Jess Perriam

Gave a talk this morning about how AI FOMO isn't a strategy and several Qs afterwards were asking if may be FOMO *should* be the driving force. But if 89% of the public think proven safety should come first, then it feels like a good idea to respect that

I thought about that a lot – 24 essays by 24 contributors A new anonymous essay published every day in December in the countdown to Christmas.

I don’t know what algorithmic magic pushed ‘I Thought About That A Lot’ under my nose a few weeks ago. But I’m glad they did. It’s an anonymous essay a day in the lead up to Christmas. An essay advent calendar, if you will. And it’s great. www.ithoughtaboutthatalot.com

A pair of meta ray-ban glasses as a gift suggestion “For Fans of AI and Blanket Digital Surveillance”

Is… The New Yorker ok? If you have fans of digital surveillance on your gift list, may I suggest backing away slowly?

Deloitte to pay money back to Albanese government after using AI in $440,000 report Partial refund to be issued after several errors were found in a report into a department’s compliance framework

Yep, here’s the Australian case of this happening: www.theguardian.com/australia-ne...

I’m only partway through II, no spoilers!

“The debt of gratitude Australians owe CSIRO for Aeroguard alone can never be repaid. Which is why it’s so alarming to watch its funding – and its people – bleed away,” writes Ebony Bennett, Deputy Director at The Australia Institute.

Read the full op-ed: australiainstitute.org.au/post/who-nee...

Book club nerds of Canberra unite!

Australia news live: Husic says ‘driest minds’ in treasury and finance need to see science as an investment not a cost after CSIRO jobs slashed
👏🏼 Preach. Don’t they know the fine folks at CSIRO invented WiFi?👏🏼

Statecraft, Sovereignty and Digital Government A two-day symposium, 16-17 April, 2026, Goldsmiths, University of London (Submission deadline: 12 December, 2025)

This is the symposium we’re organising. Pls send your finest abstracts by 12 Dec: www.gold.ac.uk/media-commun...

I’m also happy to guest lecture on #digitaltransformation #publicsector #feministSTS etc.

Hello EU/UK #STS and #digitalsociology folks! I’ll be in the area in April 2026 to host a symposium in London and am looking for some side trips to make it worth the CO2. If you or your research group have a symposium / workshop / conference etc worth my time then I’d love to hear from you.

To be clear, you’re not texting with Jesus. You’re texting with a conversational AI bot built by a human with *their* understanding of who Jesus is. Just seems a little bit icky.

It’s a hard no from this card carrying Anglican and digital sociologist.

This same report says that the Dutch government had the concept of ‘Freedom through Connectedness’. Ie. Freedom to contact or be contacted by gov in a preferred form, but reiterating the social contract of connectedness between gov & citizen. #goals

I’m currently reading a benchmarking report about digital government from the year 2000 and it’s rather jarring reading about the internet and pre-euro currencies in one document.

Obligatory Aurora Australis pics 💁🏻‍♀️

Data colonialism in the most literal sense

Meta is earning a fortune on a deluge of fraudulent ads, documents show Meta projected 10% of its 2024 revenue would come from ads for scams and banned goods, and it internally estimates that its platforms show users 15 billion scam ads a day, company documents show.

When deception’s more profitable than honesty, users lose.

Internal documents suggest that Meta earns $3.5B(!) every 6 mo. from scam ads, revealing a deeper systemic problem: the economic incentive to tolerate “higher legal risk” content still outweighs any penalty. www.reuters.com/investigatio...

A dirty mortarboard that been fished out of a creek is placed on a rock next to a creek crossing

A soggy mortarboard fished out the creek is surely a metaphor for something. Just not sure what 🤔

On this very day, the 1st of November I heard the first Christmas song blared over the speakers at the shopping centre. Thankfully it wasn’t Last Christmas so I didn’t lose Whamageddon before it even started 😑

Book launch o’clock! DOUBLE book launch o’clock! Anna Munster’s ‘Deep Aesthetics’ and Adrian Mackenzie’s ‘1000 Platforms’.

Is there a secret ANT nerd behind this hotel?

Took me long enough!

I attended an event yesterday about creative bureaucracy and I posed the question to senior public servants on the panel: Creativity is perceived as something only middle/upper class have the luxury of doing. How do you give licence for all your staff or colleagues to be creative in their roles?

9) If I'm feeling sad or anxious, bookshops are a calming influence. Books are healing.

8) I have two workplaces. One has a decent coffee machine and the other has a very, very good ice cream shop across the road. They are sadly very far apart from one another so I cannot combine the two.

7) I send postcards to random strangers. I take part in a project called Postcrossing and I was interviewed by The Guardian about it.

6) I sing soprano in two choirs. No, I'm not a soloist. I don't aspire to be one either. But I love the challenge of the music and the satisfaction of working together to make a good sound.

5) Having grown up in Western Australia, I am legally required to like and enjoy spearmint flavoured milk. This is not a hardship.

4) Jeg taler rigtig godt nok dansk. Jeg boede i Danmark mellem 2020 og 2023... helt pandemien tiden! Jeg er flydlene i trashdansk, fx. dansk du taler når du er i pubben. (I speak pretty good Danish, I lived in Denmark between 2020-2023 total pandemic time! I'm fluent in trashdansk, eg. pub Danish)