A lot of attention has been paid to the mischief done by “agentic” large language models (LLMs) on their own initiative. But the more immediate and commonplace danger is that AI will multiply and indulge existing human weaknesses. AI does not have to be super intelligent to provide an excuse for secretive and poor-quality government decision-making.

The robots are taking charge of healthcare, with assessments of NDIS and aged care patients’ needs being done by algorithms that can’t be held accountable.

Last week, when the Reserve Bank announced it had raised the cash rate to 4.85%, it also released its latest forecasts for the economy in its Statement on Monetary Policy. For those hoping for a recovery in lost living standards, the news was very grim.

For those in need, the article links to the Antipoverty Centre's ‘Mutual’ Obligations Survival Guide

The penalties were suspended more than two years ago, with two subsequent reports by the Commonwealth Ombudsman exposing unlawful cancellations and failings in the government’s approach to compensating affected people.

In August 2025, Commonwealth Ombudsman Iain Anderson recommended the government establish a compensation scheme.

A second report in December 2025 found the department’s remediation approach was unfair and unreasonable, warning that stigma against job seekers may also contribute to inadequate oversight of employment service providers.

There's been some discussions recently about how to fund open source, usually by abandoning it in some fashion. This is instead proposing that a "royalties" mechanism is established by existing repositories.

The submission, authored by co-chairs, El Gibbs and Dougie Herd, added the savings could be achieved through focusing on provider integrity, fraud enforcement and pricing reform – rather than cutting support services for Australians with disabilities.

“The community has, repeatedly, asked for that change to be done with us, not to us. The community has not been listened to in the design of this bill,” it said.

“The bill in its current form does material harm to current and future participants. It misrepresents the founding intentions of the NDIS. It inverts the [2023 NDIS] review on which the government relies. It demolishes the federated joint venture and concentrates unprecedented power in the Commonwealth minister.

“It is, on the government’s own admission, retrogressive against the rights framework the NDIS Act exists to give effect to. And it has been progressed under a timetable that breaches Australia’s binding obligation to consult.”

The committee was established in 2025 to advise the federal NDIS minister and state and territory disability ministers about the real-world impacts of any changes to the scheme.

Hi all,

I'm looking for a video I lost track of.

The video is fully narrated, the visuals are animated but only support the narration. The author describes their journey in the creative arts, as they graduated from a creative arts degree and attempted to find a job. They quickly found themselves locked out of the industry, being unable to find a job immediately, and being unable to either work independently or to polish their skills as they were unable to afford the software they needed, chiefly Autodesk Maya. They saved up for the software but by the time they had enough money it had transitioned to a subscription plan which was drastically more expensive.

The video went into depth on the economics of the subscriptions Autodesk offered, and the history of Autodesk and how it acquires and degrades software. It talked in depth about the state of software and subscriptions across the industry.

The animation consisted of an anthropomorphic cat as the author's self-insert, and alternated between showing real world things (like living in a small apartment with mostly just a computer) and visuals representing the feelings of the author throughout their experiences, like feeling small, or being caged or possibly being crushed. When necessary for communication the video showed web pages, both from the internet archive and present day to verify it's points on history, marketing and subscription fees.

The video was long form, likely 1-2 hours in length.

I've had no luck searching for it through google or youtube with any of the keywords autodesk, maya, cat, animation, subscription etc.

Even if you remember a word from the title or any details that can help me search that would be awesome.

Archive Link

Internal emails show months of unheeded warnings from the OAIC about overstated privacy claims in the government’s age check technology trial, which didn’t technically test or assess the products against Australian law.