I have an opinion piece in today’s Age, expanding on the theme of offensive internet content: do we need Rudd to step in and save us? I’m seeing more and more panic, fanned by the media, and a sense of proportion is quickly being lost.

This also continues on my new favourite theme, “Why should the Internet be any different?” I particularly dislike this sentence, often uttered by Senator Conroy, as it so clearly has a number of obvious answers explaining why the Internet is fundamentally different to other media. More on that later.

The online version of the piece is available here.

Conroy will be facing questions about the filter on ABC Radio National’s “Australia Talks” show at 6pm today, and I’ll be there to ask a few of my own.

There’s a piece by me today over on New Matilda on the Google/China fight. It’s nice to write about someone else’s filtering problems for once.

Have a read here.

It’s been a while since I’ve had the time to write fiction, but last time I did I had a lot of fun. I collaborated with Aidan and we wrote – difficult as it sounds – a humorous science fiction story called Working Holiday. The result was actually pretty good and was published in an anthology called “Australien Absurdities”. Now it’s seen the light of day again as an audio version over at the Dunesteef Audio Fiction podcast. They did a great job with the voices and effects, and I got a laugh out of it. They then to go on to discuss what commentary we could have been making about the Iraq war, which I thought was even funnier.

Have a listen here.

One test that the Government’s “clean feed” Internet censorship policy fails comprehensively is as the cyber-safety test. Does this deliver anything for kids? Over at Online Opinion, I argue no.

See the piece here.