Keeping Tabs #20: Clickbait comments, industry moves, podcast recs and AI ethics
A weekly dose of news, views and things I’ve learned
Happy August, folks. Over in Dubai, it feels like the world has seriously slowed down for the first time in a while.
The so-called summer slowdown has felt like a long-forgotten trend for years now, but in 2025 it seems to have made a resurgence. If not with our schedules, at least on the roads, which are emptier than I’ve seen them in a long time.
Now, what’s going on in the network?
🌟 Subscriber wins
💪 Freelance journalist Justin Harper is launching Dubai Athletic, a community-based platform for athletes, coaches, trainers, fitness enthusiasts and “anyone breaking out of their comfort zone with a story to tell”. He’ll be featuring “stories of discipline and drive, grit and determination”, and he’s currently looking for guests, subscribers, support and advice!
🏡 Did anyone else spot independent PR extraordinaire Rebecca Rees was the subject of The National’s My Dubai Rent feature last week (yes, that’s my by-line). It was lovely to see her home office and I’m impressed by her building, which also has a community co-working space!
🌞 Freelance journo Inzamam Rashid has written a lovely story for Monocle (which just so happens to be one of my favourite media brands) about why a Dubai summer ain’t all bad. As someone who is left behind most summers, I have to agree it feels like the city exhales as everyone else flees.
💌 Have you got a win you’d like to share with the network? Please email me at me@katygillett.com!
Now for the other bits…
🧘♀️ I immensely enjoyed hosting our first virtual Desert Prose workshop on Saturday morning with therapeutic coach Anne Jackson, who took us through her approach of merging psychotherapy with life coaching and how we can apply that to our own lives as freelancers – which can often get isolating! It was a small group, but the recording, plus free worksheet download and an exclusive Desert Prose discount for therapy sessions are all available to paid subscribers.
🎧 I also had the pleasure of starring on a podcast this week. It was for The Media Majlis Museum at Northwestern University in Qatar, where I helped edit a publication for their recent exhibition AI or Nay?. I talked with Mikey from afikra in Beirut and Hadeer, an artist in Egypt, about AI and ethics – and it was a truly fascinating conversation, although I was left wondering if sometimes I come across too optimistic about AI. I’ll share the link once it’s live. But, in the meantime, are you more optimistic or pessimistic about AI?
🧠🌍 Speaking of AI and ethics, Amazon has reportedly signed an AI licensing deal with The New York Times worth $25 million per year. I’m all for these companies paying content creators for access to copyrighted material, but I do worry these deals may be counterproductive when it comes to mitigating data bias. They’re increasingly being struck with Western media giants, which means publications in other geographical regions - and smaller independent outfits - may get overlooked. The data used to train LLMs becomes increasingly one-dimensional. But then again, should we be giving access away for free? It’s quite the dilemma.
⚖️ Not sure if anyone else caught this this week, but Sam Altman, founder of OpenAI, spoke out about how your conversations with ChatGPT can be used against you in a court of law. Something to bear in mind.
At the same time, it appears ChatGPT conversations have been showing up in Google searches. Yikes.
📊 Substack released new stats on AI usage among writers. Surprisingly, publishers 45 years and over are more likely to use AI than those under 45. I’d like to know more about that stat - like how many of the total respondents were in that age bracket or how younger users determined their usage of AI. It was also interesting to read how neurodivergent authors, such as those with ADHD and dyslexia, find AI particularly helpful to organise their publishing schedules. It’s worth checking out the full results for more insights.
📰 Over on Down the Rabbithole, I wrote a piece on the five questions to ask yourself when reading a news story. You’ll all know this stuff, but you might find it useful to share with less media-literate family members or friends!
🎙️ I've just discovered the podcast Magazeum and highly recommend it to anyone interested in magazines and media. I’ve listened to the episode on Rest of World, but they also recently did an interview with former Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter that I’ve saved for a future listen.
👀 This comment piece on Press Gazette about how clickbait has become a self-perpetuating cycle drowning out genuine news was a good read. Of course, it’s nothing new, but has probably never been more relevant – and it’s particularly emotive considering the author went toe-to-toe with The Daily Mail after they published a video recording of the moments before her daughter got hit by a car and killed. Truly awful. (Even worse, The Mail won that fight!)
🎥 Everyone in the local media industry is talking about Hadley Gamble making the move to IMI, the group behind brands like The National, Sky News Arabia and CNN Business Arabic. She’s taken on a new role as chief international anchor, after leaving a similar position at Al Arabiya English. I don’t have much to say about it, but I shall leave you with the link to her rather dramatic promo video announcing the news.
🌀 Finally, I enjoyed author Ian Leslie’s 27 Notes on Growing Old(er). It somehow manages to be both uplifting and depressing in equal measure. This made me smile:
“If you’re in your twenties, perhaps you shouldn’t exercise too much or eat too healthily, since if you’re hyper-fit at 30, all you’ll experience is decline, pure decline. Whereas if you only start getting healthy later on you can, at least for a while, experience the feeling of water running uphill.”
And with that concludes another week.