Sydney Morning Herald: Google review author who defamed surgeon revealed as former student . “A decorated surgeon has won a defamation action against a former student who was unmasked as the author of an online patient review on Google that was posted under a pseudonym and falsely claimed the surgeon had ripped off patients.”
University of Queensland: Australia’s largest literary database hits one million records. “The University of Queensland’s AustLit project, to catalogue and celebrate Australia’s literary history, this week officially marks one million records. The milestone makes AustLit the only national bibliography of its scale in the world.”
Cosmos: Kaurna online: new website to help people learn the language . “The just-established Kaurna Warra website has a host of resources for learning and teaching the language, including courses, guides, and a dictionary. The website also features educational videos, an online shop, and even a few games in Kaurna, like Wordle and Solitaire.” Kaurna is an Indigenous language of Australia that was almost wiped out in the 19th century.
WA Today (Australia): Search engine pulls ads promoting controversial weight loss drug. “Shonky websites purporting to sell an in-demand Hollywood weight loss drug have been appearing above health warnings in Australian search engine results, as the regulator continues to crack down on the illegal sale of Ozempic.”
ArtsHub (Australia): Australian collection hits 4 million items. “There are not many collecting institutions in Australia that can boast over four million items. This week, the National Film and Sound Archive (NFSA) – which is located in Canberra – has done the numbers, and, thanks to a boost in collection acquisitions during 2022, it can now stand among a coterie of collections that are truly representative of Australian culture.”
Smithsonian Magazine: See Rare Images of Early 20th-Century Antarctic Expeditions. “A trove of historic images from early 20th-century Australian and British expeditions to Antarctica is officially available to the public, the National Archives of Australia (NAA) announced this week. Once held by the Australian Antarctic Division, the collection—hundreds of photos, lantern slides and glass plate negatives—has been transferred to the NAA.”
Reuters: Australia tells Twitter, Google to give information on handling online child abuse. “An Australian regulator has sent legal letters to Twitter and Google telling them to hand over information about their efforts to stop online child abuse, drawing them into a crackdown that has already put pressure on other global tech firms.”
ABC News (Australia): Adelaide woman wins second defamation case against Google over search results. “An Adelaide woman has won a second defamation case against Google, after a court found the search engine knowingly put derogatory comments about her online despite her winning $100,000 from the company in a similar case in 2015.”
Government of Australia: National Cultural Policy launched. “The policy will stimulate new employment and training opportunities, ensure creative workers can access fair remuneration and safe work environments, and that intellectual property rights of our creators are protected. It also recognises the crucial place of First Nations stories and the importance of self-determination.”
The Guardian: ACCC to crack down on misleading influencer endorsements across social media. “Australia’s consumer watchdog is taking a close look at more than 100 social media influencers after receiving tip offs that they might not be disclosing sponsored content.”
Sydney Morning Herald: ‘An ethical and moral imperative’: One woman’s quest to save Australia’s dying songs. “Australia sits at the centre of an extraordinary web of linguistic and cultural diversity. More than 2000 of the world’s 6000 languages are spoken in Australia, the South Pacific and South-East Asia. Within the next 100 years, the number is predicted to dwindle to just a few hundred as communities age, traditions break down, and the climate crisis claims islands across the Pacific. The archive contains field recordings from the village of Tahal Nessa on Paama Island – a part of Vanuatu that is no longer inhabitable due to climate change.”
Curtin University: Everyday Aussies’ social media posts help find missing plant species . “Scientists have identified six new or rediscovered Western Australian plant species from photos taken and uploaded to the internet by members of public, including a nature photographer from Jurien Bay, a pair of wildflower enthusiasts from Dongara and a farmer from near the Stirling Range National Park.”
Cosmos: Trove in trouble: why does it cost money to keep the resource online?. “The online database Trove may go offline in the middle of the year without additional funding. Trove, which is owned and operated by the National Library of Australia (NLA), is a free resource which provides access to billions of digital documents, images, media and records of physical documents. It also contains millions of digitised Australian newspaper pages and issues.”
ABC News (Australia): Murray River flood photos on social media to help create archive for future planning. “When water levels along the South Australian stretch of the river started increasing in mid-to-late 2022, so too did the number of photographs capturing the changing landscape. Multiple social media pages dedicated to sharing visual updates of floodwaters have gained thousands of audience members far and wide.”
ABC News (Australia): National galleries and museums hopeful for May budget cash lifeline after Anthony Albanese labels them ‘starved of funds’. “The nation’s largest cultural institutions are hopeful the prime minister’s suggestion they have been ‘starved of funds’ in recent years will be followed with hefty cheques in the next federal budget, due in May.”
