John Marshall
@johnm.bsky.social
962 followers 321 following 323 posts
Bioinformatics tools developer at Australia’s Centre for Population Genomics. Will edit GA4GH specifications for food. New Zealander fairly recently returned after a decade in the U.K.
![Letter emailed to MP:
I see from the news today that the government finally plans to move ahead with its proposed social media ban for those under 16. RNZ reports that ACT and New Zealand First will not support this bill, and that National will therefore need Labour's support for the bill to progress.
Such bans are ill-considered and I trust Labour will not support the National Party in this. Both on its (lack of) merits, and because it is far too close to the upcoming election for Labour to be supporting any government legislative action. If Labour were to support this bill, I would not be able to support a Labour electoral candidate or the party with my vote in November. As a voter, I am sure I am not alone in this conclusion.
For further background on alternatives to such bans, I would commend to you InternetNZ's submission in response to the Education and Workforce Committee's inquiry in 2025:
[URL follows.] https://internetnz.nz/assets/Archives/Submissions/InternetNZ-Submission-on-Inquiry-into-the-roles-can-the-Government-business-and-society-can-play-in-addressing-online-harms-to-New-Zealands-youth-25-July-2025.pdf](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:zxvm77u3eti4gwz3sx6raag3/bafkreihy5efkzjouniqahzcyg22etmujvcn452kdthtwhwrzx5mokadjaa)
![An email (not the first!) from “noreply github team @ providence.org” entitled “Action Required: 1 Repositories Missing APM” complaining that “The following repositories associated with your account are missing a valid APM (Application Portfolio Management) value: […] PSJH/Strategic-Technology-Enablement.htslib”.
I have nothing whatsoever to do with Providence or their Strategic Technology Enablement, do not have an account with them and cannot take any action related to them. And I have not been a core htslib maintainer for almost a decade.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:zxvm77u3eti4gwz3sx6raag3/bafkreihrx4ymda4anb7ecd5m6eazimuyioiyficvtwdv5ovlaeme4253gu)
![Reply to the Stuff Editor's reply to my complaint:
To reiterate, my complaint is about the headline in particular. You write:
[quote] We also want to be clear that Stuff does not advocate for "catching Covid" as a preferred health strategy. The article explicitly reinforces the importance of medical boosters [end quote]
The headline makes the statement “catching the virus is basically our new booster”. With particular reference to principle 6 of the NZ Media Council Principles, do you consider that the headline accurately reflects the article as you have described it in the quote above?](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:zxvm77u3eti4gwz3sx6raag3/bafkreibezp3p5rc3sejvth233xle4klfdy3t2lspnusz43jtb54lpnhu5i)
