Even when you think you're not using it, you probably are. It's feeding your search results, your voice assistant, your AI chatbot.

But if Wikipedia shapes how we understand the world, what shapes Wikipedia?

Host Heather Ford, researcher Francesca Sidoti, and author Richard Cooke investigate the site and all that it touches.

Episode 1 asks, what does Australia look like on Wikipedia? The answer takes you from a fictional soap-opera suburb to a dispute over what a place should be called.

Episode 2 goes inside the three big fights that made Wikipedia what it is today.

Episode 3 asks what its future holds, in the age of generative AI?

Episode 4 is a True/False quiz with nuanced answers to simple questions.

Episode 5 is for teachers and students wanting practical tips on how to research and teach with Wikipedia.

Episode 6 is for Wikipedia editors wanting to share First Nations knowledge respectfully.

All That We Touch: Wikipedia is produced by Impact Studios at the University of Technology Sydney.

First episode coming soon. Follow now so you don't miss it.

Voices

Professor Heather Ford is an ARC Future Fellow and Professor in the School of Communication and Social Sciences at UTS. She is the author of “Writing the Revolution: Wikipedia and the Survival of Facts in the Digital Age” published by MIT Press.

Dr Francesca Sidoti is a Postdoctoral Research Associate with the ARC Discovery project ‘Wikipedia and the nation’s story: towards equity in knowledge production’ in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences.

Richard Cooke is an author, reporter and screenwriter. The author of three books, he is the former US correspondent and current contributing editor to The Monthly magazine. His latest book is The Last Best Place On The Internet: A Human History of Wikipedia.

Research

Top ten websites in the world by traffic in May 2026: Semrush

Credits

The executive producer of this series is Heather Ford.

It is hosted by Heather Ford, Francesca Sidoti and Richard Cooke.

Produced by Jane Curtis. Associate producer is Francesa Sidoti.

Story consultant is Rachael Cusick. Sound by John Jacobs.

Bell music composition by Maksim Voloshin-Cleary.

Executive Producer of UTS Impact Studios is Sarah Gilbert.

It’s produced on Gadigal Country in Sydney Australia.

wikihistories is supported by Australian Research Council Grant DP220100662, ‘Wikipedia and the Nation’s Story: Towards Equity in Knowledge Production’.

wikihistories.net

All That We Touch explores the relationship between technology and society, and how the things we make shape and reshape us in turn.

Host Matt Ryan speaks with Tamson Pietsch about the podcast's central questions and its sources of inspiration.

In a changing climate, the powerful Western notion that humans are separate from nature, enjoying dominion over it, is coming undone. Meanwhile, digital life has us doubting whether we are fully in control of some of our most everyday objects and technologies.

Our title is taken from Octavia Butler's novel, The Parable of the Sower. The dystopian story opens with the lines "all that we touch, we change, and all that we change changes us." It's a credo that seems to neatly sum up philosopher Bruno Latour's central idea: that humans, tools, language and technologies are bound together in networks where nothing stands apart, pure and untouched.

You'll hear a sneak preview of the first two stories we'll bring you over the coming months, on a podcast that will feature documentaries, talks and recordings of live events - all on that theme of technology and society.

Voices

Dr Matthew Ryan is a Chancellor's Research Fellow at UTS' Faculty of Design and Society.

Associate Professor Tamson Pietsch is director of UTS' Australian Centre for Public History at UTS and managing director of Impact Studios.

Actress Lynne Thigpen reads the excerpt from The Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Buter.

Professor Heather Ford and Dr Francesca Sidoti, along with author Richard Cooke, present our inaugural series on Wikipedia - coming very soon.

Michelle Maloney and Abe Noe-Hayes feature in a forthcoming episode, Liquid Gold.

Credits

This introductory episode was produced by Lachlan A'Court.

Excerpt from Parable of the Sower is by Octavia E. Butler, narrated by Lynne Thigpen, provided courtesy of Recorded Books, © 2000. The full recording is available wherever audiobooks are sold.

All That We Touch is made on Gadigal land, in Sydney, by UTS Impact Studios. Executive producer is Sarah Gilbert.

Further listening

To learn more about Bruno Latour, you can listen to Ep 169 of Philosophize This! or Ep 230 and 231 of The Partially Examined Life.

The Parable of the Sower, read by Lynne Thigpen, is available at Audible. You can hear an excellent discussion of the novel on Backlisted, Ep 223.