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Waleed Aly<\/a>Columnist, author and academic<\/p>\nJuly 31, 2026 \u2014 5:00am<\/p>\n
July 31, 2026 \u2014 5:00am<\/p>\n
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Remove items from your saved list<\/a> to add more.<\/p>\n AAA<\/p>\n I promise this column isn\u2019t a mere whinge; that it is going somewhere serious. But allow me to take you through my morning, because I\u2019m sure you\u2019ve had this morning before, too.<\/p>\n It begins with an email from a fast(ish) food chain. I receive these all the time. This one offers a special, available on Tuesdays if you order through the store\u2019s app. Just click on \u201cspecials\u201d it instructs, and they\u2019ll be there.<\/p>\n The enticement works. Having ignored such emails for months \u2013 for which I don\u2019t ever recall signing up \u2013 I decide to download the app and give myself the option. I endure the account-making process, and sign in. I scour every drop-down menu, click on any vaguely related link. I can\u2019t find one labelled \u201cspecials\u201d. I have no doubt I\u2019m missing something, but I figure it really should be dunce-proof.<\/p>\n Mildly inconvenienced, I move on to more serious things. I have a flu shot to book.<\/p>\n That booking requires an online form. I burst out of the gates: name, date of birth, address \u2013 I know this stuff! Then it asks for my Medicare number, at which point I discover I\u2019ve misplaced my card. Brimming with confidence, I open my Medicare app. I\u2019m greeted by a message saying the app is now obsolete \u2013 \u201cretired\u201d, I think it said, as though it was rewarding itself for a lifetime of service by finally pursuing its passions. Instead, I must download the myGov app, where my Medicare account now resides.<\/p>\n A mostly blank, blue page greets me, offering only an option to \u201cSign In\u201d. I take it, and proceed to punch in my email address and what I think is my password. Apparently, I\u2019m wrong. The app knows I\u2019ve forgotten my details, but asks me to admit it anyway: \u201cForgot password\u201d tuts the link. I swallow my diminishing pride, and click.<\/p>\n It wants to send me a code, and asks how I\u2019d like it. \u201cSMS\u201d, I decide. I wait eagerly for the code-bearing text to arrive, like a kid on Christmas morning. Turns out I\u2019m the Muslim kid who doesn\u2019t get Christmas presents. No code arrives.<\/p>\n A blank box stares at me. \u201cCode\u201d, it demands. My phone stays emphatically silent. I have no code to give it. I go back a page, to start the process over again. This time I ask for the code instead to be sent by email. A new box asks for my email. Progress! I punch in the only email I use.<\/p>\n I check my inbox. I refresh. I refresh. Nothing. I check the app. It\u2019s my old nemesis, the blank box. \u201cCode\u201d. This time I feel its indifference.<\/p>\n By now, I\u2019m running late. I have an appointment in about 20 minutes, a tram leaving in about two, and it\u2019s three minutes\u2019 walk away. I run.<\/p>\n Related Article Perhaps it\u2019s the fresh air, or perhaps it\u2019s the mild state of panic, but I\u2019m reminded there\u2019s a whole non-digital world out there. Maybe the way through my administrative cul-de-sac is to forget about navigating apps altogether, and talk to an actual Medicare staff member. I realise it\u2019s scandalously old-fashioned, but perhaps previous generations were onto something. My running has paid off. I beat the tram, and have a moment to look up the number. I find it, and call.<\/p>\n I don\u2019t get a person.<\/p>\n What I do get is a recorded message informing me that all relevant people couldn\u2019t possibly speak to me right now because they\u2019re so overwhelmed with other callers. Maybe management has overestimated the usefulness of the app, and failed to roster on enough staff. Before I can complete the thought, I\u2019m informed that the queue is quite long, and offered instead the chance to leave my number and be called back. Either way, it will take a little while for someone to get to my call. How long? About 20 minutes.<\/p>\n I give, and hang, up.<\/p>\n I won\u2019t bother you with the rest of the story. There\u2019s no fun to be had and no satisfactory resolution. There\u2019s only the faint echo of that bad dream everyone has had where they spend all day trying to get to work but never make it. Except something about it is even worse because the perpetual obstacles in this case aren\u2019t caused by random circumstance. They\u2019re carefully designed. They\u2019re also newly invented. They\u2019re an example of one of the great perversions of our time: that while this is an age of unprecedented services on demand, and almost relentless convenience, it\u2019s an age in which our dizzyingly brilliant technology also makes once-simple things difficult. Occasionally, even unconquerable. That\u2019s how I\u2019m confident you\u2019ve had a morning like this.<\/p>\n I spend a lot of my time thinking about the cantankerous nature of this moment in time. The growing social antagonisms, the political unravelling, the increasing number of signs in supermarkets or pharmacies pleading with us not to abuse their staff, or the remarkable decline I\u2019ve noticed in drivers waving to say thank you to someone who let them in. The widespread sense that the whole freaking system is out of order.<\/p>\n Like everyone else, I typically reach for the big things: the cost-of-living crisis; housing unaffordability; the trauma and psychological fragility left in COVID\u2019s wake; the way the internet has fractured our culture and polarised us politically; the anxieties of climate breakdown or AI; the ramifications of a changed America\u2019s trade and military wars; collapsing levels of trust in our institutions and each other.<\/p>\n But the little things matter, too. More specifically, the little things are often symptoms of something bigger. Mine was a morning of petty frustrations. But anecdotally, such things are increasingly triggering an irrational anger in us. They seem to symbolise how our institutions, whether companies or governments, keep offering us services that seem more in their interests than ours. Soon, we\u2019re drowning in apps, having to enter constant passwords for basic services, feeling more like administrators than customers. And we\u2019re battling government services that seem more remote, less accountable, almost brick walls by design. Some we can avoid, many we can\u2019t.<\/p>\n Related Article On its own, it\u2019s not terribly much. But added to everything else, it instils a sense of things being backward: whether as citizens or consumers, we\u2019ve been gifted trappings so wondrous and sophisticated that now we must serve them. <\/p>\n Waleed Aly is a broadcaster, author, academic and regular columnist.<\/p>\n Get a weekly wrap of views that will challenge, champion and inform your own. 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Illustration by Simon Letch<\/p>\n![\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/1785393375_294_60e0fb5fbc183451ecbed765ba703212f71dbe16.jpeg\")
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