What a scathing take on Netflix

Over the past decade, Netflix, which first emerged as a destroyer of video stores, has developed a powerful business model to conquer television, only to unleash its strange and destructive power on the cinema. In doing so, it has brought Hollywood to the brink of irrelevance. Because Netflix doesn’t just survive when no one is watching — it thrives.

Film studios have always released duds: movies that fail to gain traction and are shuttled to the studios’ archives, where they disappear into obscurity. Until recently, for most studios, a forgotten film was a sign of failure. But Netflix, uniquely, seemed to relish making its films vanish as soon as they were released, dumping them onto its platform and doing as little as possible to distinguish one from the next.

There’s also a searing criticism on the “Typical Netflix Movie” having a generic approach that one can spot fairly easily

The editors of these films seem to have just given up, too. The cutting between shots is frenetic. The lighting is terrible. The TNM looks both oversaturated and flat, with the blacks brightened and the highlights dulled, a result of Netflix’s insistence that its originals be shot with powerful digital cameras that compress poorly on viewers’ laptops and televisions. (Netflix might be the first studio in Hollywood history to consistently make daylight look bad.)

They also scorched the executives for the amount of garbage production they push out

But high output alone can’t account for Netflix’s garbage quality. In the 1920s and ’30s, studios like Paramount and Warner Bros. put out as many as seventy movies per year. Around its peak in the ’90s, Miramax tried releasing a new film almost every week. The difference between Netflix and its predecessors is that the older studios had a business model that rewarded cinematic expertise and craft. Netflix, on the other hand, is staffed by unsophisticated executives who have no plan for their movies and view them with contempt.

Closing this with questions from a Hollywood producer:

“What are these movies?” the Hollywood producer asked me. “Are they successful movies? Are they not? They have famous people in them. They get put out by major studios. And yet because we don’t have any reliable numbers from the streamers, we actually don’t know how many people have watched them. So what are they? If no one knows about them, if no one saw them, are they just something that people who are in them can talk about in meetings to get other jobs? Are we all just trying to keep the ball rolling so we’re just getting paid and having jobs, but no one’s really watching any of this stuff? When does the bubble burst? No one has any fucking clue.”

Lots more in the article.

Apple’s billion dollar Indonesian drama

The Apple investment saga in Indonesia highlights the tension between government ambitions, expectations, and the realities of global business strategies.

Tirto published an article about what’s happening with the Apple investment story in Indonesia with quotes and statements from government officials and analysts. It wouldn’t be the Indonesian government if it didn’t generate drama out of foreign relations or commercial arrangements worthy of a telenovela.

A few things about this drama. Apple has yet to deposit or realize the last $14 million of its $100 million investment commitment made in 2016. It’s chump change for the company but necessary to unlock the permit for the latest iPhones and end the sales ban which the government enacted last year because of it. Only Apple knows definitively why they haven’t delivered on this. Meanwhile there’s been no update on the status of the Bali Apple Academy, announced by Tim Cook in April on his visit to the country. This fourth Academy in the country is likely to be part of the unrealized investment.

Indonesia has also been on Apple’s sales performance radar for a few years now having posted consecutive quarterly sales increases and mentioned specifically during multiple financial calls, so it’s in Apple’s best interest to keep the momentum going. The country makes roughly 50 million Android phones a year mainly for the domestic market, and 85% of phone imports in 2023, or 2.3 million of them, worth around $2 billion, were iPhones. The government is keen to reduce this foreign spending by getting Apple to make phones locally.

Armed with this information and situation, the Indonesian government decided to increase pressure on the company to make good on their promise and weaponised it to force them to eventually offer an investment worth a billion dollars late last year.

Political ego meets business reality

Expecting companies to invest in Indonesia just because they’re doing well in sales ignores the realities of running a sustainable business. Sure, it’s fair to want businesses to contribute to the markets they profit from, but investments can’t be driven by sales numbers alone. They need to make sense, whether it’s about supply chains, regulations, or long-term viability. Pressuring companies to invest without considering these factors often leads to rushed, unsustainable decisions that end up costing everyone in the long run.

That said, there’s room for a balanced approach. Instead of tying investments directly to sales, Indonesia could focus on creating conditions that make investing worthwhile, like improving infrastructure, offering clear incentives, and ensuring regulatory stability. This way, companies can contribute meaningfully without being forced into decisions that don’t align with their business goals. Fair contributions are important, but they should come from partnerships built on mutual benefit, not pressure. Otherwise, it’s just a short-term fix with a long-term price tag.

Apple’s Vietnamese success

Indonesian officials and analysts love to compare Apple’s meager investment in the country with the $16 billion Apple already spent in Vietnam since 2019. The company has 26 suppliers and 28 factories in the country as of 2022 and they announced in April that they will spend much more.

Apple didn’t invest in Vietnam because the market loves the iPhone so much, they’be been investing for years and each time increasing their commitment because the government offer attractive investment opportunities and incentives, provide a stable and consistent environment for businesses, deliver the necessary labor force, and ensure long term investment and production sustainability and security despite political upheavals. Not to mention the factories are mostly located near China which allows them to maintain a streamlined supply chain operation. Indonesia doesn’t have that advantage.

Vietnamese mobile developers also took up the Apple platforms because they saw opportunities, not because they were pushed or coaxed into the platforms. They didn’t need an Apple Academy to get developers going. Most Indonesian developers and companies only see opportunities based on local sales numbers and market size. They don’t see beyond the domestic market. That’s why it was a struggle to find quality Mac and iOS apps and developers from Indonesia before the Academies opened.

By the way

The article also mentioned about the Ministry of Industries spokesperson saying that Apple submitted their investment proposal over WhatsApp. It sounds like the government wants to shame Apple for sending such an important document over a chat app but the country runs almost entirely on WhatsApp. Comms within and across government ministries and agencies are done almost exclusively on the platform, with letterhead documents for official records.

What are the chances that they sent it that way because they were told to submit the document ASAP and the paper doc would follow after, and that they haven’t managed to schedule the meeting with the Ministries because November and December are holiday months for the company? I mean, if it’s that important, Tim Cook could get a few execs to drop their holiday plans and make the meeting but it seems that the urgency of this deal has yet to reach that critical level.

Indonesia 2045: Between Dreams and Reality

A personal take on potential, promise, paradox, and pragmatism

Growing up in Indonesia, I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve heard the phrase “future superpower.” It’s a narrative that’s been woven into our national fabric, a story we tell ourselves about our destiny. As we approach 2045, our centennial of independence, this narrative has taken on new urgency. But we’ve watched years of grand visions collide with stubborn realities, so you can’t be hopeful about this country without a healthy dose of skepticism, probably much more than you might think.

Let’s talk about numbers first, because they tell an interesting story. By 2045, we’re projected to be home to 324-326 million people, up from today’s 284 million. Our GDP per capita could nearly triple from $4,900 to somewhere between $12,000-15,000 or optimistically, above $20,000 as set out by the government in their Digital Indonesia Vision 2045. The middle class could expand from roughly half the population to nearly 80%. These aren’t just numbers, they represent millions of individual dreams, aspirations, and potential futures.

But here’s where it gets complicated.

The Promise and the Paradox

Indonesia in 2024 is a study in contrasts. We’re a nation where gleaming skyscrapers rise above Jakarta’s perpetually flooded streets, where digital payments are ubiquitous yet basic infrastructure remains patchy, where tech unicorns coexist with traditional markets. Our youth are increasingly global in outlook while remaining deeply rooted in local traditions. It’s these contrasts that make both our potential and our challenges so fascinating.

The good news is substantial. Our digital transformation is real and accelerating. Barring any technological or societal collapse, practically everyone would have access to to the internet by 2045. Our demographic dividend provides a workforce that could power decades of growth. The country’s strategic location between the Pacific and Indian Oceans positions us perfectly for a time where maritime trade routes are increasingly crucial.

But, and there’s always a but, the challenges are equally substantial.

The Reality Check

Corruption isn’t just a governance issue, it’s a cultural challenge that has proven remarkably resistant to reform. Our corruption perception index, measured by Transparency International, had gone from 34 in 2014 to 34 in 2023. To be fair, it hadn’t been flat, in fact it went up by the end of Jokowi’s first term to 40, which is a good thing, but it fell back to 34 in 2022 and stayed there, while in terms of ranking we fell five spots. In 20 years, who knows where it will be, because it’s such a deeply rooted problem. Regional disparities remain stark as what’s true for Jakarta isn’t true for Bandung or Medan, let alone Denpasar, Pontianak, or anywhere else in the archipelago, and the gap isn’t closing as quickly as it needs to be.

The environmental challenges are particularly daunting. Rising sea levels threaten our coastal cities, especially our main cities like Jakarta and Surabaya. Deforestation continues despite commitments to the contrary. Our renewable energy transition, while accelerating from 12% to a projected 30-35% by 2045, may not be fast enough to meet climate challenges.

The Global Stage

This is where things get really interesting. By 2045, the global order will have shifted dramatically. China and India will likely be the world’s largest economies. The Indo-Pacific region will be the center of global economic gravity. Where does Indonesia fit in this new world?

Our potential role is significant. As the unofficial leader of ASEAN, a G20 member, a BRICS partner, and the world’s largest Muslim-majority democracy, our diplomatic leverage ought to count for something, more significantly than it is right now. Our economy could be the world’s 4th or 5th largest by 2045. Our cultural influence, from cuisine to creative industries, is growing.

But here’s the cynical part: we’ve heard all this before. The question isn’t about potential, we’ve always had that, we are the sleeping Asian tiger after all. The question is about execution.

The Balancing Act

Our foreign policy challenges exemplify this complexity. We’re navigating between China and the US, between regional leadership and domestic development, between economic sovereignty and global integration. We’re trying to be everyone’s friend while advancing our own interests, a challenging diplomatic dance that will only get more complex.

By 2045, Indonesia could be:

  • A regional power with global influence
  • A key player in global supply chains
  • A leader in environmental and climate diplomacy
  • A cultural and religious bridge between East and West

Or we could be:

  • Still struggling with basic governance issues
  • Caught in the middle-income trap
  • Vulnerable to climate change and environmental degradation
  • Left behind in the global technology race

The Hope and the Hurdle

What makes me cautiously optimistic? The resilience that’s evident. The youth’s entrepreneurial spirit. The way we’ve maintained a semblance of unity despite diversity that would tear many nations apart. Our ability to adapt and evolve while maintaining our core identity.

What keeps me up at night? The persistence of old problems. The way corruption seems to adapt faster than anti-corruption measures. The environmental clock that’s ticking ever louder. The risk that we might miss our demographic dividend window while we’re still sorting out basic educational challenges.

Looking Forward

By 2045, if I’m still around, I’ll be old enough to have seen this entire journey unfold. Will we look back at this moment as the turning point where we finally converted potential into reality? Or will we still be talking about being a “future” superpower?

The truth probably lies somewhere in between. We’re likely to see significant progress, higher incomes, better infrastructure, more global influence. But we’re also likely to face continued challenges with governance, inequality, and environmental sustainability.

The Personal Stakes

This isn’t just about national statistics or global rankings. It’s about the kind of future we’re creating for the next generation. It’s about whether my kids will have to leave the country to find opportunities, or whether they’ll be able to build their dreams right here.

The Indonesia of 2045 won’t be a utopia. But it doesn’t need to be. It just needs to be better, more just, more sustainable, more prosperous, than today. It’s certainly achievable but my skepticism tells me it’s not going to be what it needs to be. I mean, ten years ago we all had expected so much more under Jokowi and yet here we are with a middle class crunch and facing further economic challenges.

The country is not going to be the superpower some dream of, never will. But it needs to be something perhaps more valuable, a nation that has found its own path to progress, balancing tradition with modernity, economic growth with sustainability, global influence with local wisdom.

That’s a future some people think they’re working to achieve while others are seemingly working to ensure something else happens.

A Final Thought

We need to stop thinking about Indonesia as a “future” superpower and start thinking about it as a present responsibility. The future isn’t something that happens to us, it’s something we build, decision by decision, day by day.

We’ll definitely not get everything right and will certainly face setbacks and challenges, and as always, the country isn’t defined by its challenges but by its response to those challenges.

Funnily enough when you look back, how the country responded to challenges will not be enough and will instead predictably stunt its own growth because what is disappointment if not Indonesian politicians and their lack of willingness to put aside personal greed over national gain? Not to mention the seeds of conflicts that seem to be consistently sowed. 

Will the country grow and get better? I mean look at the progress that’s happened over the last 20 years. We’ve got better infrastructure, strong economic growth, improved social welfare, but corruption, inequality, and institutional fragility continue to hinder progres. Our democracy keeps regressing and there are active efforts within the government and among the people ourselves, to return the country into authoritarianism and take away people’s rights.

Golden Indonesia by 2045? Tell ‘em they’re dreaming.

Indonesia’s big tech dream among broken systems

Bloomberg has a piece criticizing the way the Indonesian government has forced Apple to invest a billion dollars and make a commitment to build a factory or two in the country.

Using a protectionist playbook to get companies to build factories could end up sidelining Southeast Asia’s largest economy when neighbors are rolling out the red carpet for investors who are relocating from China ahead of Donald Trump’s potential tariffs, analysts said.

What Indonesian policymakers, officials, and ultranationalists refuse to acknowledge isn’t just the shortsightedness of protectionist policies, but the recklessness of enforcing them without the infrastructure to support a modern tech manufacturing ecosystem.

They cling to the illusion that forcing tech giants to build products locally is enough, ignoring the fact that manufacturing doesn’t happen in isolation, it’s an interconnected ecosystem dependent on robust infrastructure, not just financial sticks and carrots.

The Indonesian government isn’t just using the wrong policy, they’re operating with the wrong mindset entirely. They also haven’t squared the collapsing textile industry and the falling demand in the auto industry with their tech ambitions. Apple manufacture devices for the global market regardless of their origin while Indonesia’s manufacturing industries tend to be dominated by domestic sales.

Local content requirements cover a range of industries, from cars to medical devices. Together with decades-old problems such as red tape, high taxes and a less productive workforce, Indonesia’s manufacturing growth has slowed to a crawl.

In contrast, neighbors like Vietnam and India are offering tax incentives, swift approvals and the freedom to source their components from across their global supply chains, Gupta of the Center for Indonesian Policy Studies said.

That makes them attractive for companies looking to produce for export and explains why Apple can invest a much larger $15 billion in Vietnam despite the nation having a smaller domestic market than Indonesia, he said.

How platforms like TikTok and Twitter are like life itself

Social platforms reflect people’s behaviors but unlike life, you can uninstall and stop visiting them.

TikTok and Twitter are often described as mirrors of life; chaotic, messy, sometimes brilliant, sometimes horrifying. But here’s the thing: life didn’t come with an “uninstall” button. These platforms do, sort of (you can remove the apps or stop visiting them altogether). And that makes it a lot harder to accept their messiness as something we just have to live with.

The harm they cause is undeniable. The misinformation, the rabbit holes, the amplification of violence and hate, it’s all right there, front and center. And because these aren’t immutable forces of nature but products of human design, it feels logical to think: Why not just turn them off? If a bridge kept collapsing under people’s feet, we’d stop letting people walk on it. If a factory was spewing toxins into the air, we wouldn’t celebrate the occasional mural painted on its walls, we’d shut the thing down.

But TikTok and Twitter aren’t just digital bridges or toxic factories, they’re also marketplaces, stages, classrooms, protest grounds, and cultural archives. They’ve been instrumental in amplifying marginalized voices, organizing grassroots movements, and spreading ideas that would’ve otherwise been silenced. Shutting them down wouldn’t just erase the harm, it would also erase the joy, the connection, the organizing power, and the little moments of humanity they enable.

That’s the tension we’re stuck with: the pull between “this is causing so much damage” and “this is doing so much good.” And it’s not a tension we can resolve cleanly, because both are true. These platforms are not neutral, they’re shaped by design choices, incentives, and algorithms that reward outrage, escalate conflict, and keep users scrolling no matter the emotional cost. But they’re also spaces where real, meaningful things happen, sometimes in spite of those same algorithms.

It’s easier to point fingers at the platforms themselves than to reckon with the fact that their messiness isn’t an anomaly, it’s a reflection. They thrive on the same things we do: conflict, validation, novelty, and the occasional hit of collective catharsis. The darkness they expose isn’t artificially generated, it’s drawn out from people who were always capable of it. TikTok and Twitter didn’t invent bad faith arguments, moral panic cycles, or performative empathy, they just turned them into highly optimized content formats.

That’s why it’s so tempting to reach for the “off” switch. Because these platforms don’t just show us other people’s mess, they show us our own. They force us to confront the uncomfortable reality that the world doesn’t just have ugliness, it produces it. And no matter how advanced our moderation tools get, or how many advisory panels are assembled, there’s no elegant way to algorithm our way out of human nature.

But accepting that doesn’t mean we stop holding these platforms accountable. They’re still products of human design, and every design choice, from the algorithm’s preferences to the placement of a “like” button, shapes behavior and incentives. The companies behind them can and should do better. But even if they do, the fundamental tension remains: these spaces are built on human behavior, and human behavior will always be messy.

Maybe the real discomfort isn’t just about what TikTok and Twitter are. It’s about what they reveal about us. The chaos, the harm, the brilliance, the joy, it’s all a reflection. And if we can’t figure out how to look at that reflection without flinching, no amount of platform reform is going to save us from ourselves.

P.S: Let me just add that I’m talking about the old Twitter, not the cesspool of unhinged miseducated misinformed mass of misguided white supremacists that it has increasingly become, a.k.a discount 4Chan. On top of that, outside of the English speaking sphere of the platform, the old Twitter still exists unbothered or unaffected by what’s happening outside of their spheres partly due to cultural differences, partly due to lack of relevance, partly due to language, and perhaps a handful of other reasons.

Facts aren’t enough: Why journalism needs to find a new way to reach the public

Journalism is in a crisis of accountability. Too many reporters are taking the easy route: regurgitating statements from politicians and officials without pushing back, questioning, or even glancing beneath the surface. It’s like they’ve decided that the press briefing is the new gospel, letting the people in power control the narrative and dodging any real scrutiny. This isn’t just lazy; it’s dangerous. When journalists stop asking the hard questions, they become complicit in misleading the public, and they fail democracy.

But here’s the other side of the crisis. Even when journalists are on their game, digging deep, presenting hard facts, and keeping things objective, a big chunk of the public isn’t even listening. Instead, they’re tuned into their own personal version of reality, patched together from social media rumors, conspiracy theories, and “alternative facts” that suit their biases.

A growing number of the public are increasingly immune to traditional reporting, whether it’s coming from newspapers, digital publications, or the nightly news. We’ve reached a point where the truth itself is somehow up for debate, no matter how well it’s documented because the other side have been presenting their versions more convincingly.

So what’s the answer? For starters, journalists need to get back to actually holding people accountable. Enough with the rehashed sound bites. Journalists must turn up the heat, pull apart the claims made by those in power, and lay bare the inconvenient truths, even if they’re messy or complicated.

But let’s be honest: reporting the facts clearly and objectively isn’t enough if they’re just going to be ignored. The media can’t afford to keep shouting into the void. To get through to people, journalists need to shake up the way they’re telling these stories.

Conventional formats aren’t cutting it anymore, readerships are down across the board and publications have been shutting down all around the world. Maybe it’s time to lean into platforms and techniques that disrupt echo chambers rather than reinforcing them.

This could mean turning to data visualizations that make complex issues impossible to ignore or creating interactive stories that don’t just tell people what’s true but show them, letting them see the process and judge for themselves. We need formats that combine the immediacy of social media with the depth of investigative reporting, something more visceral, less dismissible.

And this is where the press need to admit: current methods of engaging with audiences aren’t working for everyone. If journalists want people to trust the media again, they’re going to have to earn it in new ways. That might mean getting closer to the communities they cover and the audience they serve, being more transparent about the reporting process, or even tackling popular myths and misinformation head-on instead of just waving them off as fringe ideas.

Journalism’s mission isn’t just to report facts, it’s to make those facts matter. They can’t give up on that mission just because some people would rather live in a reality of their own design. It’s time for the media to level up, to be tougher, sharper, and more innovative in how to tell the truth. Because the stakes are too high for the facts to keep getting ignored.

Indonesia, the waking giant, is still scrolling through TikTok in bed

In 2016, Elizabeth Pisani described Indonesia as a “the biggest invisible thing on the planet,” in The Guardian. She signaled that the country is transitioning from decades of quiet development to a new phase of urban and economic ambition. However, looking back now, it seems Indonesia might still be stretching in bed, scrolling through TikTok rather than fully “awake.” While some progress has been made, many of the issues Pisani raised, fragmented development, infrastructure gaps, and uneven growth, still linger, preventing Indonesia from realizing its full potential as a global player.

Indonesia has seen improvements since 2016, especially in urban centers like Jakarta, where expanded transit systems and toll roads have alleviated some congestion (not enough but it’s getting there) and spurred economic activity. Additionally, the digital economy has grown rapidly, with Indonesia becoming one of the world’s most active social media markets.

Yet much of this digital growth reflects consumer habits rather than productive innovation, as Indonesia’s youth engage heavily on platforms like TikTok, which showcase Indonesia’s digital enthusiasm but don’t necessarily build the high-value tech sector Indonesia needs for long-term prosperity.

With a young, dynamic population, the country could be investing in a more diverse digital economy, one that includes tech innovation, sustainable energy, and high-value exports.

However, the once thriving ride hailing and food delivery tech giant Gojek, which was just launched at the time of Pisani’s article, is now struggling to keep up with competition as it wound down operations in Vietnam and Thailand, and sold ecommerce giant Tokopedia to ByteDance, barely two years after their celebrated merger and IPO. Layoffs in the larger tech sector have reached thousands in two years.

Another significant change since Pisani’s article is the rise of controversial former general and Defense Minister Prabowo Subianto to the presidency. His election represents a pivot in leadership style and direction. Prabowo’s popularity has been partly fueled by his endearing public persona, and he has promised continuity with former President Joko Widodo’s infrastructure agenda while adding a new layer of military discipline and assertiveness.

Prabowo has committed to ambitious goals, including an 8% annual economic growth rate, free school meals, and a more proactive foreign policy stance to increase Indonesia’s global influence. In fact, he sent Foreign Minister Sugiono to the BRICS Conference in Russia, within days of his appointment, to express intention to fully join the economic bloc. But the challenges Pisani highlighted, geographic disparities, underdeveloped human capital, and regulatory inconsistencies, still constrain Indonesia’s aspirations. President Prabowo has ordered a full review of the laws to align them with his grand plan to accelerate Indonesia’s development.

Prabowo’s pledges are bold, but achieving them may require more than infrastructure and social programs. The economy remains heavily reliant on resource extraction and low-cost labor, making it vulnerable to global market fluctuations and competition from faster-moving neighbors like Vietnam. Educational and labor inequalities persist, and while Prabowo’s initiatives may address immediate needs, sustainable growth will require deeper investment in human capital and technology-driven industries, something that the previous government was already working on.

In short, Indonesia’s journey from “invisible giant” to a true economic powerhouse appears far from complete. Pisani’s vision of a “waking” Indonesia might still be accurate, but without substantial shifts in human development and innovation, the nation risks staying in a kind of semi-conscious state. If Prabowo’s administration hopes to fulfill the dream of a “Golden Indonesia 2045,” which envisions the country as a high-income, self-sustaining economic powerhouse, now is the time to get up and go to work.

The America I knew

The America I grew up with was not a perfect nation by any measure, and it’s certainly terrible in many parts, but it also allowed people of different origins, of different cultures, of different beliefs, to come together and belong to one another. It allowed people to thrive, to find mutual connection, and create something great.

These excerpts of Presidential speeches carry the promises of a nation, the values I believe in, the values that I hold close. Promises that I hope they can still deliver in the face of seemingly insurmountable adversary and great challenges.

Kennedy, Peace Speech, 1963

Our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet, we all cherish our children’s futures, and we are all mortal. Today we seek to move beyond the accomplishments of the past to establish the principle that all people are entitled to a decent way of life.

Clinton, Inauguration, 1993

Let us not forget that each child saved, each refugee housed, each disease prevented, each barrier to justice brought down, each sword turned into a plow share brings us closer to peace, closer to freedom, closer to dignity.

Obama, State of the Union, 2013

We also know that progress in the most impoverished parts of our world enriches us all. So the United States will join with our allies to eradicate such extreme poverty in the next two decades by connecting more people to the global economy, by empowering women, by giving our young and brightest minds new opportunities to serve, and helping communities to feed, empower, and educate themselves, by saving the world’s children from preventable deaths.

That’s how we’ll confront the challenges of our time. This is how we will seize the promise of this moment in history.

Who are we to believe that today’s challenges cannot be overcome? We’ve seen what changes the human spirit can bring. That’s why we look to the future not with fear but with hope.

Study shows AI overwhelmingly favors white male in hiring job seekers

Just read an article at Ars Technica that highlights something we should all be paying more attention to: AI-driven hiring tools still have a long way to go in terms of fairness. Tests show these systems tend to favor white and male candidates, confirming that even with all our tech advances, biases persist in ways we can’t ignore. And this isn’t the only article discussing this, it’s only the latest, which means it’s a long known problem that hasn’t been rectified.

For all the hype around AI’s potential to revolutionize hiring, if it’s just reinforcing biases, what’s the point? How are these algorithms trained and why are they showing a such a strong bias towards white male candidates?

If you’re a recruiter or decision-maker, it might be time to rethink the role of AI in hiring. We all understand the basic tenet of data processing, garbage in, garbage out. Until there’s a proper process in the middle that takes away such biases, people shouldn’t be fully reliant on technology for such purposes because it’ll only reinforce them.

These high end filters make “decisions” based on their training data and will reflect biases that are already incorporated. I’m sure you’ve heard about facial identification or hand sensors that don’t work properly or have high error rates when the skin color is darker.

Not saying human-led processes aren’t prone to bias, I mean these tech “solutions” were after all built to minimize the impact of biases from human judgements, but when the outcome is no different or maybe even worse, that’s no solution at all.

When Reporters Become Collateral in an Unpopular Executive Decision

So here we are: The Washington Post announced it won’t endorse a candidate this US election, and the fallout is immediate. Readers are canceling subscriptions in droves, about 200,000 and counting according to NPR, and reporters are left scrambling on social media, pleading for them to stay. As a former journalist, I feel for the reporters caught in this mess. This isn’t just an editorial call they can shrug off. It’s a hit to their credibility, their income, and their professional mission.

To me what’s important isn’t whether a media makes a political endorsement because we live in a time when these decisions don’t matter like they used to. Media endorsements don’t carry the same weight as in previous decades. What matters to me is when they did it. I said on Threads the other day,

The issue isn’t that they will not endorse but that there’s a decades long tradition to endorse one candidate over another and not just for the presidential candidates, it’s often local candidates too. That the boards of two major US papers already drafted the endorsements only to be spiked by their billionaire owners is what matters because it’s too close to Election Day. They could have announced the stance weeks or months ago but they didn’t and now they’re causing a scene.

The timing is everything here. Only 11 days before the election, the paper killed a planned endorsement of Kamala Harris, the Democratic candidate, saying it’s a return to their “roots” of neutrality, as they did until about 50 years ago. But the newsroom is in uproar. Famed reporters like Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein have called the move cowardly. Others, like former editor Marty Baron, went further, saying it’s a betrayal of democracy itself. Many readers opined in light of the decision that the Post’s slogan, “Democracy dies in darkness”, wasn’t a slogan but a mission statement as the newspaper has decided to tun the lights off to let democracy stumble in darkness.

Meanwhile, there’s Jeff Bezos, the billionaire owner, defending the decision as “principled.” He argues it’s about restoring trust in journalism. But here’s where things get complicated. The same day the Post cancels its endorsement, Bezos’s space company, Blue Origin, had a meeting with none other than Donald Trump. Even if it’s a coincidence, it’s an unfortunate look, especially considering that endorsements were a standard practice at the Post until… well, about five minutes ago. When Woodward and Bernstein broke the Watergate scandal at the Post in the ‘70s, then owner Katherine Graham stood tall defending their decision to run the story and expose the illegal actions of President Nixon which led to his resignation. Bezos on the other hand, has no such conviction, fearing retribution by Trump in case the 34x convicted felon ended up winning re-election, and jeopardizing his government contracts and other opportunities for his companies.

And it’s not just the Post. Earlier this month, the Los Angeles Times made a similar choice, dropping its own endorsement after its billionaire owner, Patrick Soon-Shiong intervened. His daughter, who supposedly has no influence at the company, defended it as a “family decision” tied to frustration over Harris’s stance on the genocide happening in Palestine. Curiously, a feature series titled, “Case Against Trump” was canceled by the newspaper at his behest. Yet again, we’ve got a big decision, tied to editorial independence, happening at the last minute with little transparency.

USA Today has joined the ranks of papers sitting this one out. However with outlets like The New York Times, Rolling Stone, and the Philadelphia Inquirer still endorsing candidates, it seems the media landscape is splitting down the middle on this issue.

Readers, for their part, feel they’ve been sidelined. Canceling subscriptions is one of the few ways they can register their frustration with decisions made behind closed doors. But the fallout isn’t falling on Bezos, it’s falling on reporters who had no part in the decision. Now, they’re essentially forced into being spokespersons for an editorial shift they didn’t ask for, defending a stance that most of them probably would have argued against.

So, what’s the way out? Instead of reporters bearing the brunt of management’s hasty decision, maybe they could actually join with the readers on this one. Push back internally. Make it clear that if big decisions like this one are going to reshape their relationships with readers, they need to be more than last-minute top-down calls. They could demand a seat at the table, a voice in decisions that impact their integrity and the trust of their audience. Some members of the editorial boards and newsrooms at both the Post and the LA Times have made their strong opinions known even to the point of resigning.

In the end, the future of journalism doesn’t just depend on what’s reported, it depends on how these decisions are made. If the Post, the LA Times, and other major outlets want to regain trust, they need to do more than make calls from the top. Credibility is built on transparency, respect for journalists, and a genuine acknowledgment of the readers who make their work possible.