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John Livingstone is the Head of Digital Policy at UNICEF Australia. He's been talking directly to students about how the Australian social media ban is affecting young people, and whether it's making their lives better.This is Rae's full conversation with John. You can hear a broader analysis of the social media ban in our recent episode.----------This is the first edition of our 'on the down-low' series -- longer standalone interviews with interesting people in the tech world.----------

Jocelyn Brewer, psychologist and founder of Digital Nutrition, offers expertise on young people’s digital wellbeing. Josh Taylor, technology reporter at The Guardian, explains platform rules and compliance. They unpack Australia’s under-16 social media delay, how platforms enforced it, age-verification methods and privacy trade-offs. Short takes on workarounds, shifting youth behavior and legal foundations.

There's a fresh wave of headlines claiming that AI is eating the workforce whole, and that the only way to have a job is to become the person who builds the robots. Is this a reasonable assumption? Or has "AI-washing" just become the most convenient way to excuse a restructure?Plus, a genuine artistic community has grown around taking photos in video games. Who owns those creations?And, wired headphones are back? Wired headphone revenue jumped 20 percent in the first six weeks of 2026. Why?GUESTS:Kath Albury -- Professor of Technology at Swinburne University, and Associate Investigator at the ARC Centre for Excellence In Automated Decision Making and Society. Mark Serrels -- Editorial Director at Choice and co-founder of Continue Magazine.This episode was produced on the lands of the Burramattagal people.

Tobias Venus, tech and travel journalist, and Michael Cowling, RMIT educational tech professor known as Professor Tech, discuss the VPN surge after Australian site blocks. They examine risks of free VPNs and the limits of paid trust. They also tackle AI-made war videos, how fake satellite clips fool people, and the new colourful, budget MacBook Neo aimed at students.

A US government official has called Anthropic a national security risk, after the company drew ethical lines around its technology being used for mass domestic surveillance and fully autonomous weapons. How comfortable would you be with AI firing missiles?Plus, Facebook's parent company, Meta, sold seven million pairs of AI-enabled Ray-Bans last year. And now they want to add facial recognition. How will that change public spaces?And, Microsoft tried to ban the word 'microslop'. It didn't go well.GUESTS:Seamus Byrne — tech reporter and PhD research candidate with the ARC Centre of Excellence in Automated Decision Making & Society.Hannah Geremia — digital content editor at Whistleout Singapore.

New research about the social media platform X suggests that just a few weeks on what used to be Twitter can shift political attitudes AND the effects can last long after we log off. So is it really possible to use these sites at all without being affected by the system?Plus, Australia's planned AI advisory body has been scrapped after 15 months of preparation. It's been replaced by the Australian AI Safety Institute. What does this mean for AI regulation?And, scientists have found a way to make 3D printed guns traceable.GUESTS:Seamus Byrne, tech reporter and PhD research candidate.Erica Mealy, senior lecturer of computer science at the University of the Sunshine Coast.This episode was produced on the lands of the Burramattagal people.

AI is sliding into game development pipelines, but the rules around telling players what is machine-made and what is made by people are patchy at best. So, how much transparency do players deserve, and does it even matter?Also on the program, how the RAM shortage is impacting the price of game consoles. And, why VR is better suited to the medical and training fields than replacing the open-plan office.GUESTS: Chloe Appleby, games curator at the Powerhouse Museum. Alex Kidman, freelance technology journalist at Alex Reviews Tech.This episode was produced on the lands of the Burramattagal people.--------------If you liked this episode, you might like to check out our previous episode about whether a dating app for games could be the solution for that indecision of what to start next. You can find the link here.

The Winter Olympics is using drones, AI and cloud-based broadcasting to track curling stones, freeze mid-air jumps, even talk to an official Winter Olympics chatbot. It’s turning sports spectatorship into something more high tech than ever before. Is it likely to be used in other sports?Plus, a battle is being waged in court between a 20-year-old and Meta/YouTube. The argument is over whether Meta and YouTube's social media sites are engineered to be intentionally addictive. What precedent will this set if the case is successful?GUESTS:Chris Berg, professor of economics at RMIT. David Braue, technology journalist at Information Age. If you want to get in touch, you can contact us at downloadthisshow@abc.net.auThis episode was produced on Dharug and Burramattagal land.

Having an AI agent act as your personal executive assistant may seem like a sweet deal, but security experts have a few concerns.Also on the program, Moltbook is a new social media platform specfically designed for AI agents to chat. So far, they’ve started a religion, made their own scripture and called for humanity’s downfall. What happens when we anthropomorphise binary code? And, the dead internet theory used to be a fringe conspiracy theory. But AI is getting us closer and closer to it being a reality. So, how much of the internet is still occupied by humans?GUESTS:Kai Riemer, professor of information technology at University of Sydney, and and director of Sydney Executive Plus.Tegan Jones, deputy editor at SmartCompany and co-host of Weird Tech.

TikTok has finally struck a deal to avoid being banned in the United States. Their privacy policy also got a controversial update. So, who owns US TikTok now? And what difference will it make to users?Also on the program, there’s a new social media site going viral – Upscrolled. What is this Australian-owned site, exactly? And finally, OpenAI is trialling ads on ChatGPT. The company’s CEO Sam Altman once said including ads would be a last resort. So does this mean the company is financially unstable? And what kind of data would they share with advertisers?Gianfranco references this The Information article about OpenAI burning through $115 billion through 2029.GUESTS:Meg Coffey, digital strategist and founder of State of Social.  Gianfranco Di Giovanni, ABC Radio Perth content director and an arts, gaming and tech reporter.This episode was produced on Gadigal land.