The countdown is officially on to the 24th Samsung Australian IT Journalism Awards, as Influencing formally launched the awards last night at Cisco's North Sydney office.  The night was filled with conversations, catch-ups and lovely food and drinks in addition to speeches from Cisco's Communications & PR Manager, Adela Amanowicz, and Influencing CEO Phil Sim.  For those looking to purchase tickets to this year's Lizzies awards, they can do so here. (Make sure you do because they are going fast!)  Influencing would like to thank this year's sponsors, Samsung, Cisco, MYOB, Meta, Optus, Kinetic IT, PEXA, Adobe, ACS, Watterson, Aussie Broadband, Apptio and ARM Hub.  A collection of photos from last night can be found below. 

Morning, welcome to Friday and let's start with The Australian Financial Review, or more specifically with its lovely monthly magazine, the March issue of which comes out today along with the print issue. The main story in this glossy packed-with-ads-for-rich-people publication (Chanel, Hublot watches, etc) is also home to some first class editorial and photography, not least the main story which is an interview with Daniela Amodei, president and co-founder of Anthropic whose AI model Claude is at the forefront of evolving machine intelligence.   Now for those of you who are not tech-heads, I totally get it. I'm not one either, but as a colleague recently pointed out, "these days tech, and particularly AI, is in everything", which is true, like it or not. So much so that the AFR has been devoting ever more space to AI and AI-linked stories. One day I expect the financial bible to rename itself The Australian Financial &

Protection for journalists has long been a pressing issue in India, and a recent report by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) offers little reassurance. According to CPJ, one journalist has been killed in India every year for the past ten years. While the numbers are significantly lower compared to several other countries, the global picture remains grim. In its report published on February 25, CPJ recorded 129 journalists killed worldwide in 2025. This is the highest number documented by the organisation since it began tracking journalist deaths more than three decades ago. The report noted that Israel accounted for nearly two-thirds of all journalist and media worker killings during the year. When journalists themselves become the story Journalists, often described as the fourth pillar of democracy, have increasingly become news themselves. This is particularly evident in community-sensitive and geo-sensitive regions of India, where reporters face heightened risks. Earl

Journalist Neelesh Sthapak has brought pressing health and environmental concerns to the fore, filing a public interest petition that prompted the Madhya Pradesh High Court on February 25 to issue notices over unsafe transportation of fly ash from a thermal power plant in Jhabua. A division bench of Chief Justice Sanjeev Sachdeva and Justice Vinay Saraf agreed to examine the matter further, Live Law reported. Sthapak’s petition alleged that villages near the Jhabua Power Ltd plant were being exposed to pollution due to fly ash being carried in open and overloaded trucks, in violation of rules laid down by the Central Pollution Control Board (2013) and the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (2019). Fly ash, a hazardous by‑product of coal‑based power generation, was said to be contaminating air, water, and soil, posing risks to public safety. The petition also accused authorities — including the state pollution control board, district administration, an

On the occasion of Police Week, the Chakai Police in Bihar organised a friendly badminton match between police personnel and journalists on Wednesday, February 25. The match was held at the Chakai police station premises. The event was jointly inaugurated by Chakai Station House Officer Sarvjeet Kumar, Professor Mahendra Rai, Ajay Kumar Munna of the Business Association, and Manoj Poddar. The police team won the match by a margin of three to two. The chief guests later honoured both the winning and runner-up teams with trophies. The police team was led by Sarvjeet Kumar, while the Journalists’ Association team was led by Jaikumar Shukla. Sarvjeet Kumar, Prabhat Rai, Sunil Kumar, and Mantu Kumar represented the police team. The journalists’ team included Jai Kumar Shukla, Shyam Singh Tomar, Amit Kumar Rai, Vikas Lahari, Dhananjay Rai, and Sudhir Yadav, among others, Prabhat Khabhar reported.

Image edited by Dinesh Raj M   Political satire in India has always thrived on exaggeration. What it cannot survive is invisibility. A recent investigation by Newslaundry reports that political cartoonists across cities — from Pune to Kolkata — are seeing their work quietly restricted on Instagram following opaque “legal requests,” often traced back to Haryana law enforcement (Newslaundry, Feb 24, 2026). The platforms cite compliance with “local law.” The law itself is rarely named. Let’s start with the Kolkata twins. Bob and Bobby, 32-year-old filmmakers and illustrators with roughly 2.4–2.5 lakh followers, built a reputation on stylised reels mocking blind hero worship and political spectacle. On January 28, seven of their reels were restricted in India. The themes? Satire around Prime Minister Modi’s rapport with Donald Trump post-2025 inauguration, the old education qualification controversy, and “vote chori&rd

WPP and Adobe have expanded their long-standing global partnership to deliver integrated AI-powered marketing solutions for brands.  The expanded collaboration brings together Adobe’s AI tools, content platforms and data capabilities with WPP’s expertise in strategy, creativity and transformation.  The collaboration will be powered by WPP Open, the company’s agentic marketing platform, ensuring a seamless and privacy-safe transformation process. Adobe’s AI agents will assist in generating and tailoring content, while WPP’s AI tools will optimize media buying and campaign performance. Adobe Firefly Foundry will be incorporated to help maintain brand alignment across assets.  According to e4m, the partnership also includes plans to develop and deploy creative AI engineers, helping brands adopt AI tools effectively and supporting the development of future-ready marketing professionals.