We need to talk about Elon

and AI, the economy, public services, the state and society, well all things digital

25 years ago the modern digital world and the new devolved institutions were born.

Its time for a conversation about the state and society in the digital age.

Heil Twittler!

The digital world needs to be brought into the political mainstream and not regarded as a rare and delicate thing that needs special technocratic management.

Elections are the time for conversations and we need to have them urgently. Here are some of the questions that we should be talking about in May:

• How do we get an independent digital news media?

• What ethical frameworks should we use in the digital world?

• What comes after the high nationalisms that existed in a world of national newspapers, national radio, national education, national television, national literature, now that those are gone? Particularly for the English speaking world?

• How do we expand the digital world in Welsh, Gaelic and other minority languages?

• Are we at risk of losing access to our cultural history with online and streaming? How do we preserve our digital patrimony?

• How do we tackle Child Sexual Abuse Material and harassment in the online world? Is it simply baked into the tools? Should employees have criminal liability?

• What are the consequences of digital society for social trust? What needs to happen to rebuild it?

• Will AI take all our jobs? Is it a problem if it does?

• How do we push back against the surveillance workplace, and the gigification of the economy and put people back at the centre?

• What forms of political organisation do we need for the new world? How should the political parties react and change?

• What is the relationship of the citizen and the state? How has it been changed by digitisation? Should we be worried? What are civil liberties in an all-digital, joined up state?

• What happens if anti-constitutional actors seize control of the state - as has happened in America?

• How do we make it possible for people who can’t or won’t be digital natives to live and thrive in society?

• What is ‘just enough’ internet?

• How has digital changed education? What effect is AI having?

• What needs to be done to protect childhood? Should children have phones in school? What restrictions should be placed on their online lives?

• How do we tackle the epidemic of crime and fraud?

I am working with colleagues from Wales, England, Canada and all over Scotland to try and make these conversations happen in the run up to May. Stay tuned for further announcements…