Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Ben Harris-Roxas

@benhr.bsky.social

2.9K followers 920 following 130 posts

Researcher and educator from Sydney, Australia. You’ll usually find me on the forgotten parts of the web. https://unsw.to/ben_hr https://harrisroxashealth.com

Videos

Public Health 27%

Medicine 16%

Posts Media Videos Starter Packs

Ben Harris-Roxas @benhr.bsky.social · 2d

Fair questions

Ben Harris-Roxas @benhr.bsky.social · 2d

Western Sydney University students and alumni emailed to say their degrees had been “revoked”. These incidents are damaging because they mirror the officious and depersonalised tone of so much comms. If acting in more human and humane ways was the norm, these incidents wouldn’t be so harmful.

University students told degrees 'revoked' in 'fraudulent' emails

Western Sydney University has apologised to current and former students who received emails claiming their degrees have been "revoked", saying the messages are "not legitimate".

www.abc.net.au

1 1 9

Reposted by Evelyne de Leeuw

Ben Harris-Roxas @benhr.bsky.social · 3d

The Sorbonne ditches university rankings: https://benhr.xyz/2025/10/07/the-sorbonne-ditches-university-rankings.html

Sorbonne University decides to withdraw from the Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings

As of 2026, Sorbonne University will no longer submit data to the Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings. The decision comes as part of a wider approach to promote open science and reform research assessment, in accordance with the university’s commitment to the CoARA Agreement and the Barcelona Declaration. Sorbonne University is choosing open and transparent databases to assess its academic performance.

www.sorbonne-universite.fr

3 6

Ben Harris-Roxas @benhr.bsky.social · 3d

Clearly not taking their inspiration from Iolanthe nymag.com/intelligence...

Bad News, John Roberts Will Not Wear a Striped Robe for Impeachment Trial

The impeachment trial just got a little less sartorially interesting.

nymag.com

Ben Harris-Roxas @benhr.bsky.social · 4d

French Prime Minister stay in office 2026 challenge

Ben Harris-Roxas @benhr.bsky.social · 4d

Nicely done!

Ben Harris-Roxas @benhr.bsky.social · 6d

time for representative democracy but no time for System Crash, smdh

1 7

Reposted by Kai Arzheimer, Ben Harris‐Roxas, Katrina Navickas

ianVisits @ianvisits.co.uk · 7d

In memoriam...

59 1.6K 5.5K

Reposted by Ben Harris‐Roxas

Croakey Health Media @croakeynews.bsky.social · 7d

University of Technology Sydney responds to concerns about planned cuts to public health www.croakey.org/university-o... #publichealth

University of Technology Sydney responds to concerns about planned cuts to public health

www.croakey.org

Reposted by Ben Harris‐Roxas

2000AD Randomizer @2000adrandom.bsky.social · 10d

Ron Smith

1 6 49

Ben Harris-Roxas @benhr.bsky.social · 10d

I’m proud to announce my new role as Chief Content Officer for SlopApp and I look forward to the many challenges of the role.

“OpenAI Is Preparing to Launch a Social App for AI-Generated Videos”

OpenAI Is Preparing to Launch a Social App for AI-Generated Videos

The platform appears to closely resemble TikTok and is powered by Sora 2, OpenAI's latest video generation model.

www.wired.com

Reposted by Ben Harris‐Roxas

Rick Morton @squigglyrick.bsky.social · 11d

What a ride. www.abc.net.au/news/2025-09...

Writing the book on Robodebt drove Rick Morton mad. Now it's won him $80k

Journalist Rick Morton didn't want to write a book about Robodebt. Now that book, Mean Streak, has won the Prime Minister's Literary Award for non-fiction.

www.abc.net.au

150 170 920

Reposted by Cas Mudde, Anna O. Law, Joe R. Feagin , and 6 more Cas Mudde, Anna O. Law, Joe R. Feagin, Martin Paul Eve, Ben Harris‐Roxas, Scott A. Imberman, Alessandro Nai, Alexandre Klein, Béatrice Cointe

holden m. accountable @noahs.bsky.social · 11d

THE MEME IS REAL

62 2.8K 9.3K

Ben Harris-Roxas @benhr.bsky.social · 11d

University of Technology Sydney plans to cut public health at the worst possible time - Daniel Demant at InSight+

University of Technology Sydney plans to cut public health at the worst possible time - InSight+

Australia has just emerged from one of the worst global health crises in living memory. COVID-19 showed us how critical public health expertise is to protect lives, guide governments and support vulnerable communities. It also exposed workforce shortages across public health, health services management, palliative care and diabetes education — all areas the University of …

insightplus.mja.com.au

2 5

Ben Harris-Roxas @benhr.bsky.social · 13d

Rick Morton in the Saturday Paper:

> The University of Technology Sydney denied the existence of a KPMG spreadsheet ranking the research performance of academics, in breach of its own enterprise agreement, until it was forced to release it.

Exclusive: University sought secret KPMG staff spreadsheet

The University of Technology Sydney denied the existence of a KPMG spreadsheet ranking the research performance of academics, in breach of its EBA, until it was forced to release it.

www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au

1 4

Reposted by Bronwyn Fredericks, Ben Harris‐Roxas, Catherine J. Frieman

Rick Morton @squigglyrick.bsky.social · 13d

University of Technology Sydney ordered a spreadsheet from KPMG targeting individual academics by research income, which might contravene the bargaining agreement. They repeatedly denied it even existed for several info requests. But that wasn't true. www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/news/educati...

Exclusive: University sought secret KPMG staff spreadsheet

The University of Technology Sydney denied the existence of a KPMG spreadsheet ranking the research performance of academics, in breach of its EBA, until it was forced to release it.

www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au

5 81 150

Ben Harris-Roxas @benhr.bsky.social · 16d

A small way of showing your support for students and staff at UTS:

Petition · Save UTS Public Health – For Students, Communities, and Equity

Firma la petición

Save UTS Public Health – For Students, Communities, and Equity

www.change.org

2 2

Ben Harris-Roxas @benhr.bsky.social · 17d

Block free since ‘23

Reposted by Martin Tomko, Naomi Priest, Ben Harris‐Roxas , and 2 more Martin Tomko, Naomi Priest, Ben Harris‐Roxas, Adrian Vickers, David McInnis

Melissa Sweet @melissasweetdr.bsky.social · 17d

Six internationally recognised marine scientists who are researching South Australia's toxic algal bloom are set to lose their jobs at Flinders University, the ABC understands.

www.abc.net.au/news/2025-09...

Flinders University jobs under threat as news of proposed restructure spreads

Six internationally recognised marine scientists who are researching South Australia's toxic algal bloom are set to lose their jobs at Flinders University, the ABC understands.

www.abc.net.au

7 47 64

Ben Harris-Roxas @benhr.bsky.social · 18d

What about In Vitro (2024)? Though that’s a very rural film.

Ben Harris-Roxas @benhr.bsky.social · 18d

Prestige over merit: An adapted audit of LLM bias in peer review

The ever-diminishing set of use cases for LLMs…

Prestige over merit: An adapted audit of LLM bias in peer review

Large language models (LLMs) are playing an increasingly integral, though largely informal, role in scholarly peer review. Yet it remains unclear whether LLMs reproduce the biases observed in human decision-making. We adapt a resume-style audit to scientific publishing, developing a multi-role LLM simulation (editor/reviewer) that evaluates a representative set of high-quality manuscripts across the physical, biological, and social sciences under randomized author identities (institutional prestige, gender, race). The audit reveals a strong and consistent institutional-prestige bias: identical papers attributed to low-prestige affiliations face a significantly higher risk of rejection, despite only modest differences in LLM-assessed quality. To probe mechanisms, we generate synthetic CVs for the same author profiles; these encode large prestige-linked disparities and an inverted prestige-tenure gradient relative to national benchmarks. The results suggest that both domain norms and prestige-linked priors embedded in training data shape paper-level outcomes once identity is visible, converting affiliation into a decisive status cue.

arxiv.org

1 3

Reposted by Ben Harris‐Roxas

Croakey Health Media @croakeynews.bsky.social · 19d

Calls for action to stop public health cuts at University of Technology Sydney www.croakey.org/calls-for-ac...

Calls for action to stop public health cuts at University of Technology Sydney

www.croakey.org

1 4

Reposted by Ben Harris‐Roxas

Ben Spies-Butcher @bspiesbutcher.bsky.social · 19d

Join us on Tuesday night at UTS to discuss: A New Australian Politics?

George Megalogenis @frankbongiorno.bsky.social @lizhumphrys.bsky.social Emily Foley and I discuss how the last two elections have changed Australian politics and what it means for the future

events.humanitix.com/a-new-austra...

A New Australian Politics: Rupture or Realignment

We explore the outcomes of the 2025 Australian federal election and consider whether it signals a fundamental rupture or realignment in the political landscape

events.humanitix.com

2 5 8

Ben Harris-Roxas @benhr.bsky.social · 20d

I feel you. The volume of information and number of responses and systems that are expected is ridiculous. It’s not a lot better for the kids. OLEs, google docs, blah, blah, blah. Too many systems and processes. I wonder how many kids are turned off school by endless admin rather than learning.

Reposted by Ben Harris‐Roxas, Karen O’Leary

Peter Murphy @peterwmurphy1.bsky.social · 20d

"The People Vs Robodebt" explores the devastating human story behind one of Australia's greatest political scandals. The 3-part docu-drama series will be avail to stream on #SBSOnDemand on Wed 24Sept25. #auspol #Robodebt
Trailer: youtu.be/5LzL7WpswH4?...

6 76 180

Reposted by John Quiggin, Martin Tomko, Ariadne Vromen , and 6 more John Quiggin, Martin Tomko, Ariadne Vromen, Ben Harris‐Roxas, Margot C. Finn, Kathleen Kennedy, François Soyer, Michelle Arrow, David McInnis

Prof. Amanda Wise @amandawise.bsky.social · 20d

1/At Macquarie Uni we are losing 50% of our units in my faculty. This is on top of cuts in 2020. We estimate by next year my faculty will be teaching 80% fewer subjects than pre Covid. Disciplines being cut do not have declining enrolments. @jennaprice.bsky.social @michaelwestbiz.bsky.social

10 120 160

Ben Harris-Roxas @benhr.bsky.social · 21d

Needing to be left on read.

Ben Harris-Roxas @benhr.bsky.social · 22d

A Croakey post by me: Calls for action to stop public health cuts at University of Technology Sydney

Calls for action to stop public health cuts at University of Technology Sydney

Plans to abolish the School of Public Health at the University of Technology Sydney are cause for grave concern, according

www.croakey.org

2 9