Bio

I am an Australian Research Council-funded Future Fellow at RMIT University. I am a member of RMIT’s Digital Ethnography Research Centre and the Blockchain Innovation Hub. My current research is focused on the social outcomes of blockchain technologies and other forms of automated governance. In May 2020 I commenced an ARC-funded Future Fellowship project entitled 'Cooperation through Code: The social outcomes of blockchain technology'. For over a decade I conducted research on digital inclusion and exclusion, including the social, economic and infrastructure dimensions of internet adoption and use in remote Indigenous communities. I have authored/co-authored five books: Wi-Fi (Polity 2021); Using Media for Social Innovation (Intellect 2018); Internet on the Outstation: The Digital Divide and Remote Aboriginal Communities (INC 2016); Life of SYN: A Story of the Digital Generation (Monash University Publishing 2011); and Community Media: A Global Introduction (Rowman & Littlefield 2006). I am also producing two audio documentary podcast series: Disconnect (on the internet in remote Aboriginal communities) and Mutable (the social life of blockchains). Disconnect can be found on iTunes here: https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/disconnect/id1473568047, or on most other podcast platforms. Mutable is currently in production. Specialties: Areas of expertise for research and research supervision: Indigenous media, community media, blockchain/distributed ledgers in the context of the evolving internet and associated themes (privacy, trust, media ownership, distributed and automated governance).