments from Canberra 43. The robodebt royal commission provided the big story to finish the week, but there’s also new guidelines for generative AI in government, drone security concerns, and a bunch more.
I am very conscious that these have been the bulk of my public writing for months now. I do intend to get back to writing other things — especially reportage and commentary — in the not too distant future.
You can read my previous writing at Authory, where you can also subscribe to an email compilation of any new stories each Sunday morning.
Media Appearances
- It continues to amuse me that Katoomba’s unruly sulphur-crested cockatoo still gets reported, this time in Brazil as Cacatua se revolta com armadilha anti-pássaros e a destrói, four years after the original report — which of course contains one of my photos.
Videos, Photos, Corporate Largesse
None of these things. You can subscribe to my YouTube channel to be notified when new videos appear.
Recommendations
The fight is on between Musk’s Twitter and Zuckerberg’s new Threads. The drama never ends..
- Elon Musk Suggests ‘Childless’ People Should Lose the Right to Vote, perhaps based in part around his subscription to the white supremacist “great replacement” theories.
- If you reckon Mark Zuckerberg might be better, Threads: Instagram owner to launch Twitter rival on Thursday.
- Musk reacts in a typical way: Elon Musk’s Twitter threatens to file lawsuit over Mark Zuckerberg’s ‘copycat’ Threads app.
- And in further legal action, Elon Musk’s Twitter sues top law firm Wachtell over $90 million fee for work under prior ownership.
- Elon Musk responds to parody account calling Mark Zuckerberg ‘lizard boy’.
- Deep space experts prove Elon Musk’s Starlink is interfering in scientific work.
- Twitter’s API keeps breaking, even for developers paying $42,000, reports Mashable. “Everything worked fine until Elon Musk took over.”
- Telstra ‘pondered’ unpredictability of Elon Musk’s business decisions before signing Starlink deal. But they still signed it.
- “A report that Elon Musk uses ketamine [which I told you about last week] could put his security clearance at risk — again.”
- And finally on a related note, Ex-Twitter leader Jack Dorsey endorses RFK Jr for president, because of course he does. Sigh.
In other news:
- “A construction project contractor who lives and works in the countryside in China’s Hubei province records his daily life in the style of British film and television programs.”
- Dutch king apologises for Netherlands’ historical role in slavery
- Birdlife Australia has a live EagleCAM watching a pair of white-bellied sea-eagles (Haliaeetus leucogaster).
- Australian minister Clare O’Neil calls Donald Trump Jr ‘a big baby’ after speaking tour is postponed, although the tweets were later deleted.
- The new TV series American Born Chinese is fantastic. Check the Wikipedia article and this backgrounder at TIME. It’s on Disney+ but I’m sure you can find it elsewhere, as I did.
The Week Ahead
Monday will be a serious day, and mostly a technical one. I’m migrating a client’s company’s email and data storage into Google Workspace, and working on another client’s need for certain automated blog posts.
On Tuesday I’m meeting a co-conspirator up here in the Blue Mountains, at least once I finish a client meeting. It is also both Cow Appreciation Day and National Mojito Day, both of which strike me as relevant.
Wednesday sees me head down to Sydney for various routine medical appointments and some errands. And after that, it’s all the usual work through to the weekend, which is unplanned.
Further Ahead
- The 9pm Public House Forum 8 livestream and recording, 22 July 2023 at 1pm (TBC). To stay informed you should be on the mailing list, because this date is only tentative at this stage — and to be honest it’s looking unlikely.
- Aaron Chen’s Chen & Friends, Enmore Theatre, 18 August 2023.
- NetThing Internet Governance Forum, Brisbane and online, 28 August 2023 (TBC).
- APNIC 56, Kyoto and online, 12–14 September 2023. I very much doubt that I’ll be going to Japan, but this is always such a good conference (TBC).
[Photo: Some pork and beef sausages and stuff being fried up for breakfast on 4 July 2019. There was a time when my Sunday breakfasts were, shall we say, traditional.]