This Week In Cyberspace – Details, episodes & analysis

In this special extended edition of TWICS, co-host Brett Solomon reflects on his 15 years as Executive Director of Access Now.

When he started in the job Facebook and Twitter were just emerging as social media platforms. Since then we've seen the rise of both as powerful tech tools and the internet as a force for good, evil and all the grey areas in between.

What are the challenges ahead for digital rights defenders and how can citizens get involved to protect their data online?

This Week In Cyberspace, Julian Assange was brought back home to Australian soil in Canberra after a 14 year trial.

The following morning, Senator David Shoebridge organised a press conference in Parliament House with Assange's wife Stella Assange, legal team Jennifer Robinson and Barry Pollock, Senators Zoe Daniel, Murray Watt, Peter Wish-Wilson, and former Senator Scott Ludlam.

TWICS was on the sidelines - 27.6.24

How can we tell if fake news is real when, despite the facts, some people swear by it? And how do we judge the veracity of a artificially generated videos when we see them on Facebook?

Two First Amendment cases started in the US Supreme Court yesterday concerning social media laws in Texas and Florida. The State's claim the platforms are exercising “freewheeling censorship”, while they say they just want to stop conservatives posting lies like they did about the last US Federal election being stolen.

Meanwhile the new text to video AI model SORA is causing waves with its ability to create visuals that can replicate one minute of fiction that looks uncannily like the real thing.

Both of these developments have the potential to transform the internet in ways we can't even imagine. But will it be good for humanity?

The ex KGB lieutenant colonel has a Presidential election in just under a month, and aside from silencing dissenters, he’s making sure that any information Russian citizens might find on the internet is singing his praises. With the seriously suspicious death of opposition leader Alexi Navalny four days ago and the arrest of around 400 people who came out to mourn him, Putin is going for gold as a digital dictator.

2023 has been BIG! We’ve covered the Open AI soap opera, the Internet Governance Forum, the Digital Occupation of Gaza and so much more. So where does all this leave us sensitive receptors as we head into the New Year? We wrap the year in wrapping paper and wish it well as we venture forth into unchartered territory.

Two landmark pieces of international text were agreed upon this week -  the final text of COP28’s first global stocktake calling on countries to transition away from fossil fuels, and the European Union’s provisional Act to put a few guardrails around the development of Artificial Intelligence.

With lots of get-out clauses for polluters to lean on, and loopholes for Big Tech to jump through, it's a game of horse-trading behind smoke and mirrors. But in the end, it's all we've got.

What kind of a future can the United Nations offer us? As COP28 wraps up, we struggle to find any positives. There's the Loss and Damage Fund but no phase out of fossil fuel extraction on the horizon. In the midst of all the the horse-trading, the Australian Government signs on to the pledge to triple renewables while the opposition backs the nuclear option. Meanwhile, Pacific Island Nations threaten to boycott the entire process as their homes are claimed by rising sea levels. All in a day's work on the good ship COP.

In this episode of TWICS we continue our examination of the UN's climate summit in Dubai. With 2,500 registered delegates connected to the coal, oil and gas industry and the President of COP28 showing a distinct disregard for climate science, the international conference is proceeding on shaky ground. Could it be that snake oil is the biggest commodity being pedalled in the host country this year?

2023 is set to be the hottest year on record. So how will climate justice be achieved at COP28 when climate activists are relegated to a space far away from the conference and actively surveilled by an authoritarian petro-state? The only way to decouple the world economy from fossil fuels is through an active climate movement. So will free speech, independent media and the right to protest be respected at COP28?

Not since 1985 when the Apple board got rid of Steve Jobs has there been such an upheaval in the tech sector as there was last Friday when Sam Altman, the 38 year old CEO of Open AI (the not-for-profit that runs CHATGPT), was fired . It was a board coup that also saw the company’s president and three senior researchers resign. Investors were ropeable, especially the CEO of Microsoft who tried to mediate his return to the company. When that failed, Microsoft made Altman an offer he couldn’t refuse. Is this best tech soap opera to date?