The era of "AI augmentation" — that polite corporate fiction where software was merely a "co-pilot" designed to help humans work faster — has ended. 

In its place, 2026 has ushered in a period of cold, clinical replacement. 

For decades, the global transition to renewable energy was a project of incrementalism — a slow-moving mosaic of carbon taxes, solar subsidies, and earnest international accords that often felt more aspirational than urgent. 

Policy wonks argued over the nuances of the Inflation Reduction Act, while climate activists lamented the glacial pace of the "energy pivot."

For the better part of a decade, the gilded youth of the financial world — the "crypto-native" generation — dismissed gold as a "boomer rock." 

To them, the heavy, yellow metal was an analog relic, a petrous souvenir of an era before the lightning-fast efficiency of the blockchain. 

For years, the global defence industry existed in a sort of polite exile. 

In the era of ESG mandates and the "peace dividend," shares in weapons manufacturers were often treated as the "tobacco stocks" of the new millennium — profitable, perhaps, but unseemly. 

For decades, the Strait of Hormuz has existed in the global consciousness as a geopolitical abstraction — a narrow, jagged ribbon of blue on a map that experts warned was the "jugular vein" of the modern world. 

But as the closure of the Strait enters its second month, that abstraction has curdled into a cold, suffocating reality. 

Well, grab a champagne flute and a slice of avocado toast, because the Australian Taxation Office has graced us with its annual Taxation Statistics report for the 2022–23 year. 

And what a delightful read it is for anyone living in a post-code that isn't 2027 (Darling Point, Sydney).