This Month
- Analysis
- Analysis
X ruling marks the spot for online police
Elon Musk has overreach by Australia’s eSafety commissioner to thank for an important victory in the courts.
- Michael Pelly
- Opinion
- Chanticleer
Meme stock stupidity is back at the dumbest possible time
The $6 billion jump in the value of crappy US retailer GameStop is a sign of pure speculative excess.
- James Thomson
Musk triumphs over Australian government on stabbing videos
The ruling raises questions about whether the eSafety Commission has sufficient powers to do its job or if it bungled its case against Elon Musk’s X.
- Nick Bonyhady
15 minutes to get around X’s stabbing video ban, court hears
Lawyers for the social network argued that they had complied with a government take-down notice, which they said was invalid, by blocking footage in Australia.
- Nick Bonyhady
Labor goes to war with Meta in far-reaching inquiry
Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg and X owner Elon Musk could be called on to face federal parliament, as part of a new inquiry into social media algorithms.
- Tom McIlroy
Why everyone’s mad at Apple’s new iPad ad
Apple’s crushing of human creativity has sparked backlash, but its new iPad Pro ad has also inspired some surprising video responses.
- Will Oremus
How TikTok changed fashion
Trends in what people wear, whether hemlines, colours or the way they think about and shop for clothes, no longer begin with designers or even influencers.
- Rachel Tashjian
Reddit’s bright first earnings report sends shares soaring
Its IPO was one of the biggest in the US this year – and its first earnings report shows that revenue increased 48 per cent.
- Aisha Counts
TikTok sues over US ban in battle for survival
The lawsuit from the social media platform and its parent company, ByteDance, claims US legislation banning the app would breach free speech rights.
- Hannah Murphy
Why Australia’s domestic violence problem is complicated
The hope is that targeted action, and policies to boost women’s economic security more broadly, can continue to deliver results.
- Tom McIlroy
Parents unite to end ‘daily battle with kids’ over phones, social media
Banning phones in schools is only part of the solution. What happens at home is even more important.
- Julie Hare
Inside the fight for smartphone-free childhoods
A rising number of parents around the world, who have become addicted to handheld devices themselves, want to ban under-16s from having them.
- Pippa Bailey
Women to get $5000 in new emergency support payments
A snap meeting of national cabinet called after nearly 30 deaths of women at the hands of men this year – also agreed to trial new measures to extreme online misogyny.
- Tom McIlroy
April
The Meta-morphosis of Mark Zuckerberg
The robotic nerd depicted in The Social Network has turned into the kinder, more accessible face of Silicon Valley. What’s going on?
- Vanessa Friedman
Snapchat going backwards in Australia
Elon Musk’s takeover crushed Twitter, but Snap is still a fraction of the size of the dominant Meta-Google online advertising machine.
- Nick Bonyhady
AFR readers call for government spending restraint to fight inflation
Two-thirds of The Australian Financial Review readers have urged Treasurer Jim Chalmers to resist the urge to deliver a big-spending pre-election budget.
- Euan Black
- Opinion
- Opinion
Surge of violence tests policy tolerance of social media
The Coalition in particular has to ask tricky questions of when enough is enough on social media platforms.
- Laura Tingle
- Analysis
- Elon Musk
The real reason Elon Musk is taking on Australia
Australia has become the latest battleground for the billionaire’s global war on internet censorship, Will he win?
- Michael Pelly
What Forrest’s fight with Meta reveals about taking on big tech
After suffering a setback in Australian courts, the next bout of Andrew Forrest’s legal fight against Facebook owner Meta will take place in California next month.
- Tess Bennett
Why Ita Buttrose used to spy on ABC hosts’ Twitter posts
The former ABC chairwoman has strong views on lots of topics, but social media use by journalists is a particular bugbear.
- Sam Buckingham-Jones
