The UK Post Office Horizon scandal stands as one of Britain's most devastating miscarriages of justice. Over 900 sub-postmasters and postmistresses were wrongfully convicted of theft and fraud — charges that were almost certainly the result of bugs in the Post Office's Horizon IT system, with errors traceable as far back as 1999. The human … Continue reading Bug in the System: The Post Office Horizon Scandal and the Dangers of Blind Trust in Technology
From Bell Labs to the Internet: A Question Worth Answering
An old colleague who contributed to the founding of the Oxford Internet Institute in 2001 reminded me of a question he was asked back then: There is no institute for research on the telephone, so why do we need one on the Internet? Back then, I did not think the question merited an answer, but … Continue reading From Bell Labs to the Internet: A Question Worth Answering
Democracy is Alive and Well in Britain
On 7 May 2026, voters across England went to the polls to elect more than 5,000 local councillors and six directly elected mayors. [A note for American readers: think of these as something like county and city government races, spread across a dizzying patchwork of metropolitan boroughs, unitary authorities, county councils, and district councils — … Continue reading Democracy is Alive and Well in Britain
Get Me to My Bubble
We might all know by now that in these hyper-political times of polarization and toxic communication that people often live in their own hermetically sealed thought ‘bubbles’ or ‘echo chambers’. This is a problem because if we often only hear and listen to people who share our views and fail to communicate with people outside … Continue reading Get Me to My Bubble
The Bright Side of the News
I have been a proverbial news enthusiast – maybe even a news junkie – for decades. I roll out of bed to read a couple of morning papers everyday (real newspapers delivered to my door) and subscribe to more online. I’ve always enjoyed humour and cartoons accompanying the news, but never have I appreciated humour … Continue reading The Bright Side of the News
Heroes of the Horizon Post Office Scandal
The UK’s Post Office Horizon IT scandal was one of the UK’s greatest miscarriages of justice involving IT and the public in Britain. It resulted in more than 700 sub-postmasters and postmistresses charged or prosecuted for theft – even though financial losses were judged much later to be the consequence of a defective Horizon IT … Continue reading Heroes of the Horizon Post Office Scandal
Reading and Writing Skills: Flipping the Digital Divide?
by Ruth Shillair and Bill Dutton There has been much discussion of how reliance on digital media might undermine skills in reading and writing, as with pen and paper, and, in American education, with a copy of The Elements of Style by W. Strunk Jr.& E.B. White. But the loss of traditional skills goes far … Continue reading Reading and Writing Skills: Flipping the Digital Divide?
THE SOUL OF THE MACHINE
[This post was written by A. Michael Noll and distributed here with the permission of the author.] It is nothing new. For decades, we have been fascinated with digital computing machines – thinking machines. For decades we have been using human terms to characterize them – intelligent. Artificial intelligence (AI) is over a half-century old. … Continue reading THE SOUL OF THE MACHINE
Meetings!
Bill Dutton with Dr. Ruth Shillair After reading one more litany of complaints about ‘meetings’, I must come to their defense. Harry Wallop’s article ‘Are meetings pointless?’ in The Sunday Times (12 August 2026) stirred me to answer his question. While balanced, his article basically calls into question the value of meetings. So let me … Continue reading Meetings!
Noriko Hara Visits Oxford
Wonderful to have an opportunity to catch up with Professor Noriko Hara, currently a professor in the Luddy School of Informatics, Computing and Engineering and the Director of the Rob Kling Center for Social Informatics at Indiana University, Bloomington. I met her when she was a graduate student of Rob Kling’s, a former colleague of mine when I was … Continue reading Noriko Hara Visits Oxford