It's the putting right that counts

Until 2004 (Hannis, 2006) here in New Zealand there was a housewares retailer called L. V. Martin and Son, based in the Ngauranga Gorge in Wellington (Chetwin, 2017; Lawrence, 2017). Older Kiwis will no doubt remember the company's advertising strapline, as a "straight sell retailer" (Bulmer, 2001, p. 33), where Mr Martin senior, Alan Martin, would say to camera "If it's not right, we'll put it right. And it's the putting right that counts" (Chetwin, 2017; Dunne, 2022; Lawrence, 2017).

Many marketers thought this was a daft way of selling: the retailer was suggesting that something might go wrong with the product. It was thought that "as a marketing claim [it] initially seemed like a negative but, of course, in the context of their company, it’s was a real positive. Not selling their own brands, the family business was taking responsibility for the quality of the products it sold, championing the rights of their customers" (Jones, 2020). And this was the 1970s and 80s: stuff went wrong ALL THE TIME. And the L V Martin team would indeed put it right.

My father bought a water purifier from L V Martin. It went wrong. He called them: they arranged to pick up the faulty one and deliver a new one. A couple of years later, it went wrong again. They did the same thing: a pick up, and replacement, all at no cost to my Dad. Then five years on, despite the fact that the product was now well outside warranty, he contacted them about another fault. Again, a timely pick up and a seamless replacement. My father constantly told the stories about L V Martin being as good as their word. They were indeed as good as their advertising promise: if it was not right, they put it right.

And it was the putting right that counted. Their word was their bond.

That bought them reputation until the business was sold to Smiths City in 2004. Priceless.

Sam

References:

Bulmer, S. L. (2001). Consumer Interpretation of Metaphors in Complex Television Advertising: An Extension Study (Master's thesis, University of Auckland). https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Sandy-Bulmer/publication/35147154_Consumer_interpretation_of_metaphors_in_complex_television_advertising_an_extension_study/links/546a573f0cf2f5eb18077adb/Consumer-interpretation-of-metaphors-in-complex-television-advertising-an-extension-study.pdf

Chetwin, S. (2017, February 25). As the man said, it's the putting right that counts. The Post. https://www.pressreader.com/new-zealand/the-post-1022/20170225/282114931348034

Dunne, P. (2022, August 31). The Legendary Wellington Retailer Alan Martin. Dunne's Weekly: An Occasional look at Politics in general from a liberal perspective. https://honpfd.blogspot.com/2022/08/thelegendary-wellington-retailer-alan.html

Hannis, G. (2006). Visual communication in consumer journalism: The case of Consumer magazine in New Zealand. Prism Journal, 4(3), 1-11. https://www.prismjournal.org/uploads/1/2/5/6/125661607/v4-no3-a4.pdf

Jones, H. (2020). It's the putting right that counts. Waikato Business News. https://wbn.co.nz/2020/02/05/its-the-putting-right-that-counts/

Kepes, B. (2020, July 6). It’s the putting right that counts... . Diversity Limited. https://www.diversity.net.nz/its-the-putting-right-that-counts/2020/07/06/

Lawrence, H. (2017, November 1). It's the putting right that counts. https://www.hughlawrence.org/post/2017/11/01/its-the-putting-right-that-counts

read more "It's the putting right that counts"

What powers New Zealand?

I do like statistics, because they can tell quite a powerful story, quite quickly. Stats are shorthand, if we will. So a look at the graphic accompanying this post might make us think that New Zealand was caning it for green power, as 85% of our electricity needs are met by renewables, leaving NZ in 31st place on the global leader board (The Most, 2025, 8:48).

Except. That lovely statistic doesn't take into account that everything is flown or shipped here. And that uses fossil fuelled transport, which we cannot completely account for. We can't/don't account for it as it is the national data of the exporting nations. 

Our fossil fuel consumption adds up to around 67% of our total energy consumption, including coal, fuel and gas (Massey University, 2026); with our great 85% renewables stat meeting only 26% of our total energy needs. That's not to shiny, is it!

We all drive our own cars as public transport doesn't work that well, because our country is long, skinny, and very spread out. In fact 73% of us commute in our own cars (Massey University, 2020, NB: 2019 statistics)... and our fleet of vehicles is one of the oldest in the world (Massey University, 2026) averaging 15 years. Each year, New Zealanders travel 54,000 million kilometres over 5,800 million trips, taking 1,600 million hours of our collective time (Massey University, 2025). We drive 56% of the time, and 81% of that is "as a driver or passenger in a light vehicle (i.e. a van or car; Massey University, 2025). Only 6.5% of us can take public transport to work (Massey University, 2025), and Wellington is probably one of the best organised cities for public transport. The hills and the long corridors into the city probably make it one of the more commuter-friendly places in the country.

Added to that, very little of anything can be effectively recycled in New Zealand, due to how little manufacturing goes on here, and how far away from the big markets we are. It just becomes too expensive for us to ship things for reprocessing. Yes, theoretically Nespresso pods can be recycled, but as we have no aluminium resmelter in New Zealand, all the pods would all have to be collected up and put in a container and shipped to Aussie. That is WAY to expensive, so we pile it up in the hope it will be worth something, someday: and when the pile gets too high, we landfill it. We have one steel resmelter in the North Island, but none in the South Island. All South Island steel waste is likely to be landfilled... especially when the Cook Strait is one of the most expensive pieces of water to cross in the world. 

As a result, we Kiwis are amongst the most wasteful "in the OECD and the majority of [our] waste is landfilled" (Perrot & Subiantoro, 2018, p. 2). So yep, we might look like we are doing well because we have hydro power. But we are not doing so well in other the other fields we are largely ignoring. 

No pats on the back are due right now!

Sam

References:

Hedley, N. (2025, March 18). New Zealand inches closer to 100% renewable electricity. The Progress Playbook. https://theprogressplaybook.com/2025/03/18/new-zealand-inches-closer-to-100-renewable-electricity/

Massey University. (2026). Average age of motor vehicles [Environmental Health Intelligence New Zealand (EHINZ)]. https://www.ehinz.ac.nz/assets/Surveillance-reports/Released_2025/AgeOfVehicles-2505.pdf

Massey University. (2025). Energy use in New Zealand [Environmental Health Intelligence New Zealand (EHINZ)]. https://www.ehinz.ac.nz/assets/Surveillance-reports/Released_2025/EnergyUse2025_final.pdf

Massey University. (2020). Commuting time by mode of transport [Environmental Health Intelligence New Zealand (EHINZ)]. https://ehinz.ac.nz/assets/Surveillance-reports/Released_2020/Commuting-Time-by-Mode-of-Transport.pdf

Perrot, J. F., & Subiantoro, A. (2018). Municipal waste management strategy review and waste-to-energy potentials in New Zealand. Sustainability, 10(9), 3114, 1-12. https://doi.org/10.3390/su10093114

THE MOST. (2025, November 17). What Share of Electricity Is Renewable? [video]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/UlK1wiOfcnE

read more "What powers New Zealand?"

The hemline index

Many years ago I remember reading a sci fi book where the author talked about the intersection between the price of gold, hemlines and men's beards (Heinlein, 1982), specifically:

The main character has been asked about "the relationships between men's beards, women's skirts, and the price of gold. I had ceased to wonder at silly questions; around Boss anything can happen. But this one seemed super-silly. Why should there be any relationship? [...] But I had learned not to ignore questions merely because they were obvious nonsense; I tackled this one by calling up all the data I could, including punching out some most unlikely association chains. I then told the machine to tabulate all retrieved data by categories.

"Durned if I didn't begin to find connections!

"As more data accumulated I found that the only way I could see all of it was to tell the computer to plot and display a three-dimensional graph. And that looked so promising that I told it to convert to holographic in color. Beautiful! I did not know why these three variables fitted together but they did" (Heinlein, 1982, p. 224).

I remember at the time of reading that this sounded suspiciously like a spurious correlation to me, but I was reminded about this recently via a YouTube video thumbnail (while still thinking it sounded like crap). So I turned to GoogleScholar, searching for a connection between skirt length, gold and facial hair. I found nothing.

However, I did find a 1926 "hemline" index theory, or HIT, proposed by a US economist, George Taylor (Kim & Kim, 2012; Škrinjarić, 2020) where fashionistas apparently suggest skirts shorten during economic contractions, due to "designers and retailers [needing to] create and display unique styles of clothing in order to attract consumers’ attention" (Kim & Kim, 2012, p. 1).

While that sounds plausible, there is apparently no evidence to support it: "there is no statistical evidence that economic state can predict the future changes in skirt length" (Škrinjarić, 2020, p. 6) and "After completing several regression analyses which revealed no statistical significance, and a thorough observation of graphed movements between hem lengths, overall stock returns, and fashion companies’ stock returns, it is clear that there is no causal relationship indicated between these variables" (Humes, 2010, p. 59).

Why? Well, what we wear tends to be influenced by many "economic, social, cultural, social and environmental effects. Today, fashion is not just a statement of someone’s economic status" (Škrinjarić, 2020, p. 7). A good point. And even more likely: in a downturn at present, we buy nothing as we already have so much.

All claims need to pass the sniff test.

Sam

References:

Kim, J. E., & Kim, J. (2012). Skirt length theory: The impact of perceived financial status on skirt length preference. Asia-Pacific Advances in Consumer Research, 10, 23-25. http://www.acrwebsite.org/volumes/ap10/apacr_vol10_1011042.pdf

Škrinjarić, T. (2020). Hemline Index Theory: empirical analysis with Google data. International Journal of Fashion Design, Technology and Education, 13(3), 325-333. https://doi.org/10.1080/17543266.2020.1799079

Heinlein, R. A. H. (1982). Friday. Ballantine Books.

Humes, G. M. (2021). Hemline Theory: Testing the Relationship Between Fashion Trends and the Stock Market [Honours thesis, Kent State University]. https://etd.ohiolink.edu/acprod/odb_etd/ws/send_file/send?accession=ksuhonors1620591215357509&disposition=inline

read more "The hemline index"

Some Heinlein quotes part 2

As previously mentioned (here), I have been searching for a Robert Heinlein (RAH) quote around the idea ‘make it idiot-proof and the world/universe will build a better idiot’. Through that search I have been noting other quotes by the same author that I have rediscovered in the process. Having already posted one set of favourite quotes (here), this is part 2.

To begin, I have found a few more Heinlein phrases that I find notable and quotable:

• He foresaw the internet: "Electrons don’t care. Once data of any sort go into the net, time is frozen. All that is necessary is to remember that all the endless riches of the past are available any time you punch for them" (Heinlein, 1982, p. 213). And "People are so used to the computer net today that it is easy to forget what a window to the world it can be—and I include myself. One can grow so canalized in using a terminal only in certain ways—paying bills, making telephonic calls, listening to news bulletins—that one can neglect its richer uses. If a subscriber is willing to pay for the service, almost anything can be done at a terminal that can be done out of bed" (Heinlein, 1982, p. 212)
  
  
• "One might almost define intelligence as the level at which an aware organism demands, 'What's in it for me?'" (Heinlein, 1982, p. 91). There's nothing like a WIIFM!
  
  
• He had a nice view towards phones: "'It took you long enough to answer your phone.' 'It’s my phone, Mr. Secretary. Sometimes I don’t answer it at all'" (Heinlein, 1968, p. 173)
  
  
• "It sounded logical—but I could not forget Kettering’s Law: 'Logic is an organized way of going wrong with confidence'" (Heinlein, 1980, p. 106; 2020, p. p. 98)
  
  
• "a thousand reasoned opinions are never equal to one case of diving in and finding out" (Heinlein, 1981, p. 29)
  
  
• "Vengeance is mine, saith the lord, [...] then Mine only if Gwen leaves me any" (Heinlein, 1986, p. 58)
  
  
• About the 'luck' that comes from being organised: "Why were you on that frequency? Because you were wearing a space suit. Why were you wearing it? Because you were determined to space. When a space ship called, you answered. If that is luck, then it is luck every time a batter hits a ball. Kip, ‘good luck’ follows careful preparation" (Heinlein, 1977, p. 250)

Lastly, we have a couple of author stories about RAH:

• Heinlein was the master of in-cueing the reader, as was ably noted by Harlon Ellison. "Heinlein has always managed to indicate the greater strangeness of a culture with the most casually dropped-in reference: the first time in a novel, I believe it was in 'Beyond This Horizon', that a character came through a door that...dilated. And no discussion. Just: 'The door dilated.' I read across it, and was two lines down before I realized that the image had been that the words had urged forth. A dilating door. It didn't open, it irised! Dear God, how I knew I was in a future world" (Ellison, 1968, p. 8; Westfahl, G., & Clarke, 2005, p. 361)
  
  
• "You don't pay back, you pay forward". The story of this goes as follows: "Mr. Heinlein was enormously helpful. Years later, when I [, SciFi writer Jerry Pournelle,] was an established writer, I asked him how I could pay him back. 'You can’t,' he said. 'You don’t pay back, you pay forward.' I never forgot that, just as I never forgot the wonderful things his ‘juvenile’ stories did for me" (Pournelle, 1999, p. 10)
  
  

Thanks for sharing this walk down memory lane: I hope you have enjoyed it as much as I have :-)

Sam

References:

Ellison, H. (1968, September). A Voice from the Styx. Psychotic, 23, 5-11. https://fanac.org/fanzines/SF_Review/SF_Review327.pdf

Heinlein, R. A. (1953). Gulf [1949]. In Assignment in Eternity (pp. 7-67). The New American Library.

Heinlein, R. A. (1968). Stranger in a Strange Land (first edition 1961). Berkley Books.

Heinlein, R. A. (1977). Have Space Suit - Will Travel (first printing 1958). The Ballantine Publishing Group.

Heinlein, R. A. (1980). The Number of the Beast. NEL (New English Library) Paperback.

Heinlein, R. A. (1982). Friday. Holt Rinehart & Winston.

Heinlein, R. A. (1986). The Cat Who Walks Through Walls: A comedy of manners. Hodder & Stoughton (UK).

Heinlein, R. A. (2020). The Pursuit of the Pankera: A Parallel Novel About Parallel Universes. Caezik SF and Fantasy.

Pournelle, J. (1999). Starswarm: A Jupiter novel. Tor Books.

Westfahl, G., & Clarke, A. C. (2005). Science Fiction Quotations: From the inner mind to the outer limits. Yale University Press.

read more "Some Heinlein quotes part 2"

Tertiary education's death by a thousand cuts

At the end of last year, a couple of opinion pieces crossed my desk about the function that universities are  supposed to perform in society (The Australia Institute, 2025; White, 2025). Richard Denniss, a plain-English speaking economist and co-CEO of The Australia Institute, explained that "at the moment [universities]'re in the worst of both worlds [...as] they're all quite poorly regulated" (0.25). Australia's universities are "not companies and they don't have directors and they don't report to the share market" "but they're also not government departments and they're not showing up at [select] committees and [...] having ministers and opposition and crossbenches grilling them" (0.58), which is also true of New Zealand universities.

He went on to say that universities are "not getting investor scrutiny. They're not getting parliamentary scrutiny. They are getting a lot of public money" through government fee funding arrangements and now they are also "paying their vice chancellors up to $1.5 million a year" (The Australia Institute, 2025, 1:08). So we begin with poor governance, and a potential lack of accountability. Then we add in the complication of overpriced executives who ARE NOT WORTH TWENTY TIMES A LECTURER SALARY, let alone three times a PM's salary; particularly when claiming unjustifiable financial hardship within the sector. Ah, those wealthy universities which lock away "multibillion dollar accumulated surpluses" (1:16), and still "cry poor" and use financial pressure as an excuse to sack staff and cut popular courses. In New Zealand it is the same: tertiary institutes are continuously cutting jobs, closing courses and departments, often requiring a government 'lifelines' simply to stay afloat (White, 2025). 

Hmm. What is wrong with this picture? How do we manage to get glory projects like flash new buildings and flights of fancy when no one is watching, and why do the people in charge start to think like they are gods? And why do the people on the ground get less and less to do more and more?

But wait, there's more. We also have got our priorities out of whack: our universities have become obsessed with chasing revenue - being business-like and chasing international student full fees - at the expense of their core mission: education. Our tertiary institutes are supposed to deliver good quality undergraduate education and, in the process of that, those two teach also deliver ground-breaking research (The Australia Institute, 2025). Education is a social good, lifting the skills and critical thinking abilities of the national population. It is not primarily for businesses to make money: that may happen as a multiplier of education.

Here in New Zealand, we are worse off than our Aussie cousins: we have truly neglected research: two good quality government reviews by Sir Peter Gluckman have been ignored, and crucial research funding - such as the Marsden Fund being withdrawn from humanities and social sciences, despite a vital need to address societal challenges - has been axed (White, 2025).

So we have no oversight; super high pay for twats; chasing money, not education; reducing research; and then the last twist: less public money to pay for education. Government funding is not keeping pace with the rising cost of living, so effectively over time, universities are forced to seek alternative revenue to keep the lights on, and once we get into that way of thinking, we start to see how we got to the super high pay for twats situation (The Australia Institute, 2025; White, 2025). 

And even worse in New Zealand, our current government has ACTUALLY cut funding, despite significant operational cost increases. So we really do have less to do with less. And less. 

Can't think why this is a problem... can you? 

Sam

References:

The Australia Institute. (2025, November 9). Decades of neoliberalism have broken our universities [Ebony Bennett interviews Richard Denniss; video]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/dSbKSqD-JR0

White, L. (2025, November 10). We’ve forgotten what universities are for. The Spinoff. https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/10-11-2025/weve-forgotten-what-universities-are-for

read more "Tertiary education's death by a thousand cuts"

Service organisation decline, part 1

I have been a member of a few not for profit, or NFP, organisations: interest, sport, professional, and community groups. But I am not currently a member of any service organisations. 

Service organisations are those which were - theoretically - set up to do good in the community. Rotary was founded as a pot-luck lunch club in Chicago where a lawyer, "a tailor, an engineer, and a coal supplier" which moved each week to another member's house (Tamayo, 2018, p. xiii) "hence the name 'Rotary'". The model was set, way back in 1905, with every member being in a different trade, so Rotarians could network across communities. Rotary started in New Zealand in the 1920s (New Zealand History, 2026). Another American service organisation, Lions, was another Chicago-born idea of the early 20th century, establishing clubs in New Zealand later, in the 1950s (Lions Clubs, 2026; Tamayo, 2018). The Masonic Lodge is the eldest: 1717 marked the founding of the first 'grand lodge' in the UK (Freemasons New Zealand, 2026), with the first New Zealand branch being officially established in 1890.

In Aotearoa, to the best of my knowledge, there are no homegrown service organisations. We have imported these from elsewhere: largely the USA with Rotary and Lions; and the UK with the Masonic Lodge. Menz Sheds arrived here from Aussie (but I feel this is more of an interest group, rather than a service organisation; Te Ara, 2026). I became a member of Rotary some years ago because they said they wanted to make change, and were actively recruiting younger members and women. However, I left because I found the organisation - despite saying they sought change - too old-fashioned; fighting change every step of the way. I was unable to effect anything meaningful, so left. My mother was a member of the gendered arm of Lions, Lionesses: however, her local branch was forced into closure as it was literally dying out. I think my grandfather, a great-great grandfather and a great-great-great, were members of the Masonic Lodge. 

I have been idly noting for over twenty years the decline of service organisations, and recently I got to more actively wondering exactly what is driving the decline. I have a few vague thoughts based on my own experience: that (a) existing members want the organisations to stay in their current cultural shape, resisting modernisation; (b) that this shape is too rigid for a diffuse society; (c) the organisations' original networking purpose is outdated. However, I have not yet gone looking for any supporting evidence; now it is time to see what the experts have to say.

From my reading, it seems that part of that rigidity due to the shape of society at the time these organisations were created: they are a societal reflection. Service groups flourished at a time with a division of labour: women worked at home; men went out to work. Flanked by two world wars and a great depression, members could network over lunch, with organisational membership being "cosmopolitan [due to] their global reach" (Tamayo, 2018, p. xvi). A man - and it was a man - in provincial Maine could connect with a man in provincial New Zealand. Today 67% of all New Zealand women also work outside the home, alongside 75% of men (Ministry of Women, 2026).

And today we have the internet and digital media as a societal bridge. Perhaps Tim Berners-Lee's protocol has filled the service group-sized space. 

Even in the US where many service organisations originated, significant "social, cultural, and economic changes" are "contributing to a decline in volunteerism" (Conway, 2024, p. 11), so this is not only happening in New Zealand.  Along with increasing secularity, families today are smaller, both parents may work, or may parent alone without "the time, labor, or fiscal resources" to donate; and we tend to spend more "free time alone and at home", not necessarily wanting to network with people outside our families (p. 11). Do we have less 'free' time? Or is there more we want to put into our free time? 

There are interesting questions. I will continue to explore. 

Sam

References:

Conway, A. L. (2024). Serving the Nation: Volunteer Management from an Anthropological Perspective [Master's thesis, California State University]. https://scholarworks.calstate.edu/downloads/41687t01c

Freemasons New Zealand. (2026). History. https://freemasonsnz.org/history

Lions Clubs. (2026). History of Lions Clubs. https://www.lionsclubs.org.nz/about/history-lions-nz

Ministry of Women. (2026). Labour market participation. Manatū Wāhine. https://www.women.govt.nz/women-and-work/labour-market-participation

New Zealand History. (2026). First Rotary club in New Zealand founded: 7 June 1921. https://nzhistory.govt.nz/page/first-rotary-club-new-zealand-founded

Tamayo, D. (2018). Volunteers as a Community of Practice: Rotary and Lions Clubs, the Mexican Middle Classes, and the Post-Revolutionary State, 1920s-1960s [Doctoral thesis, University of California]. https://escholarship.org/content/qt6ds9m3b3/qt6ds9m3b3_noSplash_9fe8ce200da731f05c191571e8b1b082.pdf

Te Ara. (2026). Mental health community organisations: MENZSHED New Zealand. https://teara.govt.nz/en/photograph/29430/mental-health-community-organisations-menzshed-new-zealand

read more "Service organisation decline, part 1"

MS Excel can't insert new cells

If, on trying to insert a row or a column in Excel, we have ever had a really long error message, "Microsoft Excel can't insert new cells because it would push non-empty cells off the end of the worksheet. These non-empty cells might appear empty but have blank values, some formatting, or a formula. Delete enough rows or columns to make room for what you want to insert and then try again" it may be because of two tricksy little reasons. 

Firstly, we may unknowingly have a merged cell somewhere (Anonymous, 2019). 

Secondly, we may have a single, filled cell right at the end of the sheet that does not allow us to add one more row or column. 

To find out which, the process is simple, which I have covered before in a post here, detailed by Kader (2024): 

1.  Select the last active column in your spreadsheet Key Ctrl, Shift & the Right Arrow to highlight all the 'live' columns (or rows)
2. Key Ctrl & - (minus, and I used the number pad for this key) to delete cell contents 
3. Key Ctrl & S to save 
4. Close out. 

Reopen and try again to insert your cell or column. Hopefully that works for you, just as well as it worked for me :-)

Sam

References:

Anonymous. (2019, January 25). Excel can't insert new cells because it would push non-empty cells off the end of the spreadsheet. Microsoft Ignite. https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/answers/questions/4991814/excel-cant-insert-new-cells-because-it-would-push

Anonymous. (2018, January 3). Can't insert new cells - what what?. Microsoft Ignite. https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/answers/questions/4949199/cant-insert-new-cells-what-what?forum=msoffice-all&referrer=answers

Kader, E. (2024, February 12). [Solved!] CTRL+END Shortcut Key Goes Too Far in Excel (6 Fixes). Exceldemy. https://www.exceldemy.com/excel-ctrl-end-goes-too-far/

read more "MS Excel can't insert new cells"

The yeah nah of job growth

Way back in 2016, a pair of US researchers updated a working paper for showing that most of our gains in jobs, 94% our "net job growth" created between 2005 and 2015, in fact, came from what the researchers called "alternative work" (Katz & Krueger, 2016, p. 7).

Alternative work is where employees are "working or self-employed as an independent contractor, an independent consultant, or a freelance worker" (Katz & Krueger, 2016, p. 9); working for organisations such as Deliveroo, Uber, or similar; where power is wielded by the employer, and the 'independent' contractor is effectively a price-taker. This type of work appears to offer "workers the ‘freedom’ and ‘flexibility’ to work whenever and wherever they want, becoming a source of income while positively contributing to platform workers’ work–life balance" (Cano et al., 2021, p. 47). And yep, it sounds like a good deal for "governments focused on job creation, [but such roles] are also symbolic of precarious work, and hence of deteriorating working conditions and labour standards (p. 47).

Further, the reality is significantly different for the 'contractor' than the marketed ideal sounds. If contractors refuse a gig, the algorithm starts to discount them quite quickly, and they end up not making enough money to survive. There appear to be a growing class of precarious workers who cannot make ends meet, despite working far more than a full time role.

I found the Katz and Krueger (2016) findings interesting: there is evidence we were eroding our employee-base well before Covid-19, and after we have accounted for the number of new jobs we have created, less the number of jobs that have vanished, damn near all of them were contingent roles.

We are not creating safe, secure employment, but perilous, precarious work where we have to take the pay that is offered, because we have no bargaining power.

So: Yay! Job Growth. Oh no: it is contingent. I am sure this will all end really well.

Sam

References:

Cano, M. R., Espelt, R., & Morell, M. F. (2021). Flexibility and freedom for whom? Precarity, freedom and flexibility in on-demand food delivery. Work Organisation, Labour & Globalisation, 15(1), 46-68. https://doi.org/10.13169/workorgalaboglob.15.1.0046

Katz, L. F., & Krueger, A. B. (2016). The Rise and Nature of Alternative Work Arrangements in the United States, 1995-2015 [Working paper #22667]. National Bureau of Economic Research [NBER]. http://www.nber.org/papers/w22667

read more "The yeah nah of job growth"

Costing women's work

As Lucassen says, "women’s work is often overlooked compared to men’s" (2021, p. 1): I have written about this before (here), but an Australian researcher has just thrown a whole lot of skull sweat into actually costing it out (Risse, 2025). And it turns out that the proportion of overlooked, under-costed, and economically undervalued productivity in our societies is quite significant; for both men AND women. 

No surprises there. Men have almost another $500/week of unpaid work; women almost $800 (Risse, 2025). So we have clear evidence that women in our societies "contribute the bulk (61.5%) of total time spent on unpaid work and care" (Risse, 2025). Even better, this article provides a data entry field which allows us to enter and calculate out our own weekly unpaid hours. We can enter our estimated average weekly volunteer hours; the childcare hours we do; how many elder-care hours we deliver; and how many hours we spend on other domestic duties. Better still, if we are a woman, we can add a factor for our gendered pay, to have that corrected for, and to see just how many hours of work we are actually doing each week. Brilliant!

Check that tool out here, at the heading "Total value of labour", here.

It turns out that women are doing just as many productive hours as men: they simply aren't calculated as part of our economic budgeting. The author closes with a quote from our own Marilyn Waring, who noted that "The laws of economics and those that govern the UNSNA [United Nations Systems of National Accounts] are creations of the male mind and do not reflect or encompass the reality of the female world. The conceptual models are limited to the world that the economist knows or observes, and housework is most certainly not part of that world" (Risse, 2025).

It is important stuff, doing the dishes, taking out the rubbish, and turning the lights off. No job is done until that stuff is done.

Sam

References:

Lucassen, J. (2021). The Story of Work: A New History of Humankind. Yale University Press.

Risse, L. (2025, November 3). Unpaid ‘women’s work’ is worth $427 billion, new research shows. See how much your unpaid labour is worth. The Conversation. https://theconversation.com/unpaid-womens-work-is-worth-427-billion-new-research-shows-see-how-much-your-unpaid-labour-is-worth-267860

read more "Costing women's work"

A few interesting nuggets

In researching material for recent post (here) I found a few interesting nuggets (side-projects, if you will). The first tip I heard was a second recommendation for the Cory Doctorow book on internet 'enshittification' (McBain, 2025, commenter "hureharehure"; Skopic, 2025). This was noteworthy because I tend to use only three platforms regularly: following a number of makers on YouTube; posting to LinkedIn, and a very minor storefront on BlueSky. Twitter, FB, Insta etc all feel too skewed (Wylie, 2019) and full of that 'enshittification' which Cory Doctorow appears to explores in his book (Skopic, 2025). So that is a definite reading list inclusion, and I have put in a request for the title at the library.

Second, the enshittification of the interweb is making me think more seriously about reading Sarah Wynn-Williamson's book on Facebook. I was reluctant, because her time at FB is now quite dated, but I am now thinking that I should read it. Shaping forces, and all that. I have also put in a library request for this one as well (but there is a LONG waiting list!).

And third, commenter hureharehure also helpfully suggested that if readers were unable to "read some of those links directly [we...] will likely be able to find archived versions with a site like https://archive.ph/" (McBain, 2025). Wow! The Archive.Today site was one I had not previously heard of, so I have banked that very helpful suggestion... and already used it several times to great effect to read articles which are behind paywalls. 

I will do some book reviews once I have read and digested the books :-)

Sam

References:

Archive.Today. (2026). Webpage Capture and Article Finder. https://archive.ph/

McBain, S. (2025, October 18). Are we living in a golden age of stupidity?. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/oct/18/are-we-living-in-a-golden-age-of-stupidity-technology

Skopic, A. (2025, August 22). Why the Internet is Turning to Shit. Current Affairs. https://www.currentaffairs.org/news/why-the-internet-is-turning-to-shit

Wylie, C. (2019). Mindf* ck: Inside Cambridge Analytica’s plot to break the world. Profile Books.

Wynn-Williams, S. (2025). Careless People: A cautionary tale of power, greed, and lost idealism. Flatiron Books.

read more "A few interesting nuggets "

Practice models to move a client session forward

How do we determine our process with a new client: to assist them to meet the goals they set for themselves? It is an interesting question to pose, and those of us who are experienced in field will probably simply say we will talk together. In the course of exploring the client telling us about what they want to achieve, we will start to get an idea of how we might proceed together. What we are hearing will start to slot into place, we will feel echoes of previously experienced patterns and solutions in what the client is sharing with us, and, if we listen carefully, and ask enough questions, a range of options will begin to present themselves.

However, what happens if a way forward does NOT present itself? What if we meet a totally new experience, and are at a loss? This is where using a practice model as a frame may give us some ideas to progress. For example, we could use any one of the following:

1. The Calgary-Cambridge guide (Kurtz & Silverman, 1996) (here)
2. The Choose–Get–Keep Model (Anthony et al., 1984) (here)
3. The Fonofale model (Pulotu-Endemann, 2001) (here)
4. The Kakala framework (Fono, 2014) (here)
5. The ROPES model (Nemec, et al., 1992) (here)
6. The SOAP framework (Weed, 1970), also known in New Zealand as SOTAP (Evans et al., 2022) (here)
7. Te Whare Tapa Wha (Durie, 1985) (here)
8. The Zunker Model for integrating assessment results (Osborn & Zunker, 2016, p. 4) (here)

Getting familiar with these frameworks ahead of time, reflecting upon how they may have assisted when we were working with previous clients, mentally experimenting with the components, may assist us when we are feeling short of options. 

It is always good to have some alternatives to try. 

Sam

References:

Anthony, W. A., Howell, J., & Danley, K. S. (1984). Chapter 13: Vocational rehabilitation of the psychiatric disabled. In J. A. Talbott, M. Mirabi, L. Feldman (Eds.), The Chronically Mentally Ill: Research and services (pp. 215–237). Spectrum Publications, Inc.

Evans, M., Sykes, C., Hocking, C., Siegert, R., & Garratt, N. (2022). Inter-rater agreement when linking stroke interventions to the extended international classification of functioning, disability and health core set for stroke. Disability and Rehabilitation, 44(25), 8022-8028. https://doi.org/10.1080/09638288.2021.2008525

Durie, M. H. (1985). A Māori perspective of health. Social Science & Medicine, 20(5), 483-486. https://doi.org/10.1016/0277-9536(85)90363-6

Fono, T. L. (2014). Setting the scene: Working with pacific families [slide deck]. https://ana.org.nz/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/mafi-tino-lelei.pdf

Nemec, P. B., McNamara, S., & Walsh, D. (1992). Direct Skills Teaching. Psychosocial Rehabilitation Journal, 16(1), 13–25. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0095731

Pulotu-Endemann, F. K. (2001). Fonofale: Model of Health. Pacific Models for Health Promotion Workshop at Massey University, Wellington Campus, 7 September 2009. https://www.nelsontasmankindergartens.com/uploads/1/4/4/2/14426744/fonofalemodelexplanation.pdf

Osborn, D. S., & Zunker, V. G. (2016). Using Assessment Results for Career Development (9th ed.). Cengage Learning.

Weed, L. (1970). Medical records, medical education and patient care: the problem-oriented record as a basic tool. Case Western Reserve University Press.

read more "Practice models to move a client session forward"

Retiring retirement

Sir Dick Seddon, then PM, proposed a compulsory retirement age of 65 years in 1898 when the average life expectancy for a New Zealander was 54 (Schlaadt, 2009). Ouch: most of us wouldn't see 'retirement' before we sloped off to join everyone else in the dead centre of town (yep, bad Dad joke). We had a baby pension which "was rigorously means-tested [...] for those no longer able to work" which was only 4% of our then population (Schlaadt, 2009, p. 6).

By 1930 our average life expectancy was 65; by 1952 it was 70 (Global Stats, 2021), and at last 'Mr and Mrs Average' got to enjoy a couple of years as a reward for working productively for the benefit of the nation. Life expectancy has continued to increase, and while we still retire at 65, we are now likely to live to 83 (Statistics New Zealand, 2026a). That means an 18 year retirement pension payback from nation in return for our years of productivity. Retirement no longer compulsory: many enjoy working and want to keep contributing (Spoonley, 2020), but there are 17% of us over 65 (World Bank Group, 2026).

There is also a large percentage of us who can't afford to retire: those who don't own their own home; those who spent a lifetime looking after families so have few savings; those who have spent their lives being supported by their families so have no funds to make the pension liveable (Retirement Commission, 2023). This group of Kiwis at risk will form a significant financial burden for our future selves, and we need to plan how we will manage that humanitarian burden in a humanitarian way.

While easy to see in hindsight, instead of an age, we may have been better to have linked retirement and the pension to our life expectancy. Then successive governments would have found managing the cost of retirees relatively simple. Not only is this is a seriously unpopular topic to make change on - who is going to vote to retire later - there is a large block of older voters who all go to the polls.

(Good thing an ex-PM didn't use our retirement funds to fund some dams and stuff, eh. Oh wait: he did. But it was OK: twenty years later we set up another one. No harm done - only fifty years lost. I am sure that won't matter a bit.)

However, the real problem is not retirement: the real problem is birthrate. If we had enough young people coming along the population pipeline to balance out those of us who will be 'enjoying' living on half the minimum wage for the remainder of our natural, there would be no problem. But our replacement rate has dropped off a cliff, to 1.56 (Statistics New Zealand, 2026b). We used to simply plug the gap with migration: but if every other nation on the planet is experiencing the same issue with declining populations (Shaw, 2025), where will we get our new migrants from?

This bulge will go away, of course: retirees will die, but there will be fewer people to pay tax and to keep the lights on.

As a nation, we need to discuss retirement, perhaps retiring retirement, or change will 'happen' to us. Our ability to plan and effect change will be taken from us by paralysis and inaction.

I don't know what we will decide, but we really need to talk about it.

Sam

References:

Global Stats. (2021, February 20). Countries with highest Life Expectancy (1800 - 2099). YouTube. https://youtu.be/30TjaV4F3g

Retirement Commission. (2023). Tauākī Whakamaunga Atu | Statement of Intent 2023-2026. Te Ara Ahunga Ora. https://assets.retirement.govt.nz/public/Uploads/Corporate-reports/Statement-of-Intent/Statement-of-Intent-Tauaki-Whakamaunga-Atu-2023-2026.pdf

Schlaadt, R. J. (2009). Planning for retirement in 2025: A Delphi study. Retirement preparation – why is it so difficult? [Doctoral thesis, University of Otago). https://ourarchive.otago.ac.nz/esploro/fulltext/graduate/Planning-for-retirement-in-2025-A/9926479203301891?repId=12396704130001891&mId=13397144580001891&institution=64OTAGO_INST

Shaw, S. J. (Writer, Director, Producer). (2025, September 19). Birthgap [documentary film, Torch Pictures]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/m2GeVG0XYTc

Spoonley, P. (2020). Chapter 1: A Reshaped Society. In The New New Zealand: Facing demographic disruption (pp. 9-23). Massey University Press.

Statistics New Zealand. (2026). New Zealand cohort life tables: March 2025 update. https://www.stats.govt.nz/information-releases/new-zealand-cohort-life-tables-march-2025-update/

Statistics New Zealand (2026b). Net migration falls in 2024. https://www.stats.govt.nz/news/net-migration-falls-in-2024/

World Bank Group. (2026). Population ages 65 and above (% of total population) - New Zealand. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.POP.65UP.TO.ZS?locations=NZ

read more "Retiring retirement"

Building a better idiot part 2

A couple of years ago I wrote a piece on trying to find the source of the ‘make it idiot-proof and the world/universe will build a better idiot’ style of quote (here). This was - I thought - from a Robert Anson Heinlein book - which went something along the lines of "make a system idiot proof and the world will build a better idiot". I couldn't find anything in Heinlein, finding instead a quote in Cook (1990). This didn't feel right, as this saying was steeped in family lore and we had all well-left home by 1990... and none of us had read Cook's book.

So, as I had some energy, I would do a little more searching, deciding as I went along that seeking synonyms for idiot-proof may help. I hit a bit of pay-dirt with 'foolproof', finding a few earlier quotes, as follows (and in reverse chronological order):

• 1988: "There's no system foolproof enough to defeat a sufficiently great fool" (Davis, 1988, p. 46, 48, citing Teller). While I have found this widely as an 'inspirational' quote attributed to Teller, I have not yet found this actual phrase in any of Teller's writings thus far.
• 1979: "Anyone who imagines he has found a foolproof system is apt to learn that the fool is bigger than the proof" (Teller, 1979, p. 171). We have the man himself writing particular version. It is not quite as Davis (1988) has it, but reasonably close; and while we are not building a bigger fool, we do have size and the system both present. To me, this feels similar enough to "if we make something idiot-proof, we will build a better idiot" to be the source.

In addition, I found a slightly different version of the first Teller quote:

• 1982: "Having observed the evolution of nuclear technology, Edward Teller has commented: '...so far we have been extremely lucky... But with the great number of simians monkeying around with things they do not completely understand, sooner or later the fool will prove greater than the proof, even in a fool-proof system'" (Adler & Singer, 1982, p. 1412). Once again, this is not Teller saying this first-hand; it is a secondary source.
• 1976: and an earlier version almost identical to the first: "Edward Teller, father of the hydrogen bomb, believes that 'so far we have been extremely lucky... But with the great number of simians monkeying around with things that they do not completely understand, sooner or later a fool will prove greater than the proof even in a fool-proof system" (Hayes, 1976, p. 32). Again, a second-hand source.
• However, I have not been able to find this quote from Teller himself, which must be earlier than 1976.

Confusingly, I may have found another, similar version from a UK source: 

• 1984/1937: in the text, the author says: "As an experienced observer of the American scene, [Sir Ronald Charles] Lindsay knew what he was talking about and no remark was more accurate than that which he offered to the Foreign Secretary in March 1937 to the effect that Anglo-American relations were fool-proof and were only in danger when attempts were made to improve them" (Murfett, 1984, p. 25) and in the front matter, with the appearance of a quote, as "Anglo-American relations were fool-proof and only in danger when attempts were made to improve them" (p. xv, citing Sir Ronald Charles Lindsay to the Foreign Office, 22 Mar 1937). 
• As a result, it is unclear if this is Murfett's 1984 wording, or the original phrasing of Lindsay in 1937. There may be documentary proof, as a document number is supplied by Murfett (1984, p. xv): “Lindsay to Foreign Office, 22 Mar 1937, No. 247, A2378/38/45, FO 371/20651” in the book. However, am uncertain how I would get to view this. 

So currently I am not sure if (a) Lindsay owns the primary phrase and all others have built on it; or (b) the Teller is a parallel primary source and creates pre-1976 "simian" quote, the Teller 1979 "fool is bigger" quote is his smoothing of his own idea, with Davis morphing it into the short form in 1988, that in 1990 is formalised by and attributed to Cook; or (c) Teller has read/heard Lindsay and regurgitates it, followed by Davis and Cook; or (d) if Murfett in 1984 had previously read/heard Teller, and echoed this phrasing when writing about Lindsay's stance in 1937.

Isn't it fascinating just how deep down the rabbit hole we can go, looking for answers?!

Sam

References:

Adler, E., & Singer, R. (1982). Political Action Needed against Nuclear Escalation [Letters to the Editor]. American Journal of Public Health, 72(12), 1412. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.72.12.1412-a

Cook, R. (1990). The Wizardry Compiled. Baen Books.

Davis, J. (1988). Nuclear Reactions. Omni, 10(8), 40-48, 118.

Hayes, D. (1976). Nuclear Power: The fifth horseman [Worldwatch Paper 6]. The Worldwatch Institute.

Murfett, M. H. (1984). Fool-proof Relations: The search for Anglo-American naval cooperation during the Chamberlain years 1937-1940. Singapore University Press.

Teller, E. (1979). Energy from Heaven and Earth: In which a story is told about energy from its origins 15,000,000,000 years ago to its present adolescence. W. H. Freeman & Company.

read more "Building a better idiot part 2"

Why are Apprenticeships the 'poor relation'?

How did Apprenticeships become the poor relation of the qualifications field? 

Am I right in saying that they are? I think so: apprenticeships are considered a 'lesser' option by students, parents and educators. It has a "problem of esteem", where trades lack social status (Maurice-Takerei, 2025, p. 37). In Aotearoa New Zealand we have a history of resistance to, and fragmentary approaches to trades training and apprenticeship programmes, appears to have resulted in our vocational education lacking "a reliable place to sit" (Chan, 2020; Maurice-Takerei, 2025, p. 39). It lacks cohesion: as a nation we have shown we don't value it, and - as a result - we don't value it. We import tradespeople when we can't train enough (Maurice-Takerei, 2025). But we are also a nation of small businesses, where few organisations can afford to train apprentices. As a result, trades training is "seen as an option for students deemed less capable of succeeding in academic environments" (p. 39). Ouch. 

Whereas doing a degree is more than gaining a qualification: it is about "signalling", about creating personal advantage, and about building "reputational capital" from the conferring university. A degree provides "social networks and contacts" (Strathdee & Cooper, 2017, p. 374) which we obtain by attending and help us to access opportunities through in-group, insider knowledge (Strathdee & Cooper, 2017). A degree opens doors: regardless what our degree is in, it shows an employer that we can handle adversity and complete a body of challenging work over a number of years; we have a proven ability to think critically (Van Damme & Zahner, 2022). It shows our endurance and tenacity (Marshall, 2024). And it makes it easier for employers to understand the skills we must possess via "the proxy of the qualification" (Marshall, 2024, p. 591). 

In the past, professions that a degree takes us into were considered stable and "white-collar [... such as] accountancy and law" (Chan, 2020, p. 169)... and "durable". We were unlikely to be at risk of automation or AI. However, I think most of us know that was naive, as while many of the professions may as yet be "too difficult and costly to automate or to digitise", opinions are increasingly replicable by AI (p. 169). Automation cannot yet match "the complex range of environments [, ...and] the manual dexterity [...] required to accomplish many technical tasks" in fields such as plumbing or gas fitting (p. 169). Yet. 

Maurice-Takerei outlines some distasteful cultural antecedents shaped by our colonial history, which seems likely to have encouraged our lack of esteem for tradespeople; where learning a trade "is inferior to an academic education" (2025, p. 39). Further, decreasing global birthrates (Shaw, 2025) mean our ability to import those trades we need is looking decidedly rocky. 

We need to effect a cultural change in Aotearoa New Zealand where trades are valued, promoted, recruited for, and supported: before we run out of crafts people able to do this mahi.

Sam

References:

Chan, S. (2020). Identity, Pedagogy and Technology-enhanced Learning: Supporting the Processes of Becoming a Tradesperson. Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.

Maurice-Takerei, L. (2025). Change and Persistence: The Legacies for VET in Aotearoa, New Zealand. International Journal of Vocational Education Studies, 2(2), 35-51. https://doi.org/10.14361/9783839473627-03

Marshall, S. (2024). Chapter 30: Future higher education in New Zealand: creating a universal learning community for future skills. In U.-D. Ehlers, L. Eigbrecht (Eds.), Creating the University of the Future: A global view on future skills and future higher education (pp. 589-611). Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH.

Shaw, S. J. (Writer, Director, Producer). (2025, September 19). Birthgap [documentary film, Torch Pictures]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/m2GeVG0XYTc

Strathdee, R., & Cooper, G. (2017). Ethnicity, vocational education and training and the competition for advancement through education in New Zealand. Journal of Vocational Education & Training, 69(3), 371-389. https://doi.org/10.1080/13636820.2017.1300595

Van Damme, D., & Zahner, D. (Ed.). (2022). Does Higher Education Teach Students to Think Critically?. Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development [OECD] Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1787/cc9fa6aa-en

read more "Why are Apprenticeships the 'poor relation'?"

Search and AI brain rot

A recent post was about some research on the lack of brain activity when using AI tools (here; Kosmyna et al., 2025; McBain, 2025). What I also found some interesting user comments generated by the article (McBain, 2025). One, by a tutor/teacher, said that "that Googling an answer does provide knowledge [...as] long as the answer provided is the correct one" (commenter "bettycallmeal", McBain, 2025). While I would suggest that bettycallmeal may have meant 'information', rather than "knowledge", I understood the gap she was seeking to bridge for her students between search and the necessary injection of critical thinking to sift the grain from the dross.

One search solution I use is to avoid Google as much as I can, part of Alphabet's empire. I avoid Google - and Chrome - most of the time because of Alphabet's profit motive. Google is a business, collecting my cookies to track my online movements, feeding me ads designed to get me to buy, and selling my search data, and skewing my search results towards its clients, and to previous user search results in my area. It is now what they 'do'. I am not annoyed at a business being true to its nature, but I do not like constantly being marketed to/at. 

Instead, I sought out a search engine which had privacy at its core, and went with DuckDuckGo. DuckDuckGo aims "to protect the privacy of its users", and returns "the same search results for a specific keyword, without filtering those search results and personalizing them based on the [user's] history [to] the user" (Tyrsina, 2025). While I get fewer search results, often - not always though - those results are more accurate. Additionally, I use the Brave browser which while built on the Chrome platform, still slashes tracking cookies and advertising on my PC. On my mobile I use DuckDuckGo and Adblock browser. Those tools might also help bettycallsmeal's students.

But the problem is probably larger than just where we search. Another commenter (commenter "hureharehure", McBain, 2025) replied to bettycallmeal that another complication was that "the internet [...] is eating itself" - a timely reminder of the oroboros! - due to "much of the internet [now being full of] AI slop". It appears that many media platforms allow unreliable AI generated material to proliferate (read more here). Commenter hureharehure had found users to be "quite incurious about whether the information they seek is at all reliable" and pointed bettycallmeal to the following resources to assist her students (McBain, 2025):

• Users seeing the "AI-generated summary on Google search are significantly less likely to click on external links than users who don't" (commenter "hureharehure", McBain, 2025), with only 1% of users clicking on AI summary links (Chapekis & Lieb, 2025). Since Google’s AI Overviews launched in May 2024, 69% of Google news searches have users not clicking on any links, up from 56% (Barenholtz, 2025; commenter "hureharehure", McBain, 2025). So why is that, then?
• Well, because it appears that Google's AI summaries are giving people just enough information so they don't need to know more (Jaźwińska, 2025). Though I must confess, if I get a news article summary and it is on a platform I am subscribed to, I won't click through on a Google News link: I will go straight to the platform so it lowers the platform's Google bill
• Apparently nearly a billion people already use ChatGPT (The Economist, 2025); we are not talking all the other LLM platforms through, such as Deepseek, Claude, Gemini, Copilot, Perplexity, and SciSpace for language work; Reclaim and SkedPal for planning; Midjourney, Dall-E, Firefly and Deep for images; Veo, Runway, Sora and Synthesia for video; Asana for calendar work (Karkar, 2025)
• Read an exploration of the "dead internet theory" (Prada, 2025) and a summary of platform slop, advertising and AI hallucination (Goodfriend, 2025; Koebler, 2025)
• Get a review of the forthcoming book by Cory Doctorow on internet 'enshittification' (Skopic, 2025)

These are things we should be telling our students, so they realise that any search is not necessarily a 'good' search. It may be a skewed search: for example, Google/Gemini AI search and summaries are likely to be skewed based on location search history, our national laws, local businesses who have Google Ad Words, and the data that has been fed into Gemini (Gleason et al., 2023). 

If our students are not using their critical thinking skills but accepting what search has delivered up to them, then "Houston, we have a problem" (Howard & Graze, 1995, 50:52): and the research appears to already be showing that problem. Our less critical thinkers seem to be already experiencing brain rot (Karunaratne & Adesina, 2023; Kosmyna et al., 2025; McBain, 2025). 

To me, more AI use seems unlikely to improve critical thinking skills, but to reduce them. And that is a serious problem. 

Sam

References:

Barenholtz, L. (2025, March 12). Google AI Overviews: SEO Tips and Strategies. Similar Web. https://www.similarweb.com/blog/marketing/seo/ai-overviews/

Chapekis, A., & Lieb, A. (2025, July 22). Google users are less likely to click on links when an AI summary appears in the results. Pew Research Center. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/07/22/google-users-are-less-likely-to-click-on-links-when-an-ai-summary-appears-in-the-results/

Gleason, J., Hu, D., Robertson, R. E., & Wilson, C. (2023, June). Google the gatekeeper: How search components affect clicks and attention. In Proceedings of the International AAAI Conference on Web and Social Media (Vol. 17, pp. 245-256). https://ojs.aaai.org/index.php/ICWSM/article/download/22142/21921

Goodfriend, D. (2025, July 10). Deadly Slop: Artificial intelligence on the battlefield. The Baffler. https://thebaffler.com/latest/deadly-slop-goodfriend

Howard, R. (Director), & Grazer, B. (Producer). (1995). Apollo 13 [motion picture]. Universal Studios.

Karkar, J. (2025, August 21). 29 Top AI Platforms to Look Out for in 2025. TestGrid. https://testgrid.io/blog/top-ai-platforms/

Karunaratne, T., & Adesina, A. (2023, October). Is it the new Google: Impact of ChatGPT on students’ information search habits. In Proceedings of the 22nd European Conference on e-Learning, ECEL (pp. 147-155). https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Thashmee-Karunaratne/publication/374911381_Is_it_the_new_Google_Impact_of_ChatGPT_on_Students%27_Information_Search_Habits/links/6589f3110bb2c7472b0fc0d8/Is-it-the-new-Google-Impact-of-ChatGPT-on-Students-Information-Search-Habits.pdf

Jaźwińska, K. (2025, July 31). Traffic Apocalypse: Google’s AI Overviews are killing click-throughs to news sites. Colombia Journalism Review. https://www.cjr.org/analysis/traffic-apocalypse-google-ai-overviews-killing-click-throughs-news-sites.php

Koebler, J. (2025, July 15). The Hyperpersonalized AI Slop Silo Machine Is Here. 404 Media. https://www.404media.co/the-ai-slop-niche-machine-is-here/

Kosmyna, N., Hauptmann, E., Yuan, Y. T., Situ, J., Liao, X. H., Beresnitzky, A. V., ... & Maes, P. (2025). Your brain on ChatGPT: Accumulation of cognitive debt when using an AI assistant for essay writing task. arXiv. Advance online publication. https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.08872

McBain, S. (2025, October 18). Are we living in a golden age of stupidity?. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/oct/18/are-we-living-in-a-golden-age-of-stupidity-technology

Prada, L. (2025, September 15). One-Third of the Internet Is Just Bots Now. Seriously. VICE. https://www.vice.com/en/article/yep-one-third-of-the-internet-is-just-bots-now/?

Skopic, A. (2025, August 22). Why the Internet is Turning to Shit. Current Affairs. https://www.currentaffairs.org/news/why-the-internet-is-turning-to-shit

The Economist. (2025, July 14). AI is killing the web. Can anything save it?.  https://www.economist.com/business/2025/07/14/ai-is-killing-the-web-can-anything-save-it

Tyrsina, R. (2025, October 10). What is DuckDuckGo and what are the benefits of using it?. Digital Citizen. https://www.digitalcitizen.life/what-is-duckduckgo/

Wylie, C. (2019). Mindf* ck: Inside Cambridge Analytica’s plot to break the world. Profile Books.

Wynn-Williams, S. (2025). Careless People: A cautionary tale of power, greed, and lost idealism. Flatiron Books.

read more "Search and AI brain rot"