Balance is a platform and publication that explores how digital technology, power, and possibility intersect through stories, analysis, and creative expression from around the world.
This week, we look at how data centres place pressure on energy and water resources, how AI development relies on poorly recognised forms of labour, and how gaps in safety and governance remain even as capabilities advance. Women, minorities, journalists, and human rights defenders experience disproportionate harm through online violence,
Looking back at the past fortnight, we ask: whether technology will continue to concentrate power and risk, or be rebuilt to distribute human agency and planetary responsibility more fairly. Civil society faces expanding risks as tech platforms amplify harassment, extremist propaganda is being revitalised through AI voice-cloning, and big tech
The Balance team is preparing a special edition to open 2026 — a collection of stories, ideas, and sharp insights on where digital power is heading, and how we might rethink it.
The year is rushing to an end. And as the new year arrives, one thing is certain: tech has left a lasting mark. Our biweekly newsletter attempts to capture these impressions of tech. This week, we see how digital infrastructures become political battlegrounds, governance races to keep pace with technological
We’ve had a busy two weeks, initiating conversations about Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) in Sri Lanka. The island is rushing to implement a digital ID system, followed by a sovereign cloud. As is our style, we wished to slow down and consider digitisation from a rights-based perspective. We’ll
Technology moves fast, but power moves faster. Every fortnight, the Balance Brief gathers the most compelling stories, debates, and ideas at the intersection of technology, rights, and imagination — helping you stay grounded in a world being rewritten by code, platforms, and politics. The Balance Brief is for those of us
Britain’s AI “sovereignty” is a mirage — US tech giants are wiring the country’s future to their own machines, bending policies, narrowing choices, and leaving citizens with the costs of capture.
From Sri Lanka to Bangladesh, Indonesia to Nepal, youth are rising. In streets and online, they expose corruption and demand change — showing both the power and limits of tech.
Across the Global South, Digital Public Infrastructure is being sold as a leap forward for inclusion and modern governance. But as Pamodi Hewawaravita reveals, these systems often deepen exclusion, entrench surveillance, and blur the line between public good and private control.
Miraj Chowdhury examines how the Trump administration’s alliance with Big Tech is reshaping not just US regulation but global digital governance — with far-reaching consequences for rights, power and accountability.
From app removals in China to quiet compliance in Hong Kong, Benjamin Ismail traces the rise of platform-enabled censorship and the complicity of global tech giants in enabling digital authoritarianism.
Sam de Silva (SD), founding producer of Balance, and Sam Chua (SC), founding curator of Seapunk Studios, discuss how imagination, fiction and decentralised design can open up new ways of thinking about power, technology and resistance.