Radical Gentleness Archives - Crystal Adventures

Into Year Two: Reflection and the Road Ahead for Digital Inclusion Whanganui

Alistair Fraser / 9 March 2026

Over the past year, Digital Inclusion Whanganui has quietly moved from idea to action. What began as a concern about digital exclusion in our community has gradually taken shape as a locally grounded initiative focused on improving digital access, confidence, safety, and capability across the district. During this first phase we have concentrated on three

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Learning at the Right Pace, for the World We’re In

Alistair Fraser / 20 January 2026

“Reading Wired Wisdom over summer — a book that helped articulate what we’re already practising.” Over summer, while many of us were trying to slow down, I spent time reading Wired Wisdom: How to Age Better Online by Eszter Hargittai and John Palfrey (University of Chicago Press). Further reading – click here : Wired Wisdom

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Digital Inclusion Whanganui — Our Journey This Year

Alistair Fraser / 27 November 2025

End-of-year reflections, 2025 As the year turns and Whanganui settles into the long light of summer, it feels like the right moment to pause, breathe, and look back on how far this kaupapa has travelled. Digital inclusion work rarely arrives in grand announcements or dramatic breakthroughs. It grows through small, steady acts of service —

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Softening the Ground: A Kinder Way Into AI

Alistair Fraser / 21 November 2025

Over the past few months, I’ve been thinking a lot about the way many New Zealanders view the digital world. We’ve entered a period where mistrust has become almost instinctive. Whether it’s social media, online harm, misinformation, or the rise of artificial intelligence, the first response for many people is simply to recoil. And after

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Filling in the Blanks – Learning from the Past, Building Fairly for the Future

Alistair Fraser / 14 November 2025

There are moments, usually quiet ones, when a year folds back on itself and you suddenly see the path you’ve taken. This has been one of those moments for me. It’s now over a year since I stepped away from national digital inclusion work. Not dramatically — simply recognising that my energy, my instinct and

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AI is as good—or as bad—as we let it

Alistair Fraser / 4 October 2025

From fear to self-regulation: habits that make AI safer and more useful. Alignment: This post and Digital Inclusion Whanganui’s AI First Principles align with the OECD AI Principles, UNESCO Recommendation on the Ethics of AI (2021), NIST AI RMF 1.0 (2023), ISO/IEC 42001, and New Zealand’s Algorithm Charter. Lately I’ve met more

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Whanganui, Leadership, and the Fibre Future

Alistair Fraser / 30 September 2025

Over the weekend I received a reminder email from the Whanganui Tech Network. It was about tomorrow night’s meet-up — the usual mix of conversations, updates, and encouragement that keeps our small but lively tech community ticking along. Buried in that reminder was a detail that stopped me in my tracks: Mark Aue, the CEO

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Awakening the Buddha Within – and Digital Inclusion

Alistair Fraser / 28 September 2025

First Principles in Work and Life So I can make the most of successfully completing things this year — especially being named a TUANZ Member Award finalist — over the last few weeks I’ve been going back to first principles in my mahi for Digital Inclusion Whanganui (DIW). The process has been rigorous, sometimes even

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Safeguarding Our Future: Navigating Online Age Verification in Aotearoa

Alistair Fraser / 7 August 2025

This morning, as I scrolled through LinkedIn, a headline immediately caught my attention. Craig Young, CEO of the Technology Users Association of New Zealand (TUANZ), had shared a significant conversation he’d recently had on the NZ Herald’s Front Page podcast. The discussion centred around international moves towards rigorous age verification measures for online content, raising

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Embracing Radical Gentleness: A Personal Ethic for Living, Leading, and Being of Use

Alistair Fraser / 10 July 2025

Recently, I have been reflecting deeply on my style of leadership, communication, and engagement in my community mahi around digital inclusion. Throughout my career, people have often commented that I was “too nice”. While I initially took this as gentle criticism, deep inside, I knew it was something different—something subtle, strategic, and deceptively strong. What

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