Jarrod Watt

A great companion piece to Doctorow's analysis of the generative AI bubble: an historical perspective on the massive boom and bust as a result of the arrival of the tech gamechanger we know as "electricity" theconversation.com/todays-ai-hy...

China’s most infamous ghost town is now training ground for driverless trucks The empty boulevards that once symbolized the mainland’s property bust now serve as testing grounds for hundreds of autonomous vehicles.

How to recycle an abandoned city: fascinating feature from Kinling Lo on how one ghost town left from China's real estate collapse has been repurposed into a training ground for autonomous trucks and ride-hailing services. restofworld.org/2025/china-o...

Harry Harrison lights up over new labelling rules for cigarettes in Hong Kong: today’s cartoon

Cory Doctorow off the long run-up with quality AI analysis: “So, you're saying a third of the stock market is tied up in seven AI companies that have no way to become profitable and that this is a bubble that's going to burst and take the whole economy with it?" pluralistic.net/2025/09/27/e...

East coast humpback numbers are now higher than pre-whaling levels Once hunted almost to extinction, the population of humpback whales currently migrating down Australia's east coast has bounced back and is now greater than before whaling.

...and the good news today is that 62 years after banning the hunting and harvesting of humpback whales for their oil, there are now more than 50,000 - bouncing back from just 150 remaining when the ban was finally put in place. www.abc.net.au/news/science...

Harry Harrison charges up for the lantern parade in Hong Kong: today’s Mid Autumn Festival cartoon

Israel is paying influencers $7,000 per post Netanyahu referred this week to a 'community' pushing out preferred messaging in US media — and boy are they making a princely sum

Wumao? Forget 50 cents... "Being paid by Israel to post on social media is also very lucrative. According to previously unreported recent documents... influencers are likely being paid around $7,000 per post on... Tik Tok & Instagram on behalf of Israel." responsiblestatecraft.org/israel-influ...

Inside Meta's fight to change climate reality... all so it can frantically expand a risky AI program Everyone is ignoring the science on what Meta’s generative AI investment really costs, even though there's no evidence of a single, significant societal benefit.

Quality summary of the current situation involving big tech, power demands of AI and the emissions/climate crisis www.crikey.com.au/2025/10/03/m...

Harry Harrison's cartoon on the hilarious case of the Waterbomb Hong Kong music festival being cancelled due to a forecast of gravity powered water from a passing typhoon

Head slap or fingers crossed? Cathy Wilcox assesses the news on Gaza in today's cartoon

Benjamin Netanyahu has outmanoeuvred yet another American president For all US President Donald Trump's boasts about ending wars and being a worthy candidate for a Nobel Peace Prize, he has failed to end the war in Gaza and build a sustainable future for both Israelis...

A peace plan for Gaza announced by "... a president of the US who has supplied many of the bombs that have been destroying Gaza, next to a prime minister of Israel for whom the International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant for possible war crimes." www.abc.net.au/news/2025-09...

HK restaurant trendjacks viral video of food-stealing couple A Mong Kok eatery has trendjacked with a video highlighting greedy behaviour after a couple was caught attempting to take excess food from an all-you-can-eat hot pot spot in Tsuen Wan.

Hong Kong hotpot heist: “Upon inspection, the staff discovered several packs of instant noodles, a large quantity of shrimp, oysters, crab, beef, and some of the shrimp were still alive.” www.marketing-interactive.com/hk-restauran...

Harry Harrison with a new style of Hong Kong hotpot following viral video of people pocketing ingredients: today’s cartoon

Harry Harrison’s cartoon illustrates the Hong Kong housing gap between policy and reality

The TV president vs Portlandia: “The president, however, apparently deceived by video of a handful of protesters gathered outside the Ice facility in a south-west Portland neighborhood broadcast by conservative outlets, insisted that the city has been in non-stop “anarchy” since 2020..”

Could PLA’s AI-powered kill web evolve to a Skynet? China’s battlefield network can deform under attack and reassemble to original state even after huge damage, making it almost unbreakable.

Hilarious article in which the author shows clearly a) he’s never seen the Terminator films and what happens to humanity and b) is unaware of why the US military developed Arpanet in the 1970s
www.scmp.com/news/china/s...

Defiant Netanyahu Denounces Palestine Recognition, to a Mostly Empty U.N. Hall

Israel is now a pariah state, due to its own actions - and this will only change when its remaining supporters acknowledge and address its crimes

China launches campaign to keep killjoys off the internet - BBC News Pessimistic social media posts may now be targets of a fresh crackdown by the Chinese government.

Years after China’s GenZ made “laying flat” and “garbage time” popular terms online in response to the highest youth unemployment in decades, some action: Beijing is banning posts that "excessively exaggerate negative and pessimistic sentiments".
www-bbc-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/www.bbc....

House Democrats release partial Epstein records referencing Musk, Gates and Prince Andrew The pages from Epstein’s schedule show he was in touch with prominent figures like Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Steve Bannon and Peter Thiel. There is no evidence those people knew about how Epstein was sex...

Is not just Trump who wants people to stop talking about Epstein... “The pages from Epstein's schedule show he was in touch with prominent figures like Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Steve Bannon and Peter Thiel.” www-pbs-org.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/www.pbs....

Harry Harrison pops down to recently restocked supermarkets in Hong Kong for some post-typhoon regret: today’s cartoon

Exclusive: Chinese drone experts worked with sanctioned Russian arms maker, sources say Reuters is the first to report specific details of the extensive involvement of Chinese experts in tests and technological work on military-use drones inside Russia.

Chinese drone experts have flown to Russia to conduct technical development work on military drones at a state-owned weapons manufacturer that is under Western sanctions, according to two European security officials and documents seen by Reuters.

Once upon a previous century I may have played ruck for the Megahertz... seeing how this event has grown makes me very happy

'Death by bullying': NSW mum wins standing ovation for speech at UN event Australia's willingness to take on the social media giants is drawing significant international interest, winning the support of the European Commission president at a forum in New York.

Anything else happen at the UN apart from Trump having a tantrum over an escalator, failed teleprompter and Gaddafi-style speech ? Oh yes. A mother from Bathurst got a standing ovation for her speech about bullying & social media that lead to her daughter's suicide. www.abc.net.au/news/2025-09...

Xi notes 'some countries are against' climate change trend after announcing landmark pledge Outlining China's new carbon targets in a video link to the UN climate conference in New York, President Xi Jinping says "green and low carbon transition is the trend of our time".

"...President Xi Jinping said "green and low carbon transition is the trend of our time... a day after US President Donald Trump called climate change "the greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world..." www.abc.net.au/news/2025-09...

Together: Australian film altered in China to make gay couple straight A scene featuring a same-sex couple was digitally altered to depict a heterosexual couple.

"An Australian film that was digitally altered to change a same-sex couple to a heterosexual one has drawn backlash from moviegoers in China." With quotes from Chinese social media and: "the film's Chinese distributor, Hishow, who has yet to comment on the matter." www.bbc.com/news/article...

Hong Kong deals with the aftermath of Typhoon Ragasa: Harry Harrison’s cartoon

Nothing brings out Hong Kong ingenuity quite like a typhoon.

Harry Harrison has an idea of the real reason Hong Kong people buy all that masking tape before a typhoon: today's cartoon

Two photos posted on the SCMP typhoon live blog this morning that have me asking: "what happened next?"
www.scmp.com/news/hong-ko...