Guardian Australia's daily news podcast. Every weekday, join Guardian journalists for a deeper understanding of the news in Australia and beyond. You can suppor...
Where did our attention spans go, and can we get them back?
The Oxford English Dictionary announced its word of the year at the end of 2024: ‘brain rot’. The term relates to the supposedly negative effects of consuming social media content, but it struck a chord more widely with many of us who feel we just don’t have the mental capacity we once did. Gloria Mark, a professor of informatics at the University of California, Irvine, has been studying our waning attention spans for 20 years. She tells Madeleine Finlay why she believes our powers of concentration are not beyond rescue, and reveals her top tips for finding focus Please fill out our audience survey here: theguardian.com/fullstorysurvey
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17:35
Southport attacks: the failures that allowed Axel Rudakubana to kill
It was hard to imagine a more unlikely place for horror to unfold than a community centre holding a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in the sleepy seaside town of Southport. So when three little girls were murdered and eight other children and two adults viciously stabbed by a 17-year-old boy, it seemed incomprehensible. But before the shock could wear off, misinformation and lies about who had unleashed this misery began to spread. The result was days of racist riots and violence. Josh Halliday, the Guardian’s North of England editor, covered the attacks, the riots and now the court case of Axel Rudakubana as he was sentenced to 52 years in prison. On Monday, as the jury was expected to be sworn in, the now 18-year-old Rudakubana shocked everyone by pleading guilty to all the charges he was faced with. And this week the judge gave him a life sentence.
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Newsroom edition: is Albanese letting Dutton set the political agenda?
As an election year begins, both the prime minister Anthony Albanese and the opposition leader Peter Dutton have started laying out their priorities and setting the tone for the upcoming election. But with Donald Trump returning to the White House, and as horrific antisemitic attacks continue to dominate our politics, both leaders have found themselves battling for headlines. Bridie Jabour talks with editor-in-chief Lenore Taylor and head of newsroom Mike Ticher about whose pre-election message is cutting through and connecting with voters Please fill out our audience survey here: theguardian.com/fullstorysurvey
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20:27
Are culture wars and crime an election winning strategy?
As the opposition leader, Peter Dutton, warms up for the federal election campaign, he’s quick to tell voters he’s a strong man in politics who’s tough on crime – a message he’s kept consistent since his maiden speech. Guardian Australia’s Queensland correspondent, Ben Smee, and political reporter Sarah Basford Canales tell Nour Haydar the Coalition’s campaign centres on culture wars and crime Please fill out our audience survey here: theguardian.com/fullstorysurvey
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The second coming of Donald Trump
Donald Trump has been sworn in as the 47th president of the United States and has vowed to ‘put America first’ in his inauguration ceremony at the US Capitol rotunda. The chief Washington correspondent, David Smith, tells Reged Ahmad what it was like inside Trump’s inauguration ceremony and what the new president’s executive orders reveal about his populist priorities for his second term Please fill out our audience survey here: theguardian.com/fullstorysurvey
Guardian Australia's daily news podcast. Every weekday, join Guardian journalists for a deeper understanding of the news in Australia and beyond. You can support The Guardian at theguardian.com/fullstorysupport
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