As sodding 2022 finally ticked over to 2023, I did not bother making policy predictions for the year ahead. Really, this year, I just couldn’t be bothered. But while the year is still young, I’m going to do something different.
Since I signed off on my privacy book, I’ve been experiencing a surge of creative energy. It turns out that removing a weight that’s been hanging on one’s shoulders for three years does that. Who knew? While that energy is largely focused on my personal hobbies, I have been giving some thought to what sort of side project to do next.
New from me at Smashing Magazine:
To mark the publication of the hard copies of my book, I penned a few words on foundational privacy, or lack thereof; developer education, or lack thereof; and the grandstanding policymakers (and CEOs) looking for easy targets for blame.
Now tie that all together.
artist unknown.
“Getting rid of public policy people when you’re claiming to do ‘real free speech’ is the stupidest move ever.”
Audrey Herblin-Stoop,
ex-Twitter France public policy
My July blog post on the upcoming compliance obligations for everyone who is not big tech, under the Online Safety Bill, is exploding again. This is due to people sussing that any Mastodon instance which could conceivably be accessed by a precious British child will fall in scope of the OSB, which of course has no thresholds save for “big tech” and “everyone else on the planet”.
If you’ve been reading my book, and it hasn’t made you lose the will to live, you can thank Owen Gregory for that.
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I recognise that things have got a bit weird on the socials, so:
Although my days as a media contact through my jobs seem to be well behind me, I’m still on a lot of journalists’ contact lists. This has turned into an interesting experiment, as I’ve come to learn what it is they want to contact me about, thinking I am someone or something that I am not.
Now, anyone who has read my words or followed my professional advocacy work will have a fairly good idea of what I’m about – as well as what I am not about. There are issues that I clearly feel very passionately about which great journalists are aware of; in fact, here’s a piece I contributed to last week.
There are also issues about which I clearly DGAF, but when did that ever bother not-so-great journos?
So naturally, in weeks like this, it’s the stuff IDGAF about that not-so-great journalists contact me for.
I only choose friends who are brilliant, badasses, or brilliant badasses. You may have reached the part in my book where I exalt the deeds of one of them. This week I’ve had cause to exalt her again, but not for any reason she would have chosen.
I am completely focused on the imminent release of my book, and more than a little bit giddy about it. The ebook version is coming out this month, and the hard copy will follow in December at the speed of print logistics. It’s not too late to pre-order, if you haven’t already.
Writing a book – a proper, printed, published and edited book – is a completely different experience to anything else you will ever do. The emotional commitment, and the ups and downs, are just a small part of that. But me being me, there have been a few things which happened since the day I signed the contract that, well, are the kind of things that only happen to me. The kind that even if I tell you, you’re going to think “oh no way, she’s making that up”, because that’s easier to believe than the notion that they actually happened.
Here’s a little story about one of those, um, adventures. There are witnesses who were there, and who have their own stories to tell.
And oh, those stories will be far worse. Read More
