MIL-OSI Export

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alice Pember, Assistant Professor of Film and Television Studies, University of Warwick

“Want to go again?” a choreographer asks Charli XCX at the start of the mockumentary The Moment. It’s the latest entry in the pop star’s rapidly expanding cinematic empire, propelled by the stratospheric cultural impact of her 2024 album, Brat.

He is asking if she’s ready to practise a gyrating, strobe-heavy routine one more time. But this question also gestures towards the central conceit of the film: what if “Brat summer” was pushed beyond its natural expiry date? Not to explore “the tension of staying too long”, as Charli has described it, but in a cynical attempt to further monetise this fleeting moment of pop cultural hype.

Conceived by Charli, The Moment offers a semi-fictionalised mockumentary account of the post Brat summer comedown. It positions her at the centre of several cynical attempts to extend its lifespan through questionable endorsement deals, social media posts and an ill-fated concert film. The film’s events map eerily onto the real post-Brat timeline, inviting knowing audiences to question the boundary between fiction and reality.

Charli’s uncertain response to the choreographer’s question − “Err … yeah?” – from the floor of her rehearsal space (in that starriest of destinations, Dagenham) crystallises the film’s knowing subversion of dominant trends in the female-oriented pop star documentary.

As cultural theorist Annelot Prins has outlined in a paper, pop star documentaries like Lady Gaga’s Five Foot Two (2017), Kesha’s Rainbow (2020) and Taylor’s Swift’s Miss Americana (2020) tend to present “empowering narratives of talented and hardworking women who used to be constrained by different factors but overcame them with resilience […] and are now self-determined agents”.

This approach to female celebrity has continued in a recent glut of arena concert films released by stars including Swift, Beyoncé and Olivia Rodrigo. These arena spectaculars combine polished tour footage with backstage glimpses into the creative process. It’s a combination of intimacy and polish engineered to confirm their authentic talent in the face of the relentless commercial demands of the pop world.

Read more: A swift history of the concert film, from The Last Waltz to the Eras Tour

The “resilient pop documentary” is part of a wider trend identified by feminist media scholars: representations of celebrity women overcoming setbacks such as sexual assault (Kesha), addiction (Demi Lovato) or illness (Lady Gaga).

Feminist sociologist Angela McRobbie’s work shows how these images of “resilient” female celebrities block collective resistance to misogyny, racism and classism, by making women believe they can overcome oppression through “self-management and care”.

This is a pattern that these documentaries repeat with their emphasis on the creative survival of the damaged female pop star. The Moment invokes and satirises these narrative templates by showing Charli’s fictionalised self’s inability to control the runaway momentum of her own stardom.

Resilience to reflexivity

While The Moment has been positioned as Charli’s pivot from pop to the silver screen, it extends the subversions of her oft-forgotten first cinematic venture: 2022’s Charli XCX: Alone Together.

Inverting The Moment’s narrative structure, Alone Together opens with Charli’s preparations for her first arena tour, charting the effects of its abrupt cancellation in the wake of COVID. The remainder of the film depicts Charli’s production of her fourth studio album over the course of a whirlwind six-weeks of the first lockdown.

This ambitious undertaking could have provided the perfect opportunity to emphasise Charli’s resilience, but Alone Together takes a difference tack. It focuses on the emotional toll the album’s production took on Charli and emphasises the digital spaces of care and community that enabled her and her fans to survive the pandemic.

While The Moment and Alone Together approach subversion differently, both knowingly undermine the resilience typically celebrated in pop star documentaries, exposing the endless performance of “overcoming” on which female pop stardom relies. The ending of Alone Together positions Charli as the unmoved consumer of the final album. A post-credit sequence shows her immediately at another loose end. “I just feel a bit, like, bored … What am I going to do now?” she says to camera, laughing.

The Moment’s closing scenes echo Alone Together’s feeling of anti-climax by ending with the trailer for the Brat concert film and its invitation to “be a 365 Party Girl from the comfort of your own home”. Hilariously, this is soundtracked by the Verve’s Bitter Sweet Symphony – an overplayed Britpop anthem that confirms the fictional XCX’s fall from cool in pursuit of mass appeal.

The film’s quasi-documentary style compounds its challenge to the forms of authenticity upon which resilient pop stardom relies. In a voice note to her team, Charli explains that she is completing the film to “kill Brat” and free herself to pursue other creative endeavours. Here, the film uses the intimate framing used to convey authentic agency in the conventional pop documentary. This serves to blur the paper-thin line between the “real” post-Brat hype engineered by Charli and the trite, opportunistic spectacle she embraces in The Moment.

That we are left with no clear sense of what the difference truly is signals that, far from being a “shallow” take on pop celebrity, The Moment turns the conventions of the pop star documentary against themselves. In doing so, the film cleverly exposes the artificiality inherent in even the most seemingly authentic of pop performances.

Taken together, these two films cement Charli XCX’s status as our best chronicler of contemporary female pop stardom and the role of her film texts in exposing the artifice at play in supposedly “authentic” resilient pop cultural performance.

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– ref. The Moment: Charli XCX is the ultimate chronicler of contemporary pop stardom – https://theconversation.com/the-moment-charli-xcx-is-the-ultimate-chronicler-of-contemporary-pop-stardom-276681

Evening Report: https://eveningreport.nz/2026/02/24/the-moment-charli-xcx-is-the-ultimate-chronicler-of-contemporary-pop-stardom-276681/

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Georgina Sauzier, Senior Lecturer in Forensic Chemistry, Curtin University

3D-printed guns are a growing threat to public safety. The blueprints used to make these firearms can be found online, making them easily accessible. With a relatively cheap 3D printer and a quick web search, anyone could print their own unlicensed gun.

These guns have been called “untraceable”. Research is now putting this claim to the test.

Our new study, published in the journal Forensic Chemistry, has found some filaments – the materials used in 3D printers – have distinct chemical profiles that could help link seized 3D-printed guns to their source.

The threat of ‘ghost guns’

Last October, an Australian Border Force operation uncovered 281 3D-printed firearms or components.

3D-printed components can be combined with common hardware store parts to create “hybrid” weapons, increasing their strength and durability. Both fully 3D-printed and hybrid 3D-printed guns can be just as lethal as factory-made firearms.

Recent events have led to calls for retailers to help stem the flow of 3D-printed guns. Suggestions have included placing blocking technology on 3D printers or flagging the purchase of items that could be used to make hybrid firearms.

But what can be done about the weapons already circulating in the community?

3D-printed guns have earned the nickname of “ghost guns”, as they are difficult to trace through standard firearms analysis. With law enforcement struggling to trace the source of seized ghost guns, it falls to researchers to find an alternative solution.

Chemical analysis of the filaments used to print these weapons may be the ticket to ending their “untraceable” reputation.

What are 3D-printing filaments?

3D-printing filaments are made up of various polymers, or plastics.

The main polymer used in at-home 3D printing is polylactic acid or PLA, a bioplastic used to make compostable waste bags. Other common filaments are those made from ABS – the main material used to make LEGO bricks due to its toughness – and PETG, a flexible polymer found in sports water bottles.

Some specialist filaments are made by combining different polymers. Many also have additives – extra ingredients to improve toughness, flexibility or appearance.

As 3D-printing filaments are usually patented to protect their individual formulations, additives and other minor ingredients are typically not listed on the product packaging. It is these ingredients that could hold the key to tracing ghost guns.

The mix of ingredients used in 3D-printing filaments gives each type of filament a particular chemical signature. We can identify these signatures using a method called infrared spectroscopy, which records how the filament absorbs infrared light. This pattern of absorbance – an infrared profile – changes based on what molecules are present in the filament.

What we found

In our research, conducted in collaboration with ChemCentre – a statutory forensic laboratory in Western Australia – we analysed more than 60 filaments sourced from the Australian retail market. We discovered that many of these filaments could be distinguished using their infrared profile, despite looking identical to the eye.

Filaments made of PLA, ABS and PETG can be easily set apart due to large differences in the chemical make-up of each polymer.

However, we were also able to separate some filaments made of the same polymer, due to minor additives creating differences in their infrared profile.

In one filament for example, we found signs of a compatibiliser – an additive that helps two polymers to mix together. This ingredient was not found in other filaments of the same base polymer, meaning it could be a distinct part of the brand’s formulation. It also suggests this filament contained two different polymers, despite only one being listed on the packaging.

These findings highlight why chemical analysis of filaments is useful, despite them being a widely available consumer product.

Tracing the seemingly untraceable

Being able to distinguish or identify different 3D-printing filaments could allow forensic investigators to create links between a seized gun and seized filament, or guns seized from different cases.

These links can help lead law enforcement to the suppliers of these guns, ultimately disrupting supply chains and future production.

While our research shows some 3D-printing filaments could be distinguished, this was not the case for all filaments. We are now conducting further research using more analytical techniques that will provide complementary information, such as the elements contained within the filaments.

Combining different techniques will allow us to complete a full chemical picture of each filament. We hope this information will help us to make links between a seized 3D-printed firearm, the filament it was printed from, and the 3D-printer used to print it.

By tracing the chemical fingerprint of 3D-printed guns, criminals can no longer feel safe under their “untraceable” veil.

– ref. 3D-printed ‘ghost guns’ are not as untraceable as criminals think – new study – https://theconversation.com/3d-printed-ghost-guns-are-not-as-untraceable-as-criminals-think-new-study-275566

Evening Report: https://eveningreport.nz/2026/02/24/3d-printed-ghost-guns-are-not-as-untraceable-as-criminals-think-new-study-275566/

Polynesian Panther Party Legacy Trust

The Polynesian Panthers met Roger Fowler in the early 1970s when Ponsonby was home to the largest urban Pacific population in Aotearoa.

He helped establish the Ponsonby People’s Union for Survival and ran several much needed community focused programmes like a food co-op, tenant’s rights advice and support.

He was a gifted community organiser deeply committed to social justice. He had a wide field of vision enabling him to see injustice in Aotearoa and injustice overseas are interconnected.

He brought so much light into the world and into the lives of many many people who came within his orbit locally and globally including ours.

He lived his life so others could have theirs.

Manuia lou malaga Roger. Our sincere condolences and aroha to Lyn and the Fowler whanau.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Evening Report: https://eveningreport.nz/2026/02/24/roger-fowlers-legacy-and-the-polynesian-panthers-connection/

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Felicity Goodyear-Smith, Professor of General Practice and Primary Health Care, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau

Primary care – the kind delivered by general practice (GP) clinics – is the backbone of every health system. When it works, we barely notice it.

It keeps people healthy, detects problems early, coordinates care and keeps people out of hospital.

But across many high-income countries, despite very different health systems, primary care is under unprecedented strain.

Our recently published paper presents case studies from the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand.

All show governments are leaning on primary care to solve increasingly complex health needs. At the same time, bureaucracies are demanding more documentation, compliance, performance metrics and administrative work.

However, very little new investment is going into the four parts of primary care that matter most:

• continuity: seeing the same health provider over time, rather than pinballing from one specialist to another

• comprehensiveness: getting the whole family’s physical, mental and social health care from one place

• coordination: ensuring all the different people and services involved in a patient’s care work together smoothly, information is shared and roles are clear, so patients don’t fall through the cracks

• first-contact care: being able to get an appointment with a doctor or nurse you know, when you need it.

Ballooning administrative burdens

These are the core functions of effective primary care, and they are what reduce hospital visits. But across many countries, the GP workforce is shrinking or stagnating just as populations are ageing and multi-morbidity is increasing.

Medical graduates are turning away from general practice, citing high workloads, lower pay relative to other specialities, and the emotional weight of increasingly complex care.

Many GPs who stay in practice are reducing their hours, not because they lack commitment, but because the amount of unpaid work required outside of the consulting room makes full-time practice untenable.

Administrative burdens have ballooned. Electronic health-record systems generate endless inbox tasks. As hospitals push chronic care back into the community, GPs absorb more responsibility without receiving the resources to match.

The result is predictable: practices stop enrolling new patients, waiting times blow out, and people who cannot get timely care turn instead to emergency departments.

These alternatives are often far more expensive, lack continuity, and do not offer the long-term relationships that help detect disease early and manage chronic conditions effectively.

Quick wins, long-term losses

Many of the countries facing these problems spend less than 6% of their total health budget on primary care. For example, the US spends 4%, New Zealand 5.4% and Australia 6%. But how the money is allocated is as important as the amount itself.

Funding models in many countries fail to support team-based care – a collaborative, coordinated model of healthcare delivery in which multiple health professionals work together with patients and their families.

Governments often finance new roles – for example, physician assistants – in isolation, without ensuring practices have the infrastructure to integrate them safely and effectively. This creates inefficiencies and fragmentation.

Poorly designed “pay-for-performance” measures can make things worse. So, when funding is linked to disease-specific indicators rather than the core functions of high-quality primary care, clinicians end up spending more time on documentation and less on patients.

Continuity and comprehensiveness, the strongest predictors of better health outcomes, remain largely unmeasured and unrewarded.

The benefits of primary care investment accumulate slowly – fewer hospital admissions, better management of chronic disease, reduced premature mortality. But political cycles reward quick wins. Governments are tempted to fund initiatives that reduce waiting lists in months, not strengthen foundations for decades.

The result is a proliferation of short-term “solutions” that crowd out the long-term reforms primary care actually needs. The system that prevents downstream costs is neglected because its benefits are not immediately visible.

Toward a sustainable health system

Primary care is relationship-based. That continuity – knowing patients, their histories, their families and the context of their lives – is what allows efficient decision-making and prevents unnecessary interventions.

When investment flows into standalone or narrow services instead of strengthening general practice, care becomes episodic. This can result in poor followup and patients bouncing between providers who are working without shared information.

This fragmentation increases costs while reducing quality, even though each individual initiative may look beneficial in isolation. Once the foundation cracks, the entire system becomes more expensive to maintain but less effective.

The solutions are clear, and are strikingly consistent across countries. A whole-of-system approach is needed to:

• set explicit investment targets for primary care

• align funding, workforce planning and service delivery

• invest in true multidisciplinary teams, not piecemeal roles

• prioritise continuity, comprehensiveness, and first-contact access in funding models

• and create long-term accountability structures that survive election cycles.

Countries that have strong primary care systems will spend less overall on health, have better population health outcomes, and enjoy greater equity. Those that neglect primary care pay for it many times over in hospital pressures, workforce burnout and widening inequities.

Strengthening primary care is not just another reform. It is the only path to a sustainable health system. Countries that fail to recognise this are already seeing the consequences.

– ref. We studied primary care in 6 rich countries – it’s under unprecedented strain everywhere – https://theconversation.com/we-studied-primary-care-in-6-rich-countries-its-under-unprecedented-strain-everywhere-276617

Evening Report: https://eveningreport.nz/2026/02/24/we-studied-primary-care-in-6-rich-countries-its-under-unprecedented-strain-everywhere-276617/