For Tech’s Sake

We’re back, and the kids are back in school, so we are packing your lunchbox with some food for thought on tech in schools. We’re weighing up screen-free childhoods, debunking the myth of ‘digital natives’, doling out...

The UK’s upcoming social media ban for under 16s has been labelled an insufficient “political band-aid” that prioritises business as usual over online safety, and creates a “false sense of safety” for parents. Kelly and...

In this episode, Elaine is joined by energy researcher Prof Hannah Daly to discuss the energy strain data centres represent for Ireland, the greenwashing that enables their proliferation in the face of climate concerns...

Are we in danger of becoming a contactless society? That’s the concern of psychotherapist Dr Colman Noctor, who joined Elaine to explain why we need to push ourselves beyond the isolated safety of socialising through...

This week, Kelly has lost her voice! So Elaine is joined by cultural commentator, previous guest, and co-host of Get Around to It, Aoife Barry, to discuss why our feeds are filled with short video clips, and how...

Prediction markets like Polymarket and Kalshi are rocketing in popularity and raking it in as users bet on everything from the day’s weather to major political manoeuvres. In this episode, Kelly and Elaine discuss...

This week, Kelly and Elaine have a chat about how all the AI hype and hate is pushing people to switch off. It’s a frank conversation about opting out of AI, where for some people it’s a trade-off and for others a...

This week Kelly and Elaine are sharing their love for Wikipedia – its endless interesting links, dedication to niche topics, and, of course, the ‘Personal Life’ section. Amy O’Riordan, bhainisteoir pobail le Pobal...

This episode features an appearance from Elaine’s mam, who helped her review the new AI Ready platform from the Irish government ( AIReady.ie ) – and it did not go down well! We were so disappointed with this fumbled...

Pretty soon your private messages on Instagram will no longer be end-to-end encrypted. But you may not have even known they could be encrypted to begin with, as Instagram kind of buried that feature. Kelly and Elaine...

To celebrate our 100th episode, we invited our listeners to watch us in action live, with the return of special guest Dr Abeba Birhane, founder of the pioneering AI Accountability Lab. We had fun with a game of Good...

In this episode, Elaine tries to turn Kelly into a subsea cables stan with the help of Jane Ruffino, a PhD candidate who recently visited a ship in the midst of (literally) winding up TAT-8, the world’s first...

This week, Kelly and Elaine are talking about AT, assistive technology, and how we can all have nicer digital experiences because of it. Our expert guides to AT in this episode are Patrick Fitzgerald, an AT user and...

Pokémon Go collected 30 billion street-level image scans from its players, and now its creators are using that data to help train delivery robots. This prompted Kelly and Elaine to discuss the many ways human labour...

Today’s episode is a lesson in AI literacy, busting some myths and revealing the strings behind the magic trick (with a smattering of Irish for Seachtain na Gaeilge). Kelly quizzes Elaine on how we can adapt our...