ER Report: Here is a summary of significant articles published on EveningReport.nz on March 26, 2026.
Jury finds Instagram and YouTube addictive in lawsuit poised to reshape social media – platform design meets product liability
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Carolina Rossini, Professor of Practice and Director for Program, Public Interest Technology Initiative, UMass Amherst The verdict in a Los Angeles courtroom on March 25, 2026, may become one of the most consequential legal challenges that Big Tech has ever faced. This is an inflection point in
‘Coral houses’ are dotted throughout the Pacific. Now scientists know exactly when they were built
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James L. Flexner, Senior Lecturer in Historical Archaeology and Heritage, University of Sydney The Mangareva Islands are about 1,600 kilometres southeast of Tahiti in French Polynesia. They get their name (which means “floating mountains”) from the way the sea spray breaking on the surrounding coral atolls, or
Time to buy local: war fuel price shocks reveal the folly of a long food supply chain
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kimberley Reis, Senior Lecturer, School of Engineering and Built Environment, Griffith University, Griffith University Most of our food travels many thousands of kilometres across Australia to reach our kitchens. We are highly dependent on a vast web of long-haul trucks to move food between growers, massive food
What can Australia do about reports of child criminal exploitation?
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Susan Baidawi, Associate professor, Monash University Across Australia, there is growing concern about young people not offending independently but allegedly being recruited, coerced and manipulated by adults into committing crime. Recent examples include: In Australia, data on child criminal exploitation remains absent. However, it’s a problem governments
More people are dying on Australian roads. This program could make drivers safer
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amanda George, Assistant Professor (Psychology), University of Canberra Deaths on Australian roads have increased every year since 2020. This is despite the Australian government’s commitment to Vision Zero – having zero deaths or serious injuries on our roads by 2050. Unfortunately, 1,317 road deaths were recorded in
Meta and Google just lost a landmark social media addiction case. A tech law expert explains the fallout
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rob Nicholls, Senior Research Associate in Media and Communications, University of Sydney Social media platforms Instagram and YouTube have a design defect which means they are addictive, a jury in the United States has ruled. The Los Angeles jury took nearly nine days to reach its verdict
Epstein cabal play games with human lives in Iran while grasping for unearned riches
COMMENTARY: By Kellie Tranter The actions of the Trump administration and its AIPAC-Israeli donors have reached new levels of immorality, illegality and unprecedented venality. It is almost universally accepted that the US-Israel attack on Iran had no justification under international law: it was simply a war of aggression and thus the commission of perhaps the
Donald Trump’s ‘new’ 15-point plan is the biggest sign yet that Washington fears it is losing this war
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bamo Nouri, Honorary Research Fellow, Department of International Politics, City St George’s, University of London The language of power often reveals more than it intends. In a rare moment of candour on March 7, the US president, Donald Trump, described the confrontation with Iran as “a big
Jürgen Habermas: a philosopher whose hopes for a better future are more important than ever
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Susan Smith, Honorary Professor of Geography, University of Cambridge It is impossible to capture seven decades of formidable intellect, wrapped into some 14,000 books and articles, in less than a thousand words. Yet German philosopher Jürgen Habermas staked his career on the power of dialogue and deliberation,
‘He will never be replaced’ – tributes flow for ‘fearless’ Vanuatu journalist Dan McGarry
RNZ Pacific Tributes are pouring in from across the region for “fearless” and “formidable” Vanuatu journalist Dan McGarry, who died on Wednesday. McGarry, 62, fell ill after a trip to Papua New Guinea earlier this month, from where he had to be evacuated to Brisbane to undergo a heart bypass. But he faced complications during
Kay Scarpetta led the trend for serial killer hunters. I love crime heroines – but she leaves me cold
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sue Turnbull, Honorary Professor of Communication and Media Studies, University of Wollongong Dr Kay Scarpetta, chief medical examiner of the Commonwealth of Virginia, made her fictional debut in Patricia Cornwell’s first crime novel, Postmortem, published in 1990. Cornwell had been both a police reporter and a morgue
A crucial meeting aims to remake the WTO to fit the new global order
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jane Kelsey, Emeritus Professor of Law, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau With the global rules-based order collapsing, the United Nations faces an existential crisis as the United States leads other countries in defunding and withdrawing from key agencies such as the World Health Organization. The World
Ancient texts and marital breakdown: Yann Martel’s Son of Nobody descends into implausibility
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Konstantine Panegyres, Lecturer in Classics and Ancient History, The University of Western Australia When I was a doctoral candidate at Oxford, I spent much of my time working in the papyrology rooms. Usually, my only company was the curator, a kind and learned Sardinian woman who is
Trump is remaking the US media in his own image – and smashing accountability with it
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rodney Tiffen, Emeritus Professor, Department of Government and International Relations, University of Sydney This is the point of absurdity we have reached: on March 15, US President Donald Trump, in a Truth Social post, asserted that American news organisations were running AI-generated Iranian propaganda, and should be
Soaring gas prices and disrupted supply chains will ripple out to increase costs in every store and sector of the economy
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Vidya Mani, Associate Professor of Business Administration, University of Virginia; Cornell University The disruptions from the U.S. and Israeli attacks on Iran spread quickly to commercial aircraft, shipping lanes and the world’s energy supply. Those repercussions have already hit fuel costs, including for motorists, truckers and fishermen,
Matt Brittin: BBC’s new director general appointed at an existential moment for the broadcaster
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Steven Barnett, Professor of Communications, University of Westminster The BBC has appointed former Google executive Matt Brittin as its new director general. Brittin will replace outgoing director general Tim Davie. He resigned last year in the wake of revelations about the editing of a Panorama documentary about
Giant dragonflies once roamed Earth’s skies. New research upends the textbook theory of why they went extinct
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Roger S. Seymour, Professor Emeritus of Physiology, Adelaide University Insects first took to the skies about 350 million years ago, some 200 million years before birds first flapped their wings. By the end of the Carboniferous period, 300 million years ago, some flying insects had become gigantic.
‘Manners for machines’: how new rules could stop AI scrapers destroying the internet
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By T.J. Thomson, Associate Professor of Visual Communication & Digital Media, RMIT University Australians are among the most anxious in the world about artificial intelligence (AI). This anxiety is driven by fears AI is used to spread misinformation and scam people, anxiety over job losses, and the fact
This medicinal cannabis website bends the rules. Take our quiz to see why
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christopher Rudge, Lecturer in Law, Sydney Law School, University of Sydney When the Queensland Dolphins ran onto the field in mid-April 2024, the rugby league team’s jerseys bore the logo of Alternaleaf – a “plant medicine” clinic. Earlier that week, the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) had commenced
Driving in the wrong direction: why NZ’s oil consumption is at a 5-year high
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robert McLachlan, Professor in Applied Mathematics, Te Kunenga ki Pūrehuroa – Massey University New Zealand’s latest quarterly energy report shows electricity production was above 90% renewable and emissions from generation fell to the lowest level on record. But it also shows New Zealand’s oil consumption, which had
