"If policymakers wish to genuinely reduce harm to young people online, they must take seriously the task of challenging models based on behavioural advertising, profiling and problematic algorithm-driven feeds." My latest for The Guardian on the news that the ban, unsurprisingly, isn't working

the good folks at @drwaus.bsky.social have launched an AI harms register! they're collecting stories from people in Australia who have experienced AI-related harms to track the way AI is causing harm, and to pressure the govt to act. submit here: digitalrightswatch.org.au/ai-harms-reg...

I feel like Sir Ian McKellan breaking down over the profound loneliness of filming The Hobbit in a CGI booth. I don't want to talk to robots, I want to collaborate with people.

"Within the refusal of tech, we can find alternative imaginations of the future. Not anti-progress, only refusing a particular, narrow idea of what “progress” should look like."

The average landlord being like why do these rentoids get mad at me when I feel entitled enough to pass on the full cost of my investment to them (whilst simultaneously increasing the cost of housing and also benefitting from massive tax discounts purely because I own multiple homes)

the only way Emerald Fennell's "Wuthering Heights" makes sense to me is if it's read as deranged Heathcliff fan fiction

if you're a renter and have had to use an online application platform or a property management app - now's a great time to reach out to your property manager, link them this article, and ask them what they're doing to make sure that the tech they're using is keeping your data secure

On the platforms used by real estate agents for renters, documents are exposed and accessible without any form of login, according to research. I was able to view applications and lease agreements among other docs exposed. Most of the platforms didn't respond. www.theguardian.com/australia-ne...

News came out today of serious security vulnerabilities in seven popular Australian ‘RentTech’ platforms, leaving millions of documents containing renter personal information exposed. Renters often have no choice but to use these apps in order to secure housing. I wrote about it for the Guardian:

rent tech platforms looking at the hoards of renter data they collect like

"An analysis of seven rent platforms ... revealed millions of leasing documents could be accessed by threat actors." Thanks to negligent privacy practices, it is easy to access troves of highly sensitive information stored on rental management platforms www.theguardian.com/australia-ne...

"Across the country, renters are living in properties with no insulation, poor sealing, broken or inadequate fans or no cooling options at all. Others technically have air conditioning, but they are in such extreme rental stress they can’t afford to turn it on."

had to laugh at the Gen Xers around me at the david byrne gig getting excited about the anti-fascist and revolutionary spirit as footage of police and protest played behind 'Life During Wartime'. SUSAN I heard your pre-show chat, the only thing you're protesting is threats to negative gearing

brilliantly spicy take on ai and automation from the always on point @floreani.bsky.social

get in girlies, we're talking surveillance! we're talking the fantasy of automation propped up by humans! we're talking unfulfilled promises of tech to reduce household labour! we're talking funwashing of robots made for warfare!

The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) has begun spot compliance audits, checking that real estate businesses are properly applying their privacy policies www.cyberdaily.au/digital-tran... cc @floreani.bsky.social

hey Victorian renters! if you've used 'RentTech' (think online application platforms, rent payment apps, property management portals), please spend ~5 minutes to share your experience in this survey to contribute to important @cprc-research.bsky.social research: cprc.limesurvey.net/594888?lang=en

“Each of these acts may be insignificant, but an orientation toward friction is really the only defense we have against the life-annihilating suction of technologies of escape.” www.thecut.com/article/broo...

Bendigo Writers Festival, Meanjin, now Adelaide Writers … powerful vested interests would rather destroy the cultural institutions they are supposedly responsible for than allow certain voices to be heard

"the instinct to submit online strangers to viral discipline is given a faux-radical sheen. It’s a kind of casual blackmail that warns everyone to conform or be exposed" lux-magazine.com/article/priv...

one of the great things about doing a phd on renting x tech is that I can convince myself that searching + applying for rentals isn't procrastinating, it's research. one of the not-great things about this how fucked it is. one of the great things about this is that it re-motivates me back to the phd

hey Victorian renters! if you've used 'RentTech' (think online application platforms, rent payment apps, property management portals), please spend ~5 minutes to share your experience in this survey to contribute to important @cprc-research.bsky.social research: cprc.limesurvey.net/594888?lang=en

I wrote about Kalshi, prediction markets, and the vision of total financialization by turning every opinion into a tradable assets www.fastcompany.com/91457404/kal...

"we’re trapped in a nightmare in which even the act of hating AI-generated content only serves to fuel it" oof. @floreani.bsky.social on the money, as usual! www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Are you a renter, and have you ever had a property manager use a 360 camera when conducting routine inspections or condition reports? I really, really wanna talk with you. Get in touch!

today in Vic Parliament: a bill that will mean children as young as 14 will face adult prison sentences. we know this will disproportionately harm Blak, brown and migrant kids, and it goes against decades of evidence. tell the Allan govt to scrap this awful bill: cv-au.replit.app/kids-need-care

my heart!!

Three years ago I emailed Jathan in response to a PhD call-out. Now I’m two years in (to a different project because I waited too long and missed the opportunity - don’t be like me! send the email!) and it’s been great. Jathan is a wonderful supervisor and this project is both cool and important

Call for PhD Student! I'm recruiting a PhD student to work with me on a project related to my Future Fellowship at Monash University on the political economy of insurance, risk technology, climate governance, and the crisis of uninsurability. Here's the overview of my fellowship.

We need more honest language: Theft Tech (AI) Grift Tech (crypto) Death Tech (automated weapons and military surveillance)

do you resent playing AI detective online??? does it make you so, so annoyed to spend time looking for generative AI red flags? me too!!! my latest piece for the guardian is for those of us who are fed! up!

giving a talk tomorrow, it will not be cynical

what shines through, to me, is that while landlords overwhelmingly see themselves as "providing an essential service" they avoid accountability for the obligations that kind of service provision requires. they want a pat on the back for doing a ~good deed~ without the work or responsibility

my number one piece of advice to people wanting to do a PhD is to pick a topic that makes you so. fucking. angry. truly incredible the level of motivation that unbridled rage can provide

Lily Allen's 'West End Girl' is an emotionally excruciating examination of what happens when people attempt to open a relationship as a solution to a fundamentally broken romantic partnership and the affect of non-ethical non-monogamy. In this essay I will

Ok and in Victoria, rentals must have heating to meet minimum standards requirements. Searching in Melbourne when you check the 'heating' filter drops from 3365 to 2098 properties.

As of May 2025 it's unlawful in NSW for a landlord or agent to advertise that pets will not be permitted in a rental property. When you search for a rental in Sydney on realestate.com.au, 1019 rental properties return. If you tick the 'pets considered' filter option, it drops to 125 properties.

A Melbourne real estate agency just casually putting a job out on Airtasker for a lawyer to write a cease and desist for a fkn Google review. Incredible.

what in the moral valuation of women meets moral judgement of renters is happening in this choice of photo to visually represent "bad tenants" dare I say it but 365 partygirls still deserve housing xoxo

It's going to get up to 40° in Sydney today. Summer hasn't even started yet. If you're baking in your rental home, join our Renter Lab to help us make sure renters don't have to suffer through another unbearable summer: bit.ly/renter-lab-S...

any renters out there who have been pushed to use an AI chatbot as part of your rental experience, I'd love to chat with you for my PhD research! I'm looking at the ways that tech in the private rental sector is impacting renters + housing justice and this seems...troubling

Nelson Alexander requiring tenants to use an AI chatbot to report urgent repairs. Reportedly this chatbot cannot differentiate between urgent and non-urgent repairs. Incredible.

Melbourne folks! I'm going to be part of a Luddite Tribunal organised by the Brunswick Library — you gotta love public libraries and their critical workers — on November 27th at 6:30pm. I'll be joined by Lizzie O'Shea; it'll be a ton of fun! Free registration: www.eventbrite.com.au/e/the-luddit...

Oh damn, Kohei Saito has entered into the techno-feudalism debate and his argument aligns with what me and @bigblackjacobin have been saying for a long time: Stop saying techno-feudalism, this is called rentier capitalism, and it's the basis for techno-fascism. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

look all I’m saying is that one job AI could never come for is a jewellery heist at the louvre

I'm currently looking to talk with renters who have used a digital portal / app to conduct their own routine rental inspection without the real estate agent coming to your house. This is sometimes called a 'Remote Inspection' If this is you, please get in touch!

Huge story here. Daniel had his payments illegally cancelled by the Mutual Obligations system. After years of bravely fighting, he exposed the error and won the backpay he was always legally entitled to

In my research into tech x rental housing, one of the (many) grievances tenants have shared with me is the additional fees they cop just to pay rent. It's great to see legislation introduced to Vic Parliament seeking to address this.

Hello~ i wrote something for @theverge.com about the surreal horror of online transness in a fascist surveillance state. it’s time to change tactics and make ourselves less legible to this machinery of death — but *without* sacrificing our connection and community.

OpenAI has chosen the worst, weirdest possible time to embrace the fact that people want to fuck chatbots www.404media.co/chatgpt-erot...