Jan 13, 2022 | Politics & Society
By Craig Silverman, Craig Timberg, Jeff Kao & Jeremy B. Merrill A ProPublica/Washington Post analysis of Facebook posts, internal company documents and interviews, provides the clearest evidence yet that the social media giant played a critical role in spreading...
Nov 3, 2021 | Arts & Culture, Science & Technology
By Rabindra Ratan & Yiming Lei What is the metaverse? Two media and information experts explain. The metaverse is a network of always-on virtual environments in which many people can interact with one another and digital objects while operating virtual...
Oct 27, 2021 | Business & Economics
By James Muldoon Facebook won’t let state oversight trump shareholder interest, so alternatives – based on common ownership and community control – are needed. Facebook whistleblower, Frances Haugen described the company as “morally bankrupt” before a panel of...
Jul 20, 2021 | Business & Economics
By Victoria Plekhanova Australia and New Zealand are signing up for an international tax on the tech giants — but will it be enough? Australia, New Zealand and many other countries are losing hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue each year by not adequately...
Jun 9, 2021 | Business & Economics
Facebook and Google, and other large technology companies, are some of the most powerful companies to ever exist. They touch every aspect of our lives, and decisions made by a few CEOs in Silicon Valley have a bigger impact on billions of people than their own...
Feb 24, 2021 | Arts & Culture, Business & Economics
By Gavin Ellis We have been shocked by Facebook’s Australian news ban because we have been labouring under a misapprehension: We thought it was a public utility. It was conceived as a utility (for Harvard University students) and founder Mark Zuckerberg has been...
Feb 22, 2021 | Arts & Culture, Business & Economics
Social media, as it exists currently, is an oligopoly, with a handful of private companies controlling the structure and use of the platforms which mediate our communication not only with one another but also with the public sphere. As these companies continue to...
Nov 2, 2020 | Business & Economics
By Paul Panckhurst Tech giants make billions of dollars as people hand over their personal information in exchange for free apps, search engines and social media platforms. The raw material of our digital lives – location data, online searches, purchases, “likes” – is...
Jul 28, 2020 | Politics & Society, Referee
By Rachel Simpson The crisis of lawlessness on Facebook means it has become a breeding ground for alienation, fragmentation and xenophobia across the globe. In a contribution to the North Carolina Law Review, Georgetown Law Professor Anupam Chander, commented on the...
May 26, 2020 | Business & Economics
By Gavin Ellis There is an emerging dichotomy in the attitude of governments on either side of the Tasman toward social media companies. New Zealand treats these transnationals with kid gloves while Australia is pulling on the boxing gloves. The contrast is...