CAMERON WILSON

what's your email address? the stuff i'm about to send can't be posted publicly

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i wrote for the Sizzle today about how the "monitoring the situation" impulse is a form of information gooning:

thesizzle.com.au/p/a...

kudos to the tech comms person who came up with "we don't sell your data"! it's done an incredible job of placating people's fears about surveillance, while actually not denying it (adtech companies don't sell troves of data, they sell access to the users targeted using that data)

what a world

every time I, an Australian, see AI companies promise not to let their tools be used for mass ~domestic~ surveillance:

now these are the big questions

Subscribe | The Sizzle Australia's favourite daily technology email newsletter written by Cam Wilson.

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i wrote for the sizzle how someone learned the hard way that "paying your taxes" is part of OPSEC thesizzle.com.au/p/a...

haven't had a chance to sizzle about this yet but Nilay Pital on the Vergecast had a good take about how irresponsible it is for the biggest android phone maker to put AI image generating(/altering) tools at the OS level.

Australia is getting a AI Safety Institute. So, what does the government think is the biggest risk from AI?

Is it catastrophic threats like Skynet, current issues like deepfakes or squandering AI's potential with red tape?

I wrote about the jockeying over what AISI will do: www.crikey.com.au/20...

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Australia is getting a AI Safety Institute. So, what does the government think is the biggest risk from AI?

Is it catastrophic threats like Skynet, current issues like deepfakes or squandering AI's potential with red tape?

I wrote about the jockeying over what AISI will do: www.crikey.com.au/20...

i know there's some employee outcry, but it's stunning that Silicon Valley tech leaders have been muted or completely silent about the Trump administration bullying a tech company and, since it refused, trying to destroy it (especially given their vocal criticism of the Biden admin's conduct)

just realised: Australian teens could use this to get around the social media ban when it's up and running lmao

Hey, countries mulling a teen social media ban: Australia doesn’t know if ours works yet If you ignore what the politicians are saying, the official position of the regulator is that we don't know if the ban is helping our kids yet. That shouldn't be controversial, but it should be on the minds of those thinking about following us.

Relevant to news that the UK will first run a pilot of the teen social media ban, I wrote about Australia's evaluation of its own ban.

This study is an admission about the unknown impacts of the ban. (Outside of politics, it's a good thing to admit you're uncertain!)

no shortage of work either

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On top of the Iran conflict, the Trump admin also declared war on AI company Anthropic. I wrote in the Sizzle today how the US government's promise to declare the Claude-maker a 'supply chain risk' threatens to put Australia's government in a tough spot.

thesizzle.com.au/p/t...

me: so what's this ai stuff all about
the world's most divorced guys: where to begin

i'm not familiar

Here's a sentence that I didn't expect to write today:

Woolworths says that it will stop its AI phone assistant, Olive, from mentioning its "mother" to people ringing up about their grocery deliveries.

thesizzle.com.au/p/w...

i'm sorry i'm trying to be open minded and nice but the ai guys make it too easy

(Bloomberg) -- The global smartphone market will contract 12.9% in 2026 because of the unprecedented memory chip shortage, marking “a crisis like no other,” according to researcher IDC. The new forecast, a dramatic revision down from earlier estimates, gives the latest accounting of the ongoing memory crunch that’s affecting every corner of the electronics industry. The demand for advanced memory to power artificial intelligence tasks has drained global supply until well into next year and now jeopardizes the business model of many smartphone makers. IDC now sees roughly 1.1 billion mobile shipments in 2026, down from 1.26 billion the prior year and erasing years of gradual gains. Smartphone manufacturers are adapting to the elevated component costs by reining in specifications, eliminating unprofitable entry-level models and pushing consumers to buy more premium devices. “The tariffs and pandemic crisis seem a joke compared to this,” said IDC Senior Research Director Nabila Popal. “The smartphone market will witness a seismic shift by the time this crisis is over — in size, average selling prices and competitive landscape. We don’t expect the situation to ease up until mid-2027, at least.”

No public link for this yet, buy W O O F that's a big number

woke 2 is here

Subscribe | The Sizzle Australia's favourite daily technology email newsletter written by Cam Wilson.

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g̶a̶m̶b̶l̶i̶n̶g̶ 'prediction market' company Kalshi disclosed that it had caught two people doing insider betting. I wrote in today's Sizzle how these platforms are directly threatening the integrity of both the important things and the fun things

thesizzle.com.au/p/p...

Here's a sentence that I didn't expect to write today:

Woolworths says that it will stop its AI phone assistant, Olive, from mentioning its "mother" to people ringing up about their grocery deliveries.

thesizzle.com.au/p/w...

An Australian company's global gig workers are training AI for U.S. spy planes

By @cameronwilson.bsky.social

Appen recruits workers around the world—including from refugee camps in Kenya—to transcribe and label audio in languages like Somali. That data has then been sold to U.S. Air Force units.