Has the cover been blown on the true identity of British street artist Banksy? Some people seem to think so. A British tabloid, The Mail on Sunday, claim they learned Banksy’s actual name in 2008, something that has — apparently — now been verified. Banksy however, through his la … | Continue reading
Victor Tangermann, writing for Futurism: The company reported a net loss of $57.3 million in 2025 in an earnings report released on Thursday. In an official statement, the company glumly hinted at the possibility of going under sooner rather than later, writing that “there is sub … | Continue reading
In the search for evidence of intelligent extraterrestrial life, astronomers, and organisations like SETI, often seek out narrowband radio signals. Space is full of radio signals, most of them broadband, which usually occur naturally. Neutron stars are but one generator of such s … | Continue reading
Proposals were afoot to rename Eleventy — often styled 11ty — a blog publishing platform favoured by some Indie/Small Web bloggers, as Build Awesome. The awesome part of 11ty’s would-be new name derives from Font Awesome, producers of a wide range of icons website publishers can … | Continue reading
Twelve titles have been included on the longlist for this year’s Stella Prize, the Australian literary award recognising the work of women and non-binary writers. 58 Facets: On violence and the law, by Marika Sosnowski Ankami, by Debra Dank Apron-Sorrow / Sovereign-Tea, by Natali … | Continue reading
The second edition of the Internet Phone Book is in the works, and publishers of personal websites are being invited to submit their URL. I was stoked to be included in the inaugural edition, compiled last year by Kristoffer Tjalve and Elliott Cost, and you can still call me on 4 … | Continue reading
Bill Premo: I don’t know where to start with this but yeah I’m making flash if flash was built in 2026. I’m making it compatible with Linux,Mac, and PC. If you remember Flash, the animation/multimedia creation application, originally launched by a company called Macromedia, you w … | Continue reading
Scott Shambaugh: An AI agent of unknown ownership autonomously wrote and published a personalized hit piece about me after I rejected its code, attempting to damage my reputation and shame me into accepting its changes into a mainstream python library. This represents a first-of- … | Continue reading
Naarm/Melbourne based Australian poet Evelyn Araluen has won both the Victorian Prize for Literature, and Prize for Indigenous Writing, in this year’s Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards, for her second collection of poetry, The Rot. Araluen won the Stella Prize, one of Australia … | Continue reading
Chico Harlan, writing for MSM: Sometime over the next 100 years, human-driven warming could disrupt a vital ocean current that carries heat northward from the tropics. After this breach, most of the world would keep getting hotter — but northern Europe would cool substantially, w … | Continue reading
Emma Roth, writing for The Verge: Burger King is launching an AI chatbot that will live in the headsets used by employees. The voice-enabled chatbot, called “Patty,” is part of an overarching BK Assistant platform that will not only assist employees with meal preparation but also … | Continue reading
Emma Wynne, writing for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC): When Perth mother Lisa Taylor’s 11-year-old daughter slipped one arm out of her seatbelt, the family had been on the road for over two hours, returning from a holiday in Dunsborough over the Christmas period. … | Continue reading
People unfortunate enough to have one, or more, toxic people in their lives, are more likely to experience accelerated biological ageing, according to research published by PNAS. This is, no doubt, something anyone subjected to the malevolence of a toxic person could have told yo … | Continue reading
Libraries, letters, street magazines, and face-to-face social networking. This is how I saw a world without the internet sixteen years ago. Most very serious. | Continue reading
The new tool will look after some aspects of the design and maintenance of a WordPress.com blog. As I understand it, the AI assistant will not write content, though it can “edit and refine” posts if asked. The assistant however can create custom images upon prompt. Anything you l … | Continue reading
Kali Hays, Regan Morris, and Peter Bowes, writing for the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC): The head of Instagram has defended his platform against claims it caused mental health damage to minors, arguing in a California court that even seemingly excessive use of social med … | Continue reading
Jacinta Bowler writing for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC): The condition, known as tattoo-associated uveitis, can lead to permanent vision loss, glaucoma, and patients requiring immunosuppressants for the rest of their life. While rare, the condition can set in sev … | Continue reading
The Australian literary journal closed late last year after then publisher, Melbourne University Press (MUP), said the long running publication was no longer financially viable. Earlier this week, the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) said it had taken ownership of the ma … | Continue reading
Developers of Linux Mint (LM), the operating system (OS) I now use, are considering increasing the time between major updates, writes Brian Fagioli, at NERDS.xyz. Presently major updates roll out at leisurely six month intervals. To be honest, I had even noticed. I’m just gratefu … | Continue reading
Aruna Ranganathan and Xingqi Maggie Ye, writing for Harvard Business Review: In our in-progress research, we discovered that AI tools didn’t reduce work, they consistently intensified it. In an eight-month study of how generative AI changed work habits at a U.S.-based technology … | Continue reading
Elon Musk, in his capacity as CEO of SpaceX, wants to build a “self-growing” city on the Moon. He thinks the task will take about ten years to complete. Establishing a permanent base on the Moon seems like a worthwhile goal, but is not without significant challenges, as Aakash Gu … | Continue reading
Applications are open until 17 March 2026, for the role of Australian National Poet Laureate: The National Poet Laureate is a three‑year appointment that recognises an outstanding Australian poet whose work and cultural contribution have shaped contemporary poetry and its readers … | Continue reading
Jonathan Morton, at Statcounter: We have seen a significant rise in bot traffic to websites in recent months. These bots are adopting new methods to avoid detection and when they flood your stats with fake visits, they can make it very difficult to get an accurate view of the rea … | Continue reading
Jared Isaacman, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) administrator, writing on X/Twitter: NASA astronauts will soon fly with the latest smartphones, beginning with Crew-12 and Artemis II. We are giving our crews the tools to capture special moments for their f … | Continue reading
AI agents might be smart enough to tell us how to, say, mow the lawn. But an AI agent cannot actually mow a lawn itself. Unless, perhaps, the lawn-mower in question is a smart machine, that an AI agent might be able to control. Otherwise, when it comes to doing tasks that are han … | Continue reading
Luke Cooper writing for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC): Researchers found on days when maximum temperatures were 35C or higher, which the Bureau of Meteorology classifies as a “hot day”, a $5.4 million collapse in daily daytime consumer spending was recorded. Howev … | Continue reading
Mozilla, developer of web browser Firefox, and email app Thunderbird, among other things, is forming an AI “rebel alliance” to counter the industry’s big players, writes Ashley Capoot, at CNBC: Surman is building what he’s described as “a rebel alliance of sorts,” using a phrase … | Continue reading
I’m wondering why The Devil Wears Prada sequel is somewhat unimaginatively titled The Devil Wears Prada 2. Why didn’t the producers go for something a little more… groundbreaking, such as The Devil Wears Prada: Beyond the Runway? Whatever, the release of the trailer for the secon … | Continue reading
According to a Reddit thread, that was re-posted at Marginal Revolution, the online publishing platform is requesting users in Australia submit to an age verification process. Substack, as of the time I type, is not on the list of websites, or services, that Australians under the … | Continue reading
Aisha Malik, writing for TechCrunch: The launch of additional subscriptions will allow Meta to generate more revenue; however, many users may be deterred by subscription fatigue. With so many paid services competing for monthly spending, Meta will have to offer a compelling produ … | Continue reading
Lee Chong Ming, writing for Business Insider (possibly paywalled): Can AI feel anything at all? Anthropic’s in-house philosopher says the answer isn’t settled. When I read this sentence, I immediately thought of Hal, as in the HAL 9000 series computer, and AI-powered fiend, in St … | Continue reading
Marnie Vinell, writing for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC): Emily Wade, 28, says she is a genuine fan who is finding it personally frustrating to see the influx of influencers take up seats at marquee matches when others who would genuinely appreciate being there fo … | Continue reading
The London based neo-soul singer and songwriter was voted into the number one slot with her song Man I Need. Dean also scored a second spot in the Hottest 100 top ten, with Nice to Each Other. Such amazing music to listen to, especially while working. The Hottest 100 countdown is … | Continue reading
Subscribing to RSS feeds is my preferred option for following websites, but for people unfamiliar with the really simple syndication system, doing so can be daunting. I’ve long thought subscribing to a website needs to be as easy as following someone on a social network. Tap the … | Continue reading
Age prediction will soon apply to ChatGPT consumer plans. The system is said to take a number of factors into consideration when trying to figure out an account holder’s age. Should someone find themselves erroneously classified as being under the age of eighteen, they will need … | Continue reading
Sarah Perez writing for TechCrunch: A report from market intelligence firm Similarweb suggests that Meta’s Threads is now seeing more daily usage than Elon Musk’s X on mobile devices. While X still dominates Threads on the web, the Threads mobile app for iOS and Android has conti … | Continue reading
Manuel Moreale writing about People and Blogs, where he features regular interviews with bloggers: It sucks because, since day one, I tried to find a good balance between keeping the series running smoothly and not letting guests wait for months and months to get their interview … | Continue reading
Clare Armstrong writing for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC): More than 4.7 million accounts on platforms like Instagram, TikTok and Snapchat were deactivated in the first two days of the ban that started on December 10, according to new data released by the federal … | Continue reading
The first version of digg, something many people called the front page of the internet, arrived in 2004, and was a little like what Hacker News is today. A social bookmarking news aggregator, if you want to be technical. People could submit items of interest, and those favoured b … | Continue reading
Eleanor Dickinson, writing for Mumbrella: South by Southwest (SXSW) has cancelled its Sydney event — which has been held just three times — citing a “changing global environment that is impacting major events, festivals and cultural programs worldwide”. Purely anecdotal, but one … | Continue reading
Hannah Story, writing for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC): Authors including Miles Franklin winners Michelle de Kretser and Melissa Lucashenko will boycott Adelaide Writers’ Week (AWW) to protest the cancellation of an event featuring Palestinian Australian author, … | Continue reading
Anil Dash: The trillion-dollar AI industry’s system for controlling their most advanced platforms is a plain text format one guy made up for his blog and then bounced off of a 17-year-old kid before sharing it with the world for free. You’re welcome, Time Magazine’s people of the … | Continue reading
Most Australia states, with the reported exception of Queensland, are in the grip of a heatwave. Temperatures in our part of the world, the NSW Central Coast, are expected to reach the high thirties, Celsius, on Saturday. That’ll be a little too warm at our place here, which does … | Continue reading
A website to destroy all websites, by Henry Desroches. Hand-coded, syndicated, and above all personal websites are exemplary: They let users of the internet to be autonomous, experiment, have ownership, learn, share, find god, find love, find purpose. Bespoke, endlessly tweaked, … | Continue reading
Simon Willison’s third annual review of the AI space, for last year. I read someone saying somewhere that Willison has become expert in AI and LLM since ChatGPT arrived in late 2022. He’s not the only one (obviously), but in late 2022 and early 2023 I was having conversations wit … | Continue reading
But that’s what Instagram’s (IG) owner wanted of course. Put another way, this means anyone using IG is expected to behave like an influencer, even if they only have a handful of followers. The comment was made by Mosseri, Head of Meta owned IG, in a year-end presentation (Instag … | Continue reading
Fernando Borretti: I will often find a blog post on Hacker News that really resonates. And when I go to check the rest of the site there’s three other posts. And I think: I wish you’d write more! When I find someone whose writing I really connect with, I like to read everything t … | Continue reading
Test matches in cricket are generally meant to last the best part of five days. Fans of the game expect to see individual batters clock up scores of one-hundred plus runs. Maybe two-hundred plus, if they get on a roll. Brian Lara, a West Indies cricketer, once made four-hundred r … | Continue reading