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Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised this article contains names and images of deceased people.

In our new series, we explore influential Australian poems.

We can sometimes underestimate the challenges of others, especially when none have come before them to begin something – something that creates a legacy they probably never imagined. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history is littered with such people. One of these was the late Oodgeroo Noonuccal (1920–1993).

Oodgeroo (Kath Walker) was born in the Brisbane suburb of Bulimba to an Aboriginal man of Noonuccal descent from Minjerribah (Stradbroke Island) and an Aboriginal and Scottish mother. She lived on the island as a child. When she left school at 13, she moved to Brisbane to become a domestic servant. Oodgeroo had limited education, but she could read and enjoyed writing.

During World War II, she worked as a signaller for the army and performed administrative duties, becoming a Lance Corporal in 1943. The same year, she married Bruce Walker, an Aboriginal man from the Logan and Albert rivers region.

Later, as a single parent to her son, Oodgeroo became an office worker, then undertook household duties for prominent Brisbane doctors Raphael and Phyllis Cilento. Here, she was encouraged to write.

The 1940s was a time when the White Australia policy was in full flight. The only political party that did not support this policy was the Communist Party of Australia. Oodgeroo felt a strong connection to the communists’ lack of racially discriminatory beliefs. She flourished through the association, writing speeches and public speaking.

But it was after leaving the party Oodgeroo really began to delve into writing. She joined the Brisbane Realist Writers Group, a collective of left-wing authors founded in 1944. The poet Judith Wright recommended Oodgeroo’s work and her debut collection We Are Going appeared in 1964. It was the first ever book of poetry published by an Aboriginal person.

Tenacity, passion and hope

We must place this achievement in the context of the times. Where none had gone before, Oodgeroo stood, and it was only the beginning. What tenacity, passion and hope does that take? To push through where no one looks, speaks, behaves like you?

Where previously you had to expect closed doors, Oodgeroo used writing and a strong desire for change to break open those doors. That act has allowed others to follow.

Aside from this courage, it takes a great creative mind to write such powerful poetry and win such acclaim. Oodgeroo had a strong connection to the natural world and she found solace in forming words to match her feelings. We Are Going remains one of the most significant books in First Nations literature.

There were critics who likened her poems to “nursery rhymes” in their sound and structure, but they missed the true meanings instilled in them. Oodgeroo’s verses are full of anger, sadness and resilience as they look to the future. Take, for example, A Song of Hope, the final poem in We Are Going, which begins:

Look up, my people,
The dawn is breaking,
The world is waking,
To a new bright day,
When none defame us,
Nor colour shame us,

Nor sneer dismay.
Now brood no more
On the years behind you,
The hope assigned you
Shall the past replace,
When juster justice
Grown wise and stronger
Points the bone no longer
At a darker race.

Managing the delicate balance of deficit and positivity, the poem traverses space and time, from “our father’s fathers” to “our children’s children”, in a way that brings us back to the desire to push for more, for better. It envisions a “new Dream Time”, when “all doors open / That long were closed”.

Oodgeroo was proud of being a protest poet and she broke new ground in Australia, using poetry for political protest at a time when it was meant to be for art’s sake.

Oodgeroo had many attacks levelled against her by critics of the day. But her first book sold 10,000 copies, making her the bestselling Australian poet since C.J. Dennis, and she used her public recognition and her identity as a protest poet to campaign for the 1967 constitutional referendum to enfranchise Indigenous Australians.

Oodgeroo spoke of discrimination in a way that did not alienate; she mentioned “justice” in a manner accepted for the times. Her remembrance of past traumas allowed the dawning of hope for what the poem calls a “glad tomorrow”.

In today’s context, “hope” is often seen as almost too gentle a word when considering Indigenous rights. There are many First Nations people who use anger, frustration and rage to propel themselves in their activism for better rights within Australia.

That frustration and rage can assist in times when one is tired, but envisioning a different way can also empower one to rest, regroup, and then continue. These two approaches are not mutually exclusive. They can coexist within the writing of poetry and prose in a contemporary era.

Art as activism, activism as art

We live in an era of division, when some express a desire to go backwards to a time of “monoculture”. But we are also witnessing a celebration of First Nations literature, art, science and education previously hidden. The literary arena is now fortunate to have many First Nations writers all over Australia, as well as publication houses and awards specifically for these creatives to flourish.

We would not have writers of the ilk of Alexis Wright, Tony Birch, Evelyn Araluen and Alison Whittaker if not for Oodgeroo and many others who came before. Araluen’s connection to Oodgeroo’s work exists in her discussions of political clarity, reclamation of land and the re-inscribing of the concept of Country. Both poets seek to do away with a mythologised pastoral history and establish sovereignty within their words.

Whittaker’s poem Many Girls White Linen has similarities with Oodgeroo’s We Are Going and No More Boomerang in its critique of colonial surveillance and Australia’s fascination with the policing of Aboriginal bodies.

Birch’s work is not predominately in poetry, yet it is grounded in a political resistance that asserts Country as identity and protector, rather than pastoral ownership. Wright’s novel Plains of Promise takes its title from a line in A Song of Hope.

Oodgeroo was the first Indigenous woman in Australia to use poetry as a political tool. She emboldened (considering the context of the time) seemingly small yet important acts of writing as resistance – something we see in the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander literature of today. She used the fame her writing gave her to advocate for Indigenous rights, organising petitions, giving speeches and directly lobbying politicians.

She was the national campaign coordinator of the Federal Council for the Advancement of Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders and co-founded the National Tribal Council. She is regarded as a principal architect of the 1967 referendum. She was also the first Aboriginal Australian to run (unsuccessfully) for a seat in the Queensland state parliament.

This is just a small list of her significant acts. Oodgeroo was awarded a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in 1970, which she returned to the Governor General as Australia prepared to celebrate the 1988 Bicentenary to bring attention to systemic injustice and the struggle for Aboriginal land rights. It was around this time she ceased using the name Kath Walker, in favour of her Indigenous name.

Nothing Oodgeroo did was small. First Nations’ people in Australia see her activism as part of her art, as her art was part of her activism.

As Aboriginal women in academia with a love of writing, we imagine Oodgeroo’s position as a groundbreaking poet to be similar to Aboriginal academics who began their university careers when nothing was there for them. No supports translating knowledge, no comfortable spaces with like-minded and familiar-looking faces, and no great institutional desire for them to be there.

It not only takes immense talent to push through these invisible barriers to create a space; it also takes great courage. Oodgeroo knew how valuable education was, and now her words are heard throughout these institutions in Australia. The legacy she has left is at the core of our belief we teach, give knowledge and, if we are lucky enough, wisdom for others to grow from.

Writing poetry and prose is a deeply personal act; it holds an intimacy of something deep inside that needs to be spoken of and needs to be heard. Not all poetry needs to be pretty, hopeful, raging or perfect. But it does need to be in a voice that demands to be witnessed.

Now, more than ever, we need both the frustration and passion to nourish our movement, along with the hope things may be better for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. We want more Oodgeroos, more Araluens, more Whittakers into the future, more writers and poets who can propel the language, culture and poetry that has sustained us throughout history.

Oodgeroo’s life and work created a legacy that will continue to be built upon by First Nations’ writers and creatives. “So long we waited / Bound and frustrated,” she wrote in A Song of Hope, with her eyes looking to the future:

See plain the promise,
Dark freedom-lover!
Night’s nearly over,
And though long the climb,
New rights will greet us,
New mateship meet us,
And joy complete us.

Tess Ryan, Indigenous Academic Lead Australian Catholic University, Australian Catholic University and Kelly Humphrey, Pro Vice-Chancellor (Indigenous), Australian Catholic University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Recent reports have highlighted AI-generated “doctors” spreading dubious health advice to millions of social media users. Fabricated wellness trends can travel just as quickly. A supposed “pink jelly” weight-loss treatment, for example, reportedly fooled at least one celebrity.

These examples gain credibility in different ways. Influencers can appear familiar and sincere, while AI-generated doctors can look like qualified professionals. Neither familiarity nor the appearance of expertise tells us whether a medical claim is accurate.

Turning to friends and family for health advice is understandable. They may know our circumstances in ways that a healthcare professional cannot during a brief appointment. They can provide emotional support and practical help, and their advice is usually well meant. But somebody can care about us, speak honestly and still be wrong.

Truth and trust

My own research and wider research on digital health misinformation shows that trust can play an important part in deciding which claims people accept. Trust in clinicians and scientific institutions is generally associated with lower susceptibility to false health claims. Misinformation can nevertheless spread through trusted social networks when people share it because they want to help or warn others.

Social media influencers can reproduce some of the signals of friendship without having a personal relationship with their followers. They address followers directly, share details about their lives and communicate in an informal style. Over time, followers may develop what researchers call a parasocial relationship: a one-sided sense of familiarity with a media figure. A recent meta-analysis found that parasocial relationships can influence health attitudes and behaviour, although their effects vary across different contexts.

AI-generated doctors use a different route to credibility. Accounts designed to resemble real clinicians can borrow the appearance and language of medical authority without providing any reliable way to check who created the content, what qualifications lie behind it or whether the advice is supported by evidence.

Personal stories are especially persuasive. Someone describes being ill, discovering a treatment and recovering. The account is easy to follow and often more memorable than a discussion of probabilities.

Even a completely truthful anecdote cannot show that a treatment caused the recovery or that it will be safe and effective for other people. Symptoms may have improved naturally. The person may have used several treatments at once, received an uncertain diagnosis or left out relevant details. Experiments have found that anecdotes can influence medical decisions even when people are also given stronger statistical evidence.

Fear, hope and accuracy

Emotion can add to the effect. Fear or hope may draw attention to a claim and make it feel urgent. Emotional tone does not show whether the information is accurate. Research suggests, however, that heightened emotional responses can increase susceptibility to digital health misinformation.

Identity can also shape judgment. Advice from another parent or fellow patient may appear more credible because the speaker seems to understand our experience. Rejecting the advice may then feel like rejecting a community to which we belong. A systematic review found that existing beliefs, knowledge, trust and reasoning styles can all affect how people evaluate health claims.

People may also have sound reasons for distrusting healthcare institutions. Dismissive treatment, discrimination, rushed appointments and poor explanations can damage trust. Research on trust in health organisations suggests that mistrust may be a rational response to institutional failure or unequal treatment. Telling patients to trust experts will not repair relationships that healthcare systems have damaged.

So how can we assess a health claim without dismissing personal experience?

1. Examine the claim separately from the person making it

A source may be sincere, charismatic or visually convincing without having the expertise to judge whether a treatment works. Check their relevant qualifications and whether their identity can be independently verified.

2. Look for supporting evidence and independent agreement

Do the NHS, an appropriate professional body or a reputable medical charity offer similar guidance? A single study rarely settles a medical question, so substantial claims should be supported by a wider body of research.

3. Check for commercial interests

Look for products, affiliate links, paid partnerships or private treatment programmes. Financial involvement creates a potential conflict of interest that readers should know about.

4. Be cautious about sweeping promises

Claims that a treatment produces rapid results, works for almost everyone or has no meaningful risks are unlikely to reflect the uncertainty and individual variation involved in medicine.

5. Know the warning signs

Treat secrecy claims and advice to abandon prescribed care as serious warning signs The greater the potential harm, the more important it is to check the advice with an appropriately qualified professional, such as a pharmacist or GP.

Individuals cannot carry the whole burden of detecting misinformation. Social media platforms influence which claims are amplified, while health services influence whether people feel heard and respected. Researchers are increasingly calling for a systems approach to health misinformation that combines clearer public information, responsible platform design, effective regulation and trustworthy clinical communication.

Friends and relatives can provide valuable support and personal testimony can reveal experiences that medical research may miss. Judging whether a treatment is safe and effective, however, requires evidence that extends beyond any one person’s story.

Anna Stone, Senior Lecturer in Psychology, University of East London

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Five decades ago, Bali’s coastline was adorned with traditional fishing canoes with colourful carvings of mythical elephant-fish. Where did they go?

The disappearance of these canoes tells a much bigger story about how tourism, collecting and coastal change are reshaping Indonesia’s living maritime heritage – and why preserving these traditions matters.

The boats that once lined Bali’s beaches

Before Bali became one of the worlds’ most popular tourist destinations, fishing villages lined the beaches of Benoa, Nusa Dua and Sanur, along the island’s southern coast.

Generations of fishers built and sailed jukung pelasan – traditional timber double-outrigger sailing canoes with colourful carved gajah mina (elephant-fish) prows.

The gajah mina is a creature in Balinese Hindu tradition with the head of an elephant and the body of a fish. Symbolising unity and harmony between land and sea, it is said to protect crews during voyages and provide safe passage.

These were not just fishing boats; they were central to daily life in southern Bali.

The jukung were symbols of status and community identity. They embodied generations of craftsmanship, spiritual belief and maritime knowledge. They expressed the economic, social and spiritual life of Bali’s coastal communities, and reflected the enduring relationship between its people and the sea.

Today, however, only a handful remain.

My latest research, published in the International Journal of Nautical Archaeology, found only six intact timber jukung pelasan remain on beaches surveyed.

Their rapid decline over the past half century offers a window into the profound changes that have reshaped Bali.

Prosperity came at a price

The transformation began in the 1970s and 1980s. As Bali’s tourism industry took hold, hotels and resorts replaced stretches of beachfront once home to traditional fishing villages. Many fishers left the sea for more stable work in tourism. As livelihoods declined, so too did the timber jukung.

At Sanur, I spoke with a retired boat builder who told me there’s simply no demand left for timber fishing boats, as nobody fishes anymore.

The traditional boats, he said, couldn’t be repaired the old way: the trees once used for hulls were felled decades ago to make way for tourist beach resorts, and the bamboo needed for spars and outriggers no longer grows large enough. What little suitable bamboo remains is prohibitively expensive.

This boat builder is not alone. A former fisher also told me he now takes tourists out on fibreglass replicas for sunrise breakfast sails.

Indonesia’s tourism industry shows no signs of slowing. The nation’s revenue from tourism grew by 6.3% in the first quarter of 2026. In 2025, Bali generated 55% of the nation’s national tourism earnings in 2025 – with tourism accounting for about 60% of the island’s own gross domestic product.

Yet this prosperity has come at a price. Changing coastlines are adding to pressures facing the few remaining fishing communities.

Boats without a beach

As traditional fishing declined, many timber jukung disappeared from Bali’s beaches. Some were replaced with fibreglass boats. Others were sold to collectors overseas – who preserve the boats, but remove them from the communities that gave them meaning.

Today, only a few examples can be found outside Indonesia, such as in Darwin’s Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory, Seattle’s Burke Museum and at the Institute of Ancient Chinese Ships in Ningbo, China.

Australians know Bali as a holiday destination. With more than 1.5 million Australians visiting Bali each year, we remain the island’s largest source of foreign visitors, contributing 23.44% of total arrivals in 2025.

Yet Australia’s relationship with the island goes much further back than most people realise.

The shared seas between Australia and Indonesia have long connected people through fishing, trade and cultural exchange. For centuries, Indonesian seafarers crossed these seas aboard traditional boats, carrying people, knowledge and commodities. By 1754, Macassan traders were harvesting trepang (sea cucumber) in Australian waters, linking northern Australia to markets across Asia.

Beyond the boats

Maritime heritage isn’t simply about preserving traditional boats. It’s also about safeguarding the knowledge that made it possible: how to select timber, shape the hull, lash the outriggers and read the sea.

For generations, those skills were passed from boat builder to apprentice and from fisher to child. A boat preserved in a private collection can’t do this on its own.

Working with the remaining Balinese fishers and boat builders to record their knowledge, techniques and traditions is as important as preserving the boats themselves.

My ongoing research involves recording traditional Balinese maritime techniques, terminology and stories, working alongside archaeologist Widya Nayati from Universitas Gadjah Mada.

The goal is not just to help preserve Indonesia’s maritime past, but to sustain the living knowledge that connects communities, boats and the sea. The future of Bali’s maritime heritage will depend not only on those who inherit these traditions, but on those who value and support them.

Sarah Ward, Researcher, Centre for Heritage and Museum Studies, Australian National University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Have you ever wondered why it feels so good to sing in the shower? Or why turning up the radio up in the middle of a traffic jam and singing out loud can put you in a better mood?

Singing does something measurable to your body and brain, whether you are alone, harmonising in a choir, or singing with your friends at a karaoke bar.

Scientists have been interested in this “singers’ high” phenomenon for many years.

And a consistent picture is emerging from the evidence: singing can stimulate your hormones, quieten your nervous system, improve your immune system and boost your feeling of belonging, all at the same time.

Singing reduces stress

One of the most consistent findings is that singing has been shown to lower cortisol, the hormone most often associated with stress.

Several studies, using saliva samples taken before and after singing sessions, have found significant drops in cortisol in both solo and group singing, such as choir rehearsals.

Part of the explanation is biomechanical. The act of singing requires long controlled exhalation, similar to a breathing pattern (called pranayamic breathing) known to activate the vagus nerve.

The vagus nerve, which runs from the brainstem down into the abdomen, is the main neural pathway in the parasympathetic nervous system. This is responsible for slowing down heart rate, lowering blood pressure and helping digestion.

This is why it is often called the “rest and digest” pathway, calming us down when activated, in contrast to the sympathetic system which activates the “flight and fight” response when we’re stressed.

A detailed review of this breathing process found that slow breathing with extended exhalation, reliably stimulates the vagus nerve, shifting the body out of a stress response, and into a calmer state.

You don’t need to join a choir for this part. It works whether you are singing by yourself in the car after a long work week, or practising your karaoke song in the shower.

It’s a painkiller

Singing can also trigger the release of endorphins, the body’s natural painkillers.

One study measured this effect indirectly, using pain-threshold tests. The researchers believed a higher tolerance for pain after an activity might suggest greater endorphin release.

Across several experiments including active singing, dancing and drumming, they found all activities raised the pain threshold of participants, whereas passively listening to music did not.

Oxytocin, the hormone linked to bonding and trust is part of the story too, though evidence here is less tidy. Some studies have found oxytocin rises after group singing (especially if you are good at it). Others found it fell after group singing.

Another study concluded the data is not clear enough, and the effect of singing on oxytocin may depend on how socially intimate and low-stress the setting is.

What is fairly consistent, however, is that mood improves and people report feeling closer to one another after singing together – even when the underlying biochemical effects are mixed.

Singing may improve your immune system

Beyond mood and stress hormones, there is emerging evidence that singing can also have a measurable effect on the immune system, which fights infections.

One small study looked at singing sessions with cancer patients and their carers. It found that not only did participants’ mood improve after singing – including reductions in cortisol – their saliva samples also showed their cytokine levels had increased. Cytokines are chemical messengers that play a crucial role in the immune system, controlling inflammation.

Chronically high cortisol is known to suppress immune activity, so if cortisol drops after singing, this is also likely to have a positive effect on immune function.

The authors of this study emphasise that this is preliminary evidence, needing longer-term follow up studies.

Benefits for your brain and belonging

So does it matter how and where you sing? The stress-reducing, breath-based effects of singing seem to hold up whether you are singing alone or in a group. But group singing wins hands down for social bonding.

A large randomised trial of community choirs in older adults found that six months of group singing significantly reduced loneliness and increased their mood, compared with a control group.

Other studies have found that singing can also simultaneously engage different regions of the brain involved in listening, language, emotions and motor skills. This can improve brain connectivity and lead to healthier ageing.

The takeaway

You probably already knew singing felt good. But it isn’t just a pleasant distraction. It can reduce stress, calm your nervous system and make you feel closer to those around you. But if you prefer to sing alone in the shower or your car, this has many of the same benefits too – so go ahead and sing your heart out.

Kathleen Mikkelsen, Lecturer in Biomedicine, Victoria University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

You’re probably familiar with the idea that in the world of big tech, “we” are the product.

Our data is the currency being traded every time we navigate our social media feeds. Tech giants such as Apple, Google and Microsoft offer valuable services, but it comes at a price. They host our email, photos, backups, files, calendars, reminders and contacts.

If you also include all the smaller startups and niche solutions, you’ll quickly see your security cameras, electronic locks, home appliances and even your toothbrushing schedules are all online – far removed from any physical box or device that you have any control over.

But there is a way to break free from big tech. It’s called “self-hosting”.

Your life, online

Many of these large tech providers do a good job of securing your data and enabling you to access services across devices and platforms. They allow novice users with almost no technical skills to interact with and share their data at little cost.

However, being reliant on these companies isn’t risk-free.

Google, Amazon and Meta have been implicated in unexpected or questionable uses of data.

Having high-value data concentrated in well-established systems also provides cyber criminals and scammers with obvious targets to spam, imitate (spoof) or hack.

Users are also completely at the mercy of these companies should they decide to raise their fees, change their terms of service, or even discontinue access.

What exactly is self-hosting?

Self-hosting is a general catch-all term for taking control of your own data.

This shifts your data from big tech giants and moves it to self-managed applications. Your data is on your own systems and you have complete control over who can access it.

Many self-hosted applications are open-source and, thanks to community support, they can be relatively easy for a tech-savvy user to download and install.

Self-hosting isn’t new.

Squirrel Mail (a web-based email client) predated Gmail by several years. Gallery, a photo hosting application, came before Flickr and Picasa. Even WordPress was originally offered in 2003 as a self-hosted download before the WordPress.com blogging service became available in 2005.

Over the past decade, self-hosting has seen a rapid increase in the range of options available.

Today, moderately technical users can self-host a mind-boggling range of web-based applications, including media storage and sharing, blogs, websites, productivity and office apps, video conferencing, home automation and security, games and ad-blocking.

To get an idea of how much is out there, Awesome-Selfhosted publishes links to free and open-source self-hosted projects.

Self-hosting has also become more accessible with cheap, single-board computers such as the Raspberry Pi.

These tiny computers can be as small as a credit card and usually have lower-powered central processing units and no ability to expand memory, graphics or networking; they sacrifice computing “power” and flexibility for size, energy-efficiency and price.

Other common household network appliances such as network file storage, media servers and internet routers have become powerful enough that users can install custom applications to run many self-hosted services.

Another route to self-hosting is through device manufacturers such as umbrel and Zima, both of which provide physical hardware with dedicated self-hosting operating systems.

However, there is still a considerable learning curve for non-technical users.

Benefits and risks

Self-hosting provides freedom from big-tech, surveillance and/or costly subscriptions. It allows you to know exactly where your data is, and how it’s managed.

But it does come with some risks.

The most immediate risks come from technical mistakes and backup issues that can cause a self-hosted solution to lose data.

If your photo library is running on a single computer in your linen cupboard, you are reliant on that computer being powered up, backed up and available whenever you need it.

Similarly, any mistake you make in configuration or management could affect the availability of your data through access controls or even data erasure.

Another issue that users need to consider is whether they want their data available “on the move”. In most cases, home routers allow you to expose individual devices to the internet. This can allow you to access your self-hosted data while you are away from home. Unfortunately, if you can access your data, in most cases, so can cyber criminals.

Exposing self-hosted services in this way requires diligence, consideration and a certain level of expertise to minimise the risk of breaches – risks that may be amplified by poorly maintained applications.

Should I bother?

Self-hosting allows you to have greater control over how, when and by whom your data is used. For some, this is a vital requirement and worth the extra effort required to make it all work.

If you have an old computer available, why not give it a try? It may seem daunting, but self-hosting comes in many flavours, and you can choose how far you go with it.

Nikolai Hampton, School of Science, Edith Cowan University and Paul Haskell-Dowland, Professor of Cyber Security Practice, Edith Cowan University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

In Homer’s Odyssey, Nausicaa is a tall, gutsy teenage princess who finds a naked and helpless Odysseus washed up on her shore, gives him her brothers’ clothing, and instructs him on how to appeal to her mother, Queen Arete, for help to get home to Ithaca. She is crucial to his eventual return home after 20 years’ absence.

But she doesn’t appear in Christopher Nolan’s film at all – and her absence is part of a broader debate about how his version reduces or simplifies the role of women in the epic poem. In the Guardian, classicist Emily Hauser mourned the absence of the “delightfully brash princess”, along with nuance and complexity.

“There are more female characters than in most Nolan movies, thanks to the source material,” wrote classics professor Emily Wilson, whose translation of The Odyssey is a critically acclaimed bestseller, this week. “But none of them has much to say, in contrast to the characterisations in the poem.”

This applies to several key characters, from the enchantress Circe, who turned Odysseus’ men into pigs, to Odysseus’ wife Penelope. But what about the absent Nausicaa? Who was she? And why was she important?

Nausicaa, Odysseus’ teenage saviour

Nausicaa lives on the island of Scheria, where she and her fellow Phaeacians, an isolated and peaceful people, rarely encounter strangers. The goddess Athena visits the teenager in a dream and encourages her to wash her dirty laundry. She tells her the best young men of Scheria want to court her, and that Nausicaa and her bridesmaids will need clean dresses.

When she awakes, Nausicaa asks her father, King Alcinous, to loan her a mule-wagon so she and her female slaves can take the laundry to the seaside to wash. She offers to wash her father’s and five brothers’ outfits too, claiming she wants them to have clean clothes to work in and go dancing.

Nausicaa drives the wagon herself and joins in the manual labour of washing the laundry in a river that flows into the sea. She is near the spot where Odysseus has been washed ashore on a raft after leaving the island of Calypso, the lovelorn nymph, who sheltered him for seven years before being forced to let him go.

While the laundry dries in the sun, the girls play catch with a ball. Homer says Nausicaa is so tall, she stands out from the others, like the virgin goddess Artemis surrounded by nymphs. Their play wakes Odysseus, who jumps up from the bushes, naked and covered in grime. The slave girls run away, but Nausicaa stands her ground.

Odysseus praises her beauty and assures her whoever marries her will be the luckiest man by far: there is nothing better than a husband and wife whose minds live in harmony, who live in one house and make their enemies jealous. He is projecting his own desire to return home to his wife Penelope, but guesses accurately what will make this teenage princess trust him.

Thoroughly impressed, Nausicaa promises to give him clothing, food and drink, and a good wash.

After Odysseus bathes himself (at a distance, he’s shy), Athena does something special: she makes him look hot! She “made his hair grow curling tendrils like a hyacinth” and pours beauty on him just like pouring gold over silver. She makes him “look bigger and sturdier”.

Nausicaa is “shocked” and admits to her slaves: “I hope I get a man like this as husband, a man that lives here and would like to stay.” Flirting, she compliments Odysseus’ good looks.

Her next task is to save his life. She instructs him to enter her father’s palace without her, find the Great Hall, pass her father King Alcinous and go straight to her mother Queen Arete, who will be spinning wool by the hearth, and clasp her knees.

The wool-spinning alone is a sign of Arete’s status. She performs the most essential task of the household’s self-sufficiency and sustainability – making thread to weave on a loom into textiles – in the most public part of the palace.

Arete, the previous king’s daughter, has the people’s respect. What’s more, she wove the clothing Nausicaa has just loaned Odysseus. Homer says Arete recognises the clothes and is the first person to speak to Odysseus directly: “Where are you from? And who gave you those clothes?”

But she already knows: Nausicaa has given Odysseus her stamp of approval by sending him to her mother wearing them.

Arete and Alcinous receive Odysseus as their guest. It is to the Phaeacians that Odysseus narrates his adventures – such as the encounters with the Cyclops and Circe – and not, as in Nolan’s screenplay, in a lotus-induced state to Calypso. And it is the Phaeacians who escort Odysseus back to Ithaca and his family.

Penelope is shrewder in the poem

Most significantly, Odysseus’ meeting with Nausicaa is a dry run of his reunion with Penelope. He succeeds in persuading Nausicaa to trust him, helped by his good looks.

But his wife will prove shrewder. After Odysseus has killed all 108 suitors on Ithaca, he finally meets his wife as himself, not in disguise. Athena makes him look hot again, as she did on Scheria – curly hyacinth hair, beauty like gilded silver.

Penelope is not won over by this appearance. She tests his identity in another way, tricking him into revealing his knowledge of their immovable marriage bed and its construction around a tree – something replaced in Nolan’s film with a pendant of Athena that Odysseus carries around with him.

In Homer, the knowledge of the bed is more special, since it exemplifies the husband and wife whose minds live in harmony: the very thing Odysseus guessed Nausicaa wanted for herself someday.

“I love that not only is this about a very clever and ingenious man, it’s also about a very clever and ingenious woman, who’s his match in every way,” Madeleine Miller (author of a novel on Circe) told the New York Times about Penelope’s role in the Odyssey, in the lead-up to the film.

(In Nolan’s version, whose script Wilson claims she would have been “ashamed to have written”, Penelope is “barely more interesting” than the doll he has Odysseus carry to represent her.)

Miller said in Homer’s Odyssey, Circe comes to an understanding with Odysseus and invites him to stay as long as he needs. She offers “a place of peace and a haven”, where she helps him “recover from trauma”. Nolan omits the fact that Odysseus sleeps with Circe – and stays with her (and his men) for two years.

It’s a shame Nausicaa was left out of Nolan’s Odyssey: she is a good example of how Homer’s Odyssey is “a woman’s poem”, as many scholars have recognised.

But Nolan is faithful in one way to how Calypso and Circe appear in Homer: there is every indication they will continue on with their lives once Odysseus leaves their company. Had he included Nausicca, too, she would be another woman who is not just part of Odysseus’ adventures, but have independent narratives of their own – which happen to include Odysseus in it.

K.O. Chong-Gossard, Associate Professor of Classics (Ancient Greek & Latin), The University of Melbourne

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

In the early hours of August 5 (UTC), an abandoned SpaceX rocket stage is expected to slam into the Moon at around 8,700 kilometres per hour.

Launched in January 2025, the rocket sent two commercial lunar landers toward Earth’s nearest neighbour.

With its work done, the rocket lacked the fuel to return to Earth or move into deep space. It remained in an unstable orbit until gravity finally set it on a collision course with the lunar surface.

The crash itself poses no danger. However, it signals a looming regulatory problem. As governments and companies race to build a permanent presence on the Moon, there is almost no practical framework for coordinating activities that permanently reshape the lunar environment.

A rare scientific opportunity

For astronomers, the accident is a scientific opportunity. As scientists know the rocket’s size, speed and roughly where it will hit, the impact presents a rare chance to to study exactly what happens when something impacts the Moon.

The crash will provide data to improve computer models of how craters form and how lunar dust behaves.

Researchers expect the collision to excavate a crater roughly 20–30 metres across and eject a cloud of lunar dust, known as regolith, several kilometres above the surface.

What happens on the Moon stays on the Moon

Along with the dust cloud, the impact will also raise a tricky question: who gets to decide when humanity permanently changes the Moon?

Unlike Earth, the Moon has almost no atmosphere and no weather. As a result, any marks we leave behind will remain for a very long time.

More than 50 years after the Apollo Moon landings, footprints remain visible. If left untouched, they may persist for thousands of years.

The results of crashes or accidents will last just as long.

The Moon is a shared neighbourhood

Space agencies, private companies, and researchers are all operating on the Moon at the same time.

Several countries have announced ambitions for long-term lunar scientific stations. Commercial companies hope to deliver cargo, prospect for resources, operate lunar communication satellites, and eventually support a sustained human presence.

As activity increases, so too does the possibility that one mission could unintentionally affect another. A cloud of high-speed lunar dust created by a landing could damage equipment such as nuclear-powered lunar bases or satellites, contaminate experiments, destroy a site of cultural significance, or even risk the lives of people on the lunar surface.

If a poorly planned mission swept away humanity’s first footprints on the Moon or damaged the Apollo lander, it would be a loss of heritage for all humanity.

By good fortune rather than good planning, the rocket’s upcoming collision is expected to occur near the isolated Einstein Crater, away from many significant lunar sites.

Nobody owns the Moon, but some can still change it

SpaceX has unintentionally acquired the power to permanently alter the Moon. There is almost no international process for deciding whether, when or where that should happen.

At the centre of the discussion is the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, the foundation of international space law with 138 state signatories.

Under this treaty, no country can claim sovereignty over the lunar surface. Instead, the Moon is regarded as a place to be explored and used for the benefit of all humankind.

While the treaty prevents ownership, it says remarkably little about practical lunar governance or regulating the lunar environment.

Unlike Earth, the Moon has no equivalent of UNESCO World Heritage protection, domestic heritage laws, or environmental regulation.

It is each country’s responsibility to supervise their own space companies to ensure they comply with national and international law. That means the American government is, in theory, on the hook for SpaceX’s mistakes.

Lunar accidents could also open up a company to financial liability and associated risks. Damages to equipment or bases could be in the millions of dollars. Accidental deaths could create criminal liability. Damages to a cultural or scientific site could risk international diplomatic incidents.

More transparency and coordination needed

So how can the Moon be a usable space for companies, governments and scientists, while also still being protected for all humanity?

The United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) and the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space are already exploring future solutions. There are working groups examining how countries can regulate space resources and better coordinate activities on and around the Moon.

But these institutions face a difficult reality. UNOOSA has only around 40 staff with a global mandate, and the Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space meets for only a few weeks each year.

Concurrently, commercial enterprises are throwing vast amounts of money at their race to the Moon meaning the law has not kept pace with the needs of the lunar environment.

From principles to practice

The international community does not need new laws. It needs to put the ones it has to work.

Article XI of the 1967 Outer Space Treaty already calls on states to share information about their space activities. That voluntary measure is fast becoming an operational necessity.

A simple starting point would be a lunar registry where states voluntarily identify planned activities, surface infrastructure, and sites they consider culturally significant. A similar satellite registry is managed by UNOOSA. This complimentary lunar registry would capture the operational details that the satellite registry was never designed to capture.

Aviation has a system of Notices to Airmen to advise pilots and flight operators of flight hazards, and other time-sensitive information. Shipping has Notices to Mariners.

The Moon needs something similar: standardised Notices to Lunar Operators. These would flag landing sites, rover routes and dust-generating activity before missions launch.

Calls are growing for a fourth UN Conference on Outer Space. This would be a forum where governments, industry and scientists could actually build these tools.

While this rocket cannot be stopped, the next accident might be avoided. Whether that happens will depend less on rocket scientists and more on the space lawyers and diplomats.

Gregory Radisic, Fellow at the Centre for Space, Cyberspace and Data Law; Senior Teaching Fellow, Faculty of Law, Bond University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Few episodes occupy a darker place in maritime history than the wreck of the Batavia.

Wrecked off the mid-west coast of Western Australia in June 1629, 159 years before the First Fleet entered Sydney Harbour, the disaster offers a stark alternative to romanticised tales of exploration.

Batavia’s story is instead one of greed, mutiny, heroic resistance and mass murder, exposing the violence and ambition that accompanied early European ventures into Australian waters.

The ship’s story is also one of a massive global supply chain – part of which has remained hidden until now. In our new study published in the Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports, we trace the origins of some of the Batavia’s most important cargo: massive sandstone blocks.

The tiny crystal preserved in these rocks help paint a detailed picture of lives, labour and global connections nearly 400 years ago.

An immensely valuable cargo

The Batavia was the flagship of the Dutch East India Company. On its maiden voyage from the Dutch Republic to Java, it carried 341 passengers and crew, together with an immensely valuable cargo.

Among it was what mariners called “paying ballast”. This was heavy material that served two purposes: stabilising the ship and carrying commercial or practical value at its destination.

In the ship’s hold, this included thousands of bricks and large, carefully carved sandstone blocks intended for a monumental gateway or portico in the Dutch East India Company’s colonial capital, Batavia (known today as Jakarta).

During the voyage, junior officer Jeronimus Cornelisz plotted to seize the ship and its treasure. After Batavia struck Morning Reef, roughly 60km west of the modern-day town of Geraldton, Commander Francisco Pelsaert departed in an open boat to seek help.

In Pelsaert’s absence, Cornelisz seized control of the survivors scattered across the nearby islands. He sent Wiebbe Hayes and a group of fellow soldiers to a distant island, expecting thirst to kill them. Cornelisz’s mutineers then began systematically killing the remaining survivors. More than one hundred men, women and children were murdered.

But Hayes and his soldiers found water. Survivors who escaped Cornelisz reached Haye’s group on makeshift rafts and warned them of the killings. They fashioned weapons, built a stone fort, and repeatedly repelled the mutineers. The remains of their stone fort on West Wallabi Island are regarded as Australia’s oldest surviving European-built structure.

When Pelsaert’s rescue ship appeared on the horizon, Hayes raced to reach it before the mutineers. He boarded first and revealed what had happened. The mutiny was over.

Through it all, hundreds of sandstone blocks lay within Batavia’s wreck, silent witnesses to the bloodshed unfolding across the islands. The stones survived; most of the people who sailed with them did not.

Nearly 400 years later, those stones are revealing the extraordinary logistical networks that supplied the Dutch East India Company.

Gaps in the record

At the dawn of global capitalism, the Dutch East India Company created one of the richest corporate archives of the early modern world.

Yet even its meticulous records have gaps. We know the Batavia carried a prefabricated stone portico. But we don’t know precisely where the stone came from or how materials from different quarries were assembled into a single overseas shipment.

To investigate, we examined Batavia’s sandstone cargo, now held by the WA Shipwrecks Museum. The blocks looked remarkably similar to each other, and centuries beneath the waves changed more obvious clues to their origins, such as colour, mineralogy, and the cement that holds the sand grains together.

To understand their source, we therefore turned to a more durable record hidden within the rocks. Sandstone carries tiny crystals known as zircon, often eroded from many older rocks.

Each grain contains a uranium–lead clock that records when the crystal grew. Together, their ages create a distinctive geological fingerprint of the ancient landscapes that supplied the sand.

Comparing geological fingerprints

We compared the geological fingerprints of the Batavia portico blocks with sandstone from German quarries known to have supplied building stone to the Netherlands during the 17th century. Some of these quarrying and trade networks had much deeper roots, extending back to Roman times.

The fingerprints revealed that similar-looking blocks came from different sources. One matched Bentheim sandstone; the other matched Obernkirchen sandstone.

Both zircon fingerprints were strikingly different.

Bentheim blocks contained abundant 3-billion-year-old zircons derived from ancient rocks in Scandinavia, whereas Obernkirchen blocks are richer in younger zircon, eroded from the 300-million-year-old Variscan mountain belt to the south, in what is now central Germany.

The quarries are about 140km apart and connect to different river systems. The stones travelled through separate inland transport networks before converging at a Dutch East India Company hub, most likely Amsterdam, where they were shaped and assembled into a single shipment for Batavia.

Numbers carved into the blocks acted as assembly marks, a 17th century precursor to flat-pack instructions.

No surviving document records this precise journey. But geology exposes a sophisticated and coordinated supply chain linking quarry workers, stone cutters, river transporters, merchants, and sailors across northwest Europe.

More than decorative cargo

Batavia’s portico blocks are a testament to the infrastructure of an empire: European stone gathered, standardised, and shipped across the world to build the Dutch East India Company’s colonial headquarters in Java.

Nearly four centuries later, the blocks show that stories can indeed be written in stone, recovering traces of networks of labour, trade and human connection.

Anthony Clarke, Research Fellow, School of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Curtin University and Chris Kirkland, Professor of Geochronology, Curtin University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Have you ever wondered why it feels so good to sing in the shower? Or why turning up the radio up in the middle of a traffic jam and singing out loud can put you in a better mood?

Singing does something measurable to your body and brain, whether you are alone, harmonising in a choir, or singing with your friends at a karaoke bar.

Scientists have been interested in this “singers’ high” phenomenon for many years.

And a consistent picture is emerging from the evidence: singing can stimulate your hormones, quieten your nervous system, improve your immune system and boost your feeling of belonging, all at the same time.

Singing reduces stress

One of the most consistent findings is that singing has been shown to lower cortisol, the hormone most often associated with stress.

Several studies, using saliva samples taken before and after singing sessions, have found significant drops in cortisol in both solo and group singing, such as choir rehearsals.

Part of the explanation is biomechanical. The act of singing requires long controlled exhalation, similar to a breathing pattern (called pranayamic breathing) known to activate the vagus nerve.

The vagus nerve, which runs from the brainstem down into the abdomen, is the main neural pathway in the parasympathetic nervous system. This is responsible for slowing down heart rate, lowering blood pressure and helping digestion.

This is why it is often called the “rest and digest” pathway, calming us down when activated, in contrast to the sympathetic system which activates the “flight and fight” response when we’re stressed.

A detailed review of this breathing process found that slow breathing with extended exhalation, reliably stimulates the vagus nerve, shifting the body out of a stress response, and into a calmer state.

You don’t need to join a choir for this part. It works whether you are singing by yourself in the car after a long work week, or practising your karaoke song in the shower.

It’s a painkiller

Singing can also trigger the release of endorphins, the body’s natural painkillers.

One study measured this effect indirectly, using pain-threshold tests. The researchers believed a higher tolerance for pain after an activity might suggest greater endorphin release.

Across several experiments including active singing, dancing and drumming, they found all activities raised the pain threshold of participants, whereas passively listening to music did not.

Oxytocin, the hormone linked to bonding and trust is part of the story too, though evidence here is less tidy. Some studies have found oxytocin rises after group singing (especially if you are good at it). Others found it fell after group singing.

Another study concluded the data is not clear enough, and the effect of singing on oxytocin may depend on how socially intimate and low-stress the setting is.

What is fairly consistent, however, is that mood improves and people report feeling closer to one another after singing together – even when the underlying biochemical effects are mixed.

Singing may improve your immune system

Beyond mood and stress hormones, there is emerging evidence that singing can also have a measurable effect on the immune system, which fights infections.

One small study looked at singing sessions with cancer patients and their carers. It found that not only did participants’ mood improve after singing – including reductions in cortisol – their saliva samples also showed their cytokine levels had increased. Cytokines are chemical messengers that play a crucial role in the immune system, controlling inflammation.

Chronically high cortisol is known to suppress immune activity, so if cortisol drops after singing, this is also likely to have a positive effect on immune function.

The authors of this study emphasise that this is preliminary evidence, needing longer-term follow up studies.

Benefits for your brain and belonging

So does it matter how and where you sing? The stress-reducing, breath-based effects of singing seem to hold up whether you are singing alone or in a group. But group singing wins hands down for social bonding.

A large randomised trial of community choirs in older adults found that six months of group singing significantly reduced loneliness and increased their mood, compared with a control group.

Other studies have found that singing can also simultaneously engage different regions of the brain involved in listening, language, emotions and motor skills. This can improve brain connectivity and lead to healthier ageing.

The takeaway

You probably already knew singing felt good. But it isn’t just a pleasant distraction. It can reduce stress, calm your nervous system and make you feel closer to those around you. But if you prefer to sing alone in the shower or your car, this has many of the same benefits too – so go ahead and sing your heart out.

Kathleen Mikkelsen, Lecturer in Biomedicine, Victoria University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Consider these scenarios.

An influential political commentator posts a reel on social media, cherry-picking facts to manipulate a situation for political gain. His post gets no likes, no shares, and no angry emojis from users.

A scammy online ad using a celebrity’s image pops up on people’s social media feeds. Nobody clicks on it.

A wellness influencer shares disproven health advice and is entirely ignored. And a deepfake artificial intelligence (AI) video is downgraded by the algorithm because nobody believes it.

Instead, people are fact-checking before sharing or commenting. They’re consulting experts and scrolling beyond the AI summary at the top to seek out reliable information sources that abide by the standards of accuracy, independence and ethics.

These situations may seem laughable in our algorithm- and AI-driven online world where emotion is key to engagement.

But they are, in fact, the simple practical outcomes of a media literate society. And our report on a newly developed media literacy course shows there’s a cheap and effective solution to the scourge of misinformation at the heart of our overwhelming, and often polarised, online environment.

Misinformation is a global risk

We live in a world where anyone with an internet connection can publish instantly to the world – with few guardrails for accuracy or ethics.

Misinformation has been ranked first or second in the top short-term global risks by the World Economic Forum for three years running. Misinformation is often at the heart of fear campaigns and hate speech that can help fuel extremism and polarisation. It erodes trust in governments and institutions. It’s a public health hazard and a threat to public order and disaster management.

And now it’s being supercharged by low-effort generative AI. These tools spit out plausible and convincing content, but can also be wildly inaccurate and biased. As such, Australians are deeply concerned about misinformation. More so than many of their counterparts around the world.

Children have for many years been the focus of media literacy programs and research, such as Civic Online Reasoning in the US. Meanwhile adults – particularly those who were raised in the pre-internet era of landlines and snail mail – have been left floundering.

Educating adults is now an urgent priority. We found just 60 minutes of media literacy training makes a measurable difference to people’s ability to apply critical thinking skills to deal with misinformation.

A spoonful of adult education

To find solutions through media literacy, we focused on older people (aged 55+) who are known to be more vulnerable to misinformation, have fewer media skills, and feel less confident in their media abilities. We recruited our study participants from across Australia through libraries, the news media, and social media.

Through a simple short course delivered online and in person, we taught 79 participants how to:

• identify misinformation
• fact check and verify
• find reliable sources, and
• be self-aware while navigating the online world.

The media literacy levels of the participants grew by 23% on average, regardless of their background and political beliefs. Their ability to determine the reliability of information improved especially – by 27% – as did confidence in their ability to critically navigate the online world (by 32%).

Importantly, our course – the first known empirically-validated resource of its kind targeted at older Australians – helped people who are socially excluded the most.

We tested participants’ media literacy before the short course, immediately after, and three months later. Older, regional, less educated, and culturally and linguistically diverse groups maintained their gains for longer.

But our research also confirmed what others before us have fretted over: media literacy training is not a one-off. Overall, advances from education diminished over time among our study participants, although scores remained 11% higher on average than pre-course levels even after three months.

This suggests media literacy programs must be embedded in people’s everyday lives as a life-long learning process. It would help us keep pace with new platforms, digital systems and social trends.

Where to next?

The outcomes from the short course led to the development of the Stay Smart Online program, a toolkit to provide a simple and flexible way of teaching media literacy.

We conducted a pilot using an adapted version of the short course with libraries and their patrons throughout Australia with impressive results: 97% of patrons said they would recommend the course to a friend.

Libraries are ideal institutions to deliver this training to the public, especially older Australians. Among library staff nationally 99% see media literacy as essential work, but just 10% feel adequately equipped to support that mission.

What sets our research apart from many other misinformation and media literacy interventions (and is, perhaps, among the reasons for its success), is that it incorporates through the course materials the concept of intellectual humility.

Put simply, this is the acceptance that each person’s knowledge is limited, that we may be wrong, and we are open to revising our views based on evidence. As the term suggests, it’s a humbling notion. However, as we’ve found, it’s essential to media literacy.

In order to embrace evidence-based facts, we need first to acknowledge how our life experiences, upbringing, education, friends and family, community, language and culture have shaped our world view. All of these influence how we approach and process information and media.

Being conscious of our own inherent biases helps us apply the critical thinking skills we need to build resilience to misinformation.

Saffron Howden, PhD Candidate, Faculty of Arts and Design, University of Canberra; Janet Fulton, Research Fellow, News & Media Research Centre, University of Canberra, and Sora Park, Professor of Communication, News & Media Research Centre, University of Canberra

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Reforming Australia’s gambling industry has been one of the most high-profile political issues of recent years. Constantly in the headlines, there are high levels of public support to bring in tougher rules, including gambling advertising bans.

But the federal government has been reluctant to act. It has introduced its new gambling legislation to parliament, but the bill has been criticised as not going far enough to address the problem.

There’s been a lot of speculation as to why there’s been so little political appetite to bring in tougher measures. One key reason is governments have a clear conflict of interest: they rely on gambling revenue while also being responsible for reducing gambling harm.

Years of resistance

Momentum for changing Australia’s gambling laws has been building since the 2023 release of the Murphy report. Handed down by a cross-party parliamentary inquiry and chaired by the late Labor MP Peta Murphy, the report made 31 recommendations, including limitations on gambling advertising and the appointment of a national online gambling regulator.

The government was slow to respond to the report. Three years later, it finally did.

The proposed legislation makes some attempts to protect people from gambling harms. If passed, this legislation would restrict when and how frequently gambling ads may air and ban the use of celebrities in those ads, among other changes.

Last week at Labor’s 50th National Conference, the party’s draft national platform acknowledged the public health benefits of reducing tobacco consumption. It described the tobacco industry as coercive and stated the party would not engage with anyone with financial links to tobacco.

This raises the obvious question: why has the Albanese government taken a markedly different approach to the gambling industry?

Put simply, the federal government’s reluctance to push for stronger regulation can be linked to the revenue gambling generates.

Imbalances in funding

To understand how this situation came about, we need to consider a concept called vertical fiscal imbalance, as we did in our new research.

Vertical fiscal imbalance is the financial mismatch between the federal and state governments. Under the Constitution, the federal government is more able to raise revenue, but the responsibility to deliver public services is largely left to the states, leading to an imbalance. It first started when the federal government assumed control over collecting income tax after the second world war.

With this imbalance, the states became increasingly dependent on federal funding grants. These grants are distributed through the horizontal fiscal equalisation grants process: a process designed to share government money fairly across the country.

While all states receive grants from the Commonwealth, horizontal fiscal equalisation aims to provide each state with the financial capacity to provide services to its population at a comparable level.

But this process cannot fully account for differences in land areas or resources.

For example, Western Australia argues it has been effectively penalised for having ample mineral resources that create revenue, which negatively impacts their share of the equalisation funding.

What does this have to do with gambling?

The current grants don’t provide enough funding for the states to support vital public services such as education, health, transport or social services. State governments have sought different ways to make up the shortfall.

This includes gambling taxes. Gambling revenue isn’t taken into account when the Commonwealth Grants Commission decides how much money each jurisdiction should receive. Every dollar states raise from gambling, they get to keep.

Our study looks at how the vertical fiscal imbalance led to New South Wales embracing the idea of gaining revenue from gambling taxes, including from poker machines.

Based on records of parliamentary debates, our research shows gambling went from a moral issue in the early 1900s, with parliamentarians stating gambling was a “material evil”, to a new revenue source.

In 1956, extreme budget pressures caused NSW Premier Joseph Cahill to declare not allowing poker machines into clubs would put the government in a “parlous financial position”.

Yet, another MP argued the government had “sunk to the depths, was desperate for money, and was capitalising upon the most vulnerable members of the community”.

But despite earlier concerns about morality, new legalised forms of gambling proliferated, particularly poker machines.

In terms of bringing in money for the state government, it worked. According to the most recent state budget, revenue from all gambling taxes in NSW was $3.6 billion in 2024–25, making up about 7% of the state’s $48 billion total tax revenue. Gambling revenue is forecast to surge to $4.7 billion over the next four years.

NSW is now home to about half the poker machines in the country. There are almost 90,000 machines across the state.

In May, the Labor party unanimously passed a motion at its NSW state conference to significantly reduce the number of poker machines in the state in the next ten years. But the parliamentary party isn’t compelled to legislate accordingly.

What about beyond NSW?

Other states and territories, with the exception of WA, have also come to rely on gambling revenue.

In 2022–23, the Queensland government collected $1.9 billion in gambling taxes and levies. In Victoria in 2024–25, it was more than $2.4 billion.

Even in Tasmania, a much smaller state, gambling generated more than $120 million for state coffers in 2023–24.

On a national level, the Albanese government’s reluctance to impose stronger regulation on advertising for the gambling industry, or establish a national gambling regulator, is likely driven by concerns about what this would mean for the federal budget. Weaning the states off gambling revenue would necessitate fundamental changes to federal-state fiscal relations.

At a time when the government is already under pressure given the nation’s ballooning debt, such fundamental economic reform would be a courageous path to take.

From this perspective, the Albanese government’s response to the Murphy report is less an isolated policy decision than the continuation of a longstanding pattern in which structural reform gives way to more politically and economically acceptable measures.

Our findings suggest an important solution to the gambling crisis lies in reforming the current federal funding model to the states. Doing so would reduce the states’ dependence on gambling revenue and enable them to fund essential services without relying on the gambling losses of everyday Australians.

Barbara Kinder, Adjunct Fellow, Lecturer, Southern Cross University and Michael B. Charles, Associate Professor, Management Discipline, Faculty of Business, Arts and Law, Southern Cross University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

As countries around the world look to follow Australia’s lead in restricting young people’s access to social media, a new report by the eSafety Commissioner might give them reason to pause, at least temporarily.

Australia’s online watchdog found more than 80% of kids were still using an age-restricted platform, such as Instagram, TikTok or Snapchat, three months after the trailblazing social media ban took effect.

The report is the first in a series the commissioner will publish as part of a two-year evaluation process. It contains several other key findings which confirm earlier evidence that the ban isn’t quite going to plan.

Reductions in social media use ‘limited in scale’

The commissioner’s report presents findings from 803 children (aged 10–15) and their parents, drawing on national baseline survey data from just before social media restrictions took effect in December 2025, and data collected from a three-month follow up from March to April 2026.

Its aim isn’t to assess the long-term effectiveness of the policy, but to examine whether anticipated early changes are happening.

While the number of children holding accounts dropped from roughly 52% to 42%, the emerging picture for ongoing use of social media is concerning. As the report says:

Our findings suggest that three months after the commencement of the age restrictions, reductions in children’s use of age-restricted platforms and account ownership have been limited in scale.

The “primary reason” for this was “ineffective implementation of age assurance measures by platforms”. In fact, more than half of kids surveyed said the platforms hadn’t even asked them to confirm their age. Some 18% reported platforms had incorrectly estimated their age to be above 16, and 37% said they had simply listed their age as 16 or above on their accounts to maintain access.

Prior to the restrictions being introduced, 85.9% of children reported using at least one social media platform. This number only dropped to 81.5% at three months.

“This may reflect the relatively low barrier to continued account access,” the report said, “with little need for children to rely on workarounds to obtain or maintain access”.

Alongside this, the report found “early signals” some children were moving to other platforms, such as Reddit and Pinterest. It also detected an “unintended consequence” of the ban: the proportion of parents who didn’t know their child had used social media increased by 10%.

And despite Prime Minister Anthony Albanese saying he hoped the ban would lead to more kids “playing outside with their friends”, the report found “little to no change” in what kids did offline three months after the ban took effect.

Unsurprising results

The results of this first evaluation are not surprising.

There have been regular media reports of children retaining accounts and getting around age-assurance checks.

And the findings reinforce the online regulator’s report from March, which raised concerns that social media platforms were not complying with the legislation.

The findings also echo other research showing children continue to access social media.

What happens next?

The report’s release is timely, given the government’s intention to “double down” on compliance by increasing penalties and expanding the commissioner’s information-gathering powers.

The government will now be under pressure to make good on its intentions to investigate non-compliance and, where appropriate, implement fines. The findings of this three-month report may bolster those investigations.

Earlier this week, the companies selling age-assurance software also called on the government to implement a “mandatory independent audit” of every platform covered by social media age restrictions, to test if they are using the tools properly.

The Age Verification Providers Association argues social media companies may opt to wear fines to see the legislation fail.

Yet even if companies comply and keep children under 16 from having accounts, this won’t stop kids accessing social media. The legislation does not restrict use in a logged-out state – and the three-month report shows children continue to access social media in this way.

All this should demonstrate to other countries that age-based restrictions are not a quick fix.

The government has committed to introducing digital duty of care legislation this year, which would hold technology companies to account and provide protections for Australians of all ages.

If we want to protect our kids from harmful content and algorithms on social media, that legislation cannot come soon enough.

Lisa M. Given, Professor of Information Sciences & Director, Social Change Enabling Impact Platform, RMIT University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Do you use an offset account to save money on your mortgage? It might be a good idea to contact your bank and check it has actually been set up and is working as it should.

That’s according to a report released on Wednesday by the corporate watchdog, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC).

ASIC’s review of eight banks – accounting for more than 70% of the Australian home loan market – found “weaknesses” in how all of them “set up, monitored and managed offset accounts, resulting in some customers missing out on promised savings”.

Across the entire banking sector, ASIC says Australian banks have paid out more than A$55 million in compensation for offset account failures reported between September 2023 and August 2025.

Reserve Bank data show 55% of Australian mortgages – representing an estimated 1.8 million households – have an offset account.

According to ASIC, in March, Australians held a total of $349.1 billion in offset account balances, up 28% over two years. The watchdog’s findings raise concerns some aren’t getting the savings they’ve been promised.

As my recent research has explored, even when operating as intended, these products can be difficult to navigate as a consumer and won’t save everyone money.

How does an offset account work?

An offset account is a type of bank account linked to a mortgage.

Instead of earning interest, the savings in the offset account reduce the interest payable on your mortgage balance.

To give a simplified example, if you owe $1 million on a mortgage, but also have $100,000 in a linked offset account, the bank will only calculate interest based on an effective balance of $900,000.

It might seem like an easy way to save money, but there are some important caveats. First, many banks charge customers to open or operate an offset account, or impose other costs such as higher interest rates on a linked mortgage.

Second, they won’t be a good deal for everyone. Savings depend on a household’s ability to save and the specific costs of the product.

Why the regulator is concerned

Across eight banks, ASIC reviewed 204,000 home loans that were settled between March and August 2025.

Among various types of offset account failure identified, the two most common were banks not opening an offset account when it had been requested, or an account being opened but not linked to the mortgage. Manual errors by staff were identified as the main cause of account failures.

Overall, the report identified four overarching concerns, finding some banks:

• struggled to “readily identify” offset account requests
• did not consistently detect failures
• were slow to fix issues or failed to compensate customers
• did not consistently provide customers with “clear, timely information” about their offset accounts.

These findings are particularly concerning where a customer has opted to use an offset account instead of another type of account that pays interest. If their offset account hasn’t been linked correctly, they are missing out on both mortgage interest savings and the benefit of using another savings mechanism.

Not for everyone

My own recent research examined who uses offset accounts in Australia, and how much of a benefit they actually receive.

I found mortgage holders are only likely to benefit from an offset account if they can save enough money – after mortgage payments and other expenses – that the mortgage interest savings outweigh the ongoing fees associated with the account.

For example, at a 6% mortgage interest rate, a customer would need to hold at least $5,000 in their offset account for an entire year to justify a $300 annual fee.

Customers with lower mortgage interest rates or less ability to save may not be getting value for money from their offset account. Put simply, while some mortgage holders might save money, others might be incurring fees for little gain.

Checking your account

ASIC has encouraged anyone with a mortgage offset account to check:

• whether it has actually been set up
• that it is linked to the right home loan
• that it is saving interest.

Actual savings will vary significantly by product and by bank. For that reason, it can be difficult to offer a simple formula everyone can use to check they’re saving money.

But if you have concerns, you can contact your bank or mortgage broker.

ASIC’s report serves as a warning that these mortgage products can be difficult to navigate and may not be suitable for everyone. As always, it’s a good idea to seek professional financial advice about your mortgage options, products and decisions.

Disclaimer: This article provides general information only and does not take into account your personal objectives, financial situation, or needs. It is not intended as financial advice.

James Graham, Senior Lecturer in Economics, University of Sydney

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

At Labor’s national conference last week, the Albanese government said it would establish a new federal Fair Work Court to provide “simpler, fairer and faster” resolution of workplace disputes.

At this stage, details remain sparse. But the broad idea is this new specialist court will work alongside the Fair Work Commission – the existing employment tribunal – to facilitate speedier resolution of claims brought under the Fair Work Act.

There is growing evidence to suggest that trying to resolve workplace disputes and recover backpay is too costly, too hard and too slow.

Intentional “wage theft” has been a criminal offence for more than 18 months. Despite this, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told the conference there were:

still too many of the most vulnerable workers in this country being illegally underpaid, because they cannot access or afford the justice that they are owed.

The new court aims to fix this problem by appointing judges with expertise in workplace law and bridging the existing gap between the Fair Work Commission and the federal court system.

Why do we need a new court?

One of the reasons for the current disjointed process is that, due to constitutional limitations, the Fair Work Commission cannot simultaneously create rights and enforce them.

The tribunal has the power to make modern awards and to approve enterprise agreements. It also has the power to conciliate and arbitrate unfair dismissal claims and some industrial disputes.

However, it is not authorised to determine an underpayment claim and it cannot impose penalties where there is a contravention of the Fair Work Act.

Currently, only designated courts have the authority to do this.

We’ve been here before

A dedicated employment court is not necessarily a new idea. Rather, the Fair Work Court has been described as “decades in the making”.

In 1994, the Keating Labor government established an industrial relations court, which operated separately from the federal court system. This specialist court was abolished under the Howard coalition government in 1997.

The concept of a “one-stop shop” for workplace claims was later floated by Labor while in opposition in 2007, but was ultimately abandoned. Instead, the 2009 Fair Work Act created specialist Fair Work divisions within the federal court system to hear employment matters. It also established a separate “small claims” process for monetary claims (previously capped at $20,000, now at $100,000).

Small claims proceedings are designed to be less formal with the aim of settling disputes quickly and cheaply. However, the small claims process is still seen as confusing and cumbersome, especially for vulnerable workers, such as migrants.

Setting the scope

The Albanese government has signalled it will consult on the design of the new Fair Work Court before the end of the year, including how it would coordinate with the Fair Work Commission, the existing federal courts and the state-based systems.

Rather than simply reforming the small claims process, Labor has left open the possibility the new court will deal with “a whole range of matters”, including:

• bargaining disputes
• appeals from the Fair Work Commission
• unlawful termination matters
• large underpayment claims.

The government says it is committed to working on the design of the new court “as swiftly as possible”.

Other questions to answer

Beyond the scope of the new court, the government will also have to iron out a host of other procedural issues.

Will applicants be able to file a single, rolled up claim in one place and access the conciliation processes of the Fair Work Commission and the judicial powers of the Fair Work Court? Or will they need to file separate claims to access each forum?

What rules of procedure and evidence will apply if the new Court is determining more significant matters and imposing penalties?

If the government wants to improve access to justice, it will need to consider whether class actions can be heard and if and when parties can recover their legal costs. The costs of obtaining legal advice can present a real hurdle, especially where the backpay amount is relatively modest.

Avoiding a ‘lawyer’s picnic’

Labor’s proposal hasn’t been without criticism. Business groups have questioned whether the new court would simply duplicate existing courts, add “another layer of bureaucracy” or even risk creating a “lawyer’s picnic”.

Other commentators believe the creation of a new specialist court will do little to address the inherent complexity of the system.

Employment and Workplace Relations Minister Amanda Rishworth said she couldn’t see how the court would add an “extra level of regulation”, framing it as:

a more effective and efficient way to ensure that the workplace laws and rights in this country are upheld.

Unions have welcomed the proposal of a dedicated court. But we shouldn’t assume that on its own, creating a new court – even one staffed by specialists – will solve the scourge of underpayment.

Some of the most egregious wrongdoers will still make themselves judgment-proof through insolvency, bankruptcy or abandonment, and workplace justice will continue to be denied.

Tess Hardy, Associate Professor, Director of the Centre for Employment and Labour Relations Law, The University of Melbourne

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Winter has a way of making the office, train and school pick-up line feel like a giant petri dish of germs and potential infection. It’s also when many of us quietly let our exercise routine slide.

With late sunrises and a warm doona, a run in the rain or snow has lost its appeal. But could skipping that workout actually make you more likely to catch the flu or seasonal bug?

The short answer: regular, moderate exercise probably does lower your risk of catching a cold or flu. But it won’t cure you once you’ve got it, and more exercise isn’t always better.

Exercise and the immune system

When you exercise, your muscles contract and release signalling proteins called myokines.

These natural chemical messengers help mobilise beneficial immune cells – particularly natural killer cells and T-cells – and redistribute them throughout the bloodstream and bodily tissues. This improves the immune system response to threats, making your body better at fighting infection.

However, the effect isn’t permanent. Within hours after exercise, your cell counts (a measure of how your immune system is responding) return to normal.

But researchers think repeated bouts of these immune “boosts” do add up over time, building an immune system that detects and responds to viruses more efficiently.

Regular moderate exercise also appears to lower chronic inflammation, which otherwise prevents your immune system working as well as it should.

The evidence backs this up, if imperfectly. A 2022 review of the evidence concludes that physically active people consistently report fewer respiratory infections than those who do very little physical activity.

Prevention, not the cure

Exercise won’t shorten a cold you already have, and there’s no evidence an intense gym session “sweats out” a virus.

What the research supports is exercise as a preventative tool. Think of exercise as a way to reduce your chances of getting sick rather than preventing it altogether. Even very fit people catch colds and flu.

There’s also a caveat, sometimes called the immune “J-curve”: very prolonged, high-intensity exercise can lead to a temporary dip in immune function in the hours afterwards.

This mostly affects endurance athletes doing significant amounts of training – think marathon training, not a lunchtime walk.

However, more recent research questions how large that risk really is. For most of us average folks, going beyond the healthy amount of weekly physical activity is not a concern.

How much exercise and physical activity do you actually need?

You don’t need to train like an athlete. Guidelines recommend adults do 150–300 minutes of moderate physical activity a week, or 75–150 minutes of vigorous intensity activity. Or you can do an equivalent combination of moderate and vigorous activity.

Moderate intensity means anything that noticeably lifts your heart rate and breathing: a brisk walk, cycling, swimming, raking leaves, even dancing in the kitchen. It doesn’t need to be a structured “workout”.

Vigorous intensity means any activity of any duration that gets us huffing and puffing.

A way to test exercise intensity is with the “talk and sing” test. At moderate intensity, you’ll be able to talk but not sing. At vigorous intensity, you won’t be able to talk without pausing to catch your breath.

Finding motivation when its cold and dark

Winter motivation is a genuine hurdle. But a few things can help:

• treat exercise as a fixed appointment, not something you’ll “find time” for

• move it indoors on bad weather days

• break it into smaller chunks, such as three five-to-ten minute walks – these work as well as a single 30-minute session

• exercise with a friend, if accountability helps you

• get outside when you can – especially when the sun is out.

To exercise or to rest? The million dollar question

The trickiest calls come when you’re not quite sick but feel run down.

Many clinicians use a simple “neck check”. This means if symptoms are above the neck (for example, a runny nose, sneezing, a mild sore throat) light-to-moderate exercise is generally fine, though it’s sensible to ease off the intensity and duration.

If you have symptoms below the neck (such as a chest cough or upset stomach) or symptoms affecting your whole body (such as fever, body aches or serious fatigue) rest is the better call.

Exercising with a fever raises your core temperature further, can worsen dehydration, and adds strain on your heart.

If you’re simply feeling flat or short on sleep, rather than unwell, a gentle walk is unlikely to do harm and may even help. But it’s also a good moment to prioritise sleep and lower the intensity rather than push through a hard session.

None of this makes exercise a substitute for a flu shot, hand-washing or staying home when you’re contagious.

But as one of the few winter habits genuinely within our control, regular exercise and physical activity is a reasonable, low-cost way to tilt the odds in your favour.

Matthew Ahmadi, Associate Professor of Digital Health, Monash University; Joanne Caldwell Odgers, Senior Lecturer in Physiology, Monash University, and Nicholas Koemel, Senior Research Fellow in Digital Health, Monash University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Young people are navigating their romantic and sexual lives in an increasingly complex world.

Social media content, including from misogynistic influencers, have contributed to rapidly changing norms around gender, sex and relationships.

Recent Australian research has found concerning rates of unwanted, forced or coerced sex and intimate partner violence among young people, including adolescents as young as 14.

At the same time, many young people find the relationships and sexuality education they’ve received is inconsistent, unconvincing or disconnected from the realities of their lives.

We surveyed 482 teachers working across government, Catholic and independent schools who deliver relationship and sexuality education and found they often feel ill-equipped to deliver lessons on sex, consent and respectful relationships.

Teachers feel unprepared and under-supported

In previous generations, sex education focused on biology. Today, a more comprehensive approach is taken. Relationships and sexuality education encompasses sexual and reproductive health, respectful relationships and consent education.

Our study examined the training and support needs of Australian teachers and student (pre-service) teachers who deliver relationships and sexuality education.

More than two thirds (around 67%) of teachers reported receiving no university classes on how to teach relationships and sexuality education.

Most (77%) said their university preparation left them poorly equipped to teach these topics.

Professional development after entering the workforce was also inconsistent. Nearly half (43%) said they still required additional training.

Half (50%) reported their school did not allocate adequate time or funding for professional development in relationships and sexuality education. Less than half (39%) felt they had sufficient time for lesson planning.

Overall, teachers viewed relationships and sexuality education positively. Most believed:

• their school leadership team valued relationships and sexuality education (72%)
• parents were supportive (60%)
• students generally felt comfortable engaging with it (65%).

However, this support was not always matched by practical resources.

Teachers who received dedicated in-service training and sufficient preparation time, and felt supported by their school administration, said they were significantly more comfortable to deliver relationships and sexuality education.

This is important, as around 60% of teachers worried about negative reactions from parents, saying the wrong thing during lessons or how to respond to student disclosures of experiencing sexual violence.

Many teachers were also uncomfortable delivering education on challenging or sensitive topics, including pornography, abortion or sexual violence.

What do students say they want?

Across multiple studies, young people report they want:

• more support to navigate romantic and sexual relationships

• meaningful education about the emotional complexities of relationships, how to communicate with a partner and how to express needs and boundaries in sexual relationships

• more relevant critical education on pornography.

Young people also want education on the practical realities of sex. They want to know more about what to expect and what to prepare for.

They also want education that is inclusive of diversity in gender, sexuality and bodies.

Consent education aims to reduce sexual violence

Mandatory consent education was introduced in 2023 in response to sexual consent advocate Chanel Contos’ Teach Us Consent campaign. This drew national attention to young women’s experiences of sexual violence and highlighted inadequacies in current education.

Australia has now made sexual consent education a national priority, with federal, state and territory governments making a committment in 2022 as part of national efforts to address sexual and gender-based violence.

Schools are key in preventing sexual and gender-based violence: they’re one of the few institutions that reaches almost all young people.

Consent and respectful relationships sit within the broader relationships and sexuality education curriculum, which also includes education on sexual and reproductive health, sexuality and gender.

Relationships and sexuality education provides a platform to engage with young people during the years when they are likely exploring romantic and sexual relationships for the first time.

The purpose isn’t only to teach young people legal definitions of consent or the basics of safe sex. When done well, it helps to shape school culture, and reduces misogynist and harmful attitudes and behaviours in the school community.

What should happen next?

Relationships and sexuality education should provide opportunities for young people to engage critically with issues such as sexual ethics, gender stereotypes, power in relationships and the complexities of coercion.

These are complex and sensitive topics that require skilled teaching.

Our research suggests that effective and sustainable relationships and sexuality education will be most effective if teachers:

• are given dedicated professional training
• have access to evidence-based curriculum resources
• have opportunities to work collaboratively with other staff, including school-based adolescent health nurses, wellbeing teams and external specialist educators.

Schools should be supported to develop a whole-school approach to relationships and sexuality education, in which school leadership is engaged and all staff have some capacity to respond to issues relating to consent, respectful relationships and sexual wellbeing.

To make a sustained difference in the lives of young people, we need a nationally coordinated approach to relationships and sexuality. Better support for teachers and schools to deliver this is crucial. 

Jennifer Power, Principal Research Fellow, Australian Research Centre in Sex, Health and Society, La Trobe University and Lily Moor, Research Officer, Australian Research Centre in Sex, Health and Society, La Trobe University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Parents, schools and clubs regularly post images of children to social media platforms and websites.

While this may support connection with family and friends, promote school or sports activities or celebrate children’s achievements, there can be unintended consequences.

In its latest advice, the eSafety Commissioner notes how the rise of AI tools has “significantly escalated” safety risks around sharing photos and videos online.

On Tuesday, the eSafety Commissioner said it had seen a rise in reports of imagery harvested from school social media accounts or websites being used in AI-generated abuse.

What role do trusted adults play in making children visible online? And what should parents think about before they post images of their kids?

What are the rules?

Legally, parents can post almost any photo of their child online and authorise others to do the same. Abusive or exploitative photos are still subject to criminal law. But an average embarrassing moment likely falls short of “serious harm” outlined by the Online Safety Act.

But while Australian privacy laws treat these photos and videos primarily as personal information (and so up to parents to decide), research increasingly recognises the situation is more complex. In an old family album, a photo records a private memory. Online, it constructs a public identity.

Policy-makers are also starting to recognise that children’s right to participate in decisions applies to images shared online, particularly as they can remain there indefinitely.

France now requires parents to involve children in decisions about how they are portrayed online. New Spanish legislation gives more weight to protecting a child’s reputation than a parent’s right to expression.

The risks need consideration

Any photo can be edited into a nude photo, circulated on platforms as cyberbullying, used for sexual extortion, or amplified to wider audiences through algorithms.

A 2026 Adelaide University study suggests AI is used in one in four cases of image-based child sexual abuse. Yet public awareness is still low. For example, a 2026 eSafety Commissioner survey found only 11% of parents had spoken to their child about how generative AI can be used or misused.

The Australian Federal Police stresses the importance of education and awareness for parents, rather than fear.

Parents can take practical steps to protect their children’s safety when posting photos. This includes avoiding school logos, street names and front doors in photos posted online, and not including children’s names, ages and school years in captions.

In its new advice, eSafety also outlines how schools can safely share images by making conscious decisions that consider risks alongside potential benefits. Who is able to see this photo? What does the photo add? Are close ups needed?

Kids say they feel powerless

It is important to take these measures seriously because the consequences could be severe. However, that does not mean they are likely. The Adelaide University survey found 6.4% of those under 18 had experienced non-consensual image sharing.

Yet there is also a more widespread form of harm: lack of consent.

The Australian Information Commissioner suggests 86% of surveyed primary school children experienced a friend or parent sharing a photo they didn’t want shared.

Children have reported these experiences cause them to feel embarrassed, powerless and misrepresented. Research with First Nations children suggests greater control over how they are represented online supports positive identity and connection.

What can you ask yourself before posting online?

There is no single rule to determine whether an image should be shared. But we can gain useful guidance from the United Nations agency for children’s advice on media coverage and the Centre of Excellence for the Digital Child’s Manifesto for a Better Children’s Internet.

Based on these, and my decade of experience making images with children around the world, these four questions guide my thinking.

1. Why am I sharing this? Who is it really for?

Parents may post in the moment without thinking much about it. Or think lots about what their photos say about them.

Maybe your child is in fancy dress for a party, and you’re proud of their hairstyle or in hysterics at how badly it turned out.

Pause and ask yourself: who is the audience? What am I hoping this post communicates, and is that more about me or my child?

Your friends having a chuckle may not be in the child’s best interests. But if the child wants everyone to see their hair, posting could support their pride. You could exclude their face as an optional precaution.

2. What is the post saying about this child?

A photo of the kids pulling funny faces at the beach may seem like a pretty average image. But what else could it say without context?

If there has been a bit of bother at school lately, and others might see a lack of seriousness. If there has been a recent ADHD diagnosis, the image may enforce the stereotype of disruption. Or maybe they’ve experienced bullying, and this is a precious reminder they have pals.

We can’t control what people think. But we can ask the child about what’s going on in their world to consider the impact on them, and clarify what we mean with captions.

3. What happens once the image leaves my hands?

This is a difficult question to answer, as we don’t always have control over what happens to something once we post it online, or know how technology will evolve in future.

Ask yourself, who can currently access, download or screenshot the image? Could it be copied, repurposed or edited?

If your child later reconsiders their consent and doesn’t want it online, do the platform’s settings allow you to delete it?

4. Does this image need to be made public, or could it be shared a different way?

Perhaps you can just message the picture to a private family chat or group with friends. Or print a copy for your child to share with theirs, or treasure themselves.

Lauri Parr, Research Associate, School of Population Health, Curtin University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

You’re probably familiar with the idea that in the world of big tech, “we” are the product.

Our data is the currency being traded every time we navigate our social media feeds. Tech giants such as Apple, Google and Microsoft offer valuable services, but it comes at a price. They host our email, photos, backups, files, calendars, reminders and contacts.

If you also include all the smaller startups and niche solutions, you’ll quickly see your security cameras, electronic locks, home appliances and even your toothbrushing schedules are all online – far removed from any physical box or device that you have any control over.

But there is a way to break free from big tech. It’s called “self-hosting”.

Your life, online

Many of these large tech providers do a good job of securing your data and enabling you to access services across devices and platforms. They allow novice users with almost no technical skills to interact with and share their data at little cost.

However, being reliant on these companies isn’t risk-free.

Google, Amazon and Meta have been implicated in unexpected or questionable uses of data.

Having high-value data concentrated in well-established systems also provides cyber criminals and scammers with obvious targets to spam, imitate (spoof) or hack.

Users are also completely at the mercy of these companies should they decide to raise their fees, change their terms of service, or even discontinue access.

What exactly is self-hosting?

Self-hosting is a general catch-all term for taking control of your own data.

This shifts your data from big tech giants and moves it to self-managed applications. Your data is on your own systems and you have complete control over who can access it.

Many self-hosted applications are open-source and, thanks to community support, they can be relatively easy for a tech-savvy user to download and install.

Self-hosting isn’t new.

Squirrel Mail (a web-based email client) predated Gmail by several years. Gallery, a photo hosting application, came before Flickr and Picasa. Even WordPress was originally offered in 2003 as a self-hosted download before the WordPress.com blogging service became available in 2005.

Over the past decade, self-hosting has seen a rapid increase in the range of options available.

Today, moderately technical users can self-host a mind-boggling range of web-based applications, including media storage and sharing, blogs, websites, productivity and office apps, video conferencing, home automation and security, games and ad-blocking.

To get an idea of how much is out there, Awesome-Selfhosted publishes links to free and open-source self-hosted projects.

Self-hosting has also become more accessible with cheap, single-board computers such as the Raspberry Pi.

These tiny computers can be as small as a credit card and usually have lower-powered central processing units and no ability to expand memory, graphics or networking; they sacrifice computing “power” and flexibility for size, energy-efficiency and price.

Other common household network appliances such as network file storage, media servers and internet routers have become powerful enough that users can install custom applications to run many self-hosted services.

Another route to self-hosting is through device manufacturers such as umbrel and Zima, both of which provide physical hardware with dedicated self-hosting operating systems.

However, there is still a considerable learning curve for non-technical users.

Benefits and risks

Self-hosting provides freedom from big-tech, surveillance and/or costly subscriptions. It allows you to know exactly where your data is, and how it’s managed.

But it does come with some risks.

The most immediate risks come from technical mistakes and backup issues that can cause a self-hosted solution to lose data.

If your photo library is running on a single computer in your linen cupboard, you are reliant on that computer being powered up, backed up and available whenever you need it.

Similarly, any mistake you make in configuration or management could affect the availability of your data through access controls or even data erasure.

Another issue that users need to consider is whether they want their data available “on the move”. In most cases, home routers allow you to expose individual devices to the internet. This can allow you to access your self-hosted data while you are away from home. Unfortunately, if you can access your data, in most cases, so can cyber criminals.

Exposing self-hosted services in this way requires diligence, consideration and a certain level of expertise to minimise the risk of breaches – risks that may be amplified by poorly maintained applications.

Should I bother?

Self-hosting allows you to have greater control over how, when and by whom your data is used. For some, this is a vital requirement and worth the extra effort required to make it all work.

If you have an old computer available, why not give it a try? It may seem daunting, but self-hosting comes in many flavours, and you can choose how far you go with it.

Nikolai Hampton, School of Science, Edith Cowan University and Paul Haskell-Dowland, Professor of Cyber Security Practice, Edith Cowan University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

South Sudan is expected to hold an election on 22 December 2026, the first in the country’s history. It’s already been postponed twice, in 2022 and 2024.

A great deal is being said and written about whether or not there should be an election. But, having researched South Sudan’s post-war transition since the revitalised peace agreement was signed in 2018, I would argue that the real question is whether another extension would create the political conditions that previous delays failed to deliver.

South Sudan’s first national elections will almost certainly be imperfect. Few countries emerging from violent conflict hold flawless elections.

But another transition extension is even less likely to resolve the country’s underlying political problems. These include elite power struggles, weak institutions and unresolved security arrangements.

In my view, the transition has reached its limits. What’s needed to move ahead is a succession plan. Naming a running mate for President Salva Kiir could facilitate a political succession that would be less disruptive than an unplanned and sudden succession in the event that the transition gets prolonged again.

Unpreparedness is real

The National Election Commission announced the poll date six months in advance, as required by law. But neither the state of preparations nor the available funding made this look realistic.

Critics have warned that the country isn’t ready. Institutions remain weak. Insecurity persists across parts of the country and civic education is lacking. Cornerstones of the 2018 peace agreement – such as a permanent constitution and a joint army that integrates the armed opposition forces – aren’t in place.

The first vice-president – and potential presidential contender – Riek Machar remains detained and on trial for his role in armed fighting in Nasir, Upper Nile State, in March 2025.

Preparations are also falling behind. The current election law is flawed – for instance, it mistakenly provides for 105% of the seats in the national assembly – and voter registration hasn’t started.

The election commission has also decided to reuse the constituencies from Sudan’s 2010 elections. This has prompted legal objections that these boundaries don’t reflect reality in an independent South Sudan.

Unfinished business

The signing of the peace agreement in 2018 established a fragile power-sharing arrangement. It brought the country’s warring parties into a transitional government of national unity. General elections were intended to conclude the transition period.

Each extension was justified by the promise that additional time would allow completion of the key transitional tasks. That never happened. There is little reason to believe that another two or three years would produce a different outcome.

The biggest gaps in South Sudan at the moment are these:

• Constitution-making remains politically contested. South Sudan still operates under a transitional constitution from 2011. It largely reflects arrangements inherited from the pre-independence period. A permanent constitution is expected to define matters like the distribution of political power, the relationship between national and state authorities, the role of customary law, and how the country’s diversity is represented in the political system.

• Security sector reform has made only limited progress. A central provision of the peace agreement is the integration of government forces, the opposition and other armed groups into a unified military force. The aim is to reduce the risk of renewed conflict.

• Transitional justice processes haven’t started. These mechanisms are intended to investigate crimes committed during South Sudan’s civil war, and provide accountability and reconciliation. Senior political and military figures responsible for implementing these provisions could themselves become subjects of investigation. If indicted by the courts, they would be barred from holding public office. There has, therefore, been little political appetite to establish the processes.

The transition has turned into the main obstacle for these tasks to be completed. An election would make it possible to get on with the tasks by giving someone the authority.

The existing gaps have left the door open to unhelpful developments. The worst is the reproduction of kleptocratic and authoritarian structures.

The case for an election

One of South Sudan’s biggest challenges could be resolved by an election: the question of political succession in the executive.

The question looms large over South Sudan. Whether elections are held or postponed, it’s likely to be a source of political disruption.

Kiir has dominated South(ern) Sudanese politics for more than 20 years. Who could succeed him if he were no longer able to continue?

The transitional framework offers remarkably little certainty on this. Formally, the ruling party would need to name a successor. Nobody has been earmarked. Were succession to become an immediate political issue, the most likely consequence would be violent infighting within the ruling party.

Elections offer something that another extension cannot. They can force the ruling party – which, according to available political perception data, has a good chance to win both presidential and parliamentary elections even without rigging – to clarify the succession issue.

A presidential election would require the governing party to nominate a presidential candidate and a vice-presidential candidate endorsed by Kiir and party organs. Whoever occupies the vice-president position would be the leading and legitimised candidate to succeed should the presidency unexpectedly become vacant.

This does not eliminate political competition. It provides a far clearer and more legitimate succession pathway than the current transitional arrangements.

Those arguing against a poll being held point to the dangers of electoral violence. Election-related violence is a genuine risk. But postponing elections doesn’t necessarily reduce such risk.

Extending the transition again would instead deepen political uncertainty.

Perhaps the strongest argument for elections, however, comes from South Sudanese citizens themselves.

Nationwide survey research shows that around four in five South Sudanese support holding elections, even though most also recognise that violence remains a serious possibility.

This finding deserves greater attention than it usually receives. If most South Sudanese want elections, on what basis should political elites or international partners argue that they should wait?

What needs to be done

None of this means that elections can simply proceed. The financial, legal and practical preparation challenges are severe and will not be resolved overnight. An inter-party dialogue preparing the political ground for elections is a useful initiative. But this is unlikely to resolve the tensions with the main opposition forces behind Machar.

Recent suggestions by international partners like the European Union to discuss a short technical extension – for instance to March or April 2027 – or to hold executive and legislative elections separately are reasonable. But an indefinite postponement won’t lead the country anywhere.

Jan Pospisil, Researcher at the Austrian Institute for International Affairs

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.