Last week, the Tasmanian Greens announced they’ll move for an urgent parliamentary inquiry into the AI data centres going up across the north of the state. I think this is a very good idea. These projects appear to have been approved without any specific regulations or parliamentary oversight, and the public has barely had the chance to have a say. The announcement also put a new number on the rec

We spent today in some of the forests up in lutruwita/Tasmania’s Central Highlands that are being logged, or are about to be. It was a Bob Brown Foundation Threatened Forest Open Day . It was sobering and a bit sad. Also fascinating, and the forest is beautiful. The marquee, set up in the forest. It rained pretty much all day. The marquee was up in the middle of the forest and we stood under it wh

Submissions for Australia’s next National Cultural Policy closed in May 2026. I wrote one, on behalf of Tasmanian Game Makers , because I want games taken seriously as what they are: the art form most of us actually play. Read the full submission on Tas Game Makers Here are the highlights. Games are the art form of our time. In 2025, 82% of Australians played them, the average player was 35, and w

We’re working on an adventure game, Leonardo’s Moon Ship . The player character, Leo, has the usual pile of animations: idle left and right, walk in four directions, a couple of stair anims. Since implementing the basics of the character, Leo has had this slightly cursed behaviour where he’d grow about 3% taller the moment he started walking, then shrink back when he stopped. His feet would also l

I’m really pleased to share that I’ve been awarded a 2026 Libraries Tasmania Research Fellowship . The project is on Tasmania’s space history, from the establishment of Rossbank Observatory in 1840 through to the contemporary work being done here on tracking interplanetary spacecraft. There’s a surprisingly long thread connecting convict-era astronomy in Hobart to the antennas, satellites, and dee

Big Plans is out now on iOS and Android. We built it at Secret Lab for Bank of us , the Tasmanian customer-owned bank, as a story-based game for kids aged 5 to 8 about money. Specifically, the value of money, needs versus wants, and the basics of planning and making choices. We loved making it. The brief was unusually thoughtful for a kids’ app: no ads, no in-app purchases, no online interaction,

These are my notes and expanded thoughts from this month’s Space News segment on ABC Radio Hobart and ABC Northern Tasmania. Every month I join Lucie Cutting on Sunday mornings to chat about what’s happening above and beyond. Here’s what we discussed, plus some of my notes, and expanded thoughts from this edition of the programme : Artemis II: Four Humans At The Moon Right Now Artemis II launched

These are my notes and expanded thoughts from this month’s Space News segment on ABC Radio Hobart and ABC Northern Tasmania. Every month I join Lucie Cutting on Sunday mornings to chat about what’s happening above and beyond. Here’s what we discussed, plus some of my notes, and expanded thoughts from this edition of the programme : SETI@Home’s Final 100 Signals This month’s show had a theme — lett

We recently released a brand new Try Yarn Spinner , which I wrote (more details in the Yarn Spinner January update ), and I wrote a new demo story too! Check it out below: Technical post on the new Try Yarn Spinner coming soon.

We just had the AGM for Tasmanian Game Makers, Inc. (TasGM) in Launceston on Friday, and I was thrilled to (once again, somehow) be elected as President! For the fourth year in a row, I’m really grateful for the trust of our members, and I’m excited to work with the new board to keep pushing the video game industry in Tasmania forward. The new board is: President: Paris B-A Vice-Presidents: Michae

These are my notes and expanded thoughts from this month’s Space News segment on ABC Radio Hobart and ABC Northern Tasmania. Every month I join Lucie Cutting on Sunday mornings to chat about what’s happening above and beyond. Here’s what we discussed, plus some of my notes, and expanded thoughts from this edition of the programme : Katherine Bennell-Pegg: 2026 Australian of the Year Katherine Benn

I’m so proud of this. Hint Line ‘93 , a game we made at Yarn Spinner , is now on display at ACMI’s Game Worlds exhibition. We put up a big behind-the-scenes post on the Yarn Spinner blog , so go read that… For those who don’t know, early last year ACMI (the Australian Centre for the Moving Image, a museum of screen culture in Melbourne) put out a call for commissioned microgames. They wanted playa

Related: This article examines state-level AI governance in Australia. For analysis of the Commonwealth’s AI governance failures, see Slop for the People . For context on the newly announced federal AI Safety Institute, see Australia’s AI Safety Institute: Lessons from the UK and US . The Commonwealth government attracts most attention for its AI policies. State and territory governments are also

My company Yarn Spinner published a post today explaining why we don’t use AI and won’t be adding it to our products. The TL;DR: AI companies make tools for hurting people and we don’t want to support that. From the post: If you look at what AI companies promote now, it’s not what we wanted. When you boil down everything they say and strip it right back, what they make are tools to either fire peo

Related: This article examines what Australia can learn from international AI safety institutes. For analysis of the Commonwealth’s AI governance failures, see Slop for the People . For state-level AI governance, see State of Play: How Australian States Are (Not) Governing AI . On 25 November 2025, Minister for Industry and Innovation Tim Ayres announced the establishment of the Australian AI Safe

We released Yarn Spinner 3.1 on December 3, 2025, introducing several significant improvements to our dialogue system framework. This update emphasises asynchronous operations, graceful error handling, and enhanced customisation options. Key Features Async Dialogue Runner Methods — The dialogue runner’s core methods now support asynchronous operations. The StartDialogue and Stop methods are now as

Summary: A major brick-and-mortar store sold an Apple Gift Card that Apple seemingly took offence to, and locked out my entire Apple ID, effectively bricking my devices and my iCloud Account, Apple Developer ID, and everything associated with it, and I have no recourse. Can you help? Email paris AT paris.id.au (and read on for the details). ❤️ Update 14 December 2025: Someone from Executive Relati

These are my notes and expanded thoughts from this month’s Space News segment on ABC Radio Hobart and ABC Northern Tasmania. Every month I join Lucie Cutting on Sunday mornings to chat about what’s happening above and beyond. Here’s what we discussed, plus some of my notes, and expanded thoughts from this edition of the programme : Moss Survived Nine Months in Space, and Scientists Are Stunned Jap

Related: This article examines the Commonwealth’s AI governance failures in practice. For context on the newly announced federal AI Safety Institute, see Australia’s AI Safety Institute: Lessons from the UK and US . For state-level AI governance, see State of Play: How Australian States Are (Not) Governing AI . The Australian Public Service’s (APS) official culture of AI adoption is not found in t

Australia’s world-first ban on social media for children under 16 takes effect in just over a month on December 10, 2025, yet nobody knows exactly how it will work . The Online Safety Amendment (Social Media Minimum Age) Act 2024 passed parliament in a rushed process in November last year, imposing potential fines of up to $50 million on platforms that fail to keep out underage users. While 77% of