### Issue 1254 - Friday 20th November, 2020

## In Today's Issue

- Audit office reckons ABS isn't fully prepared for a reliable 2021 digital census
- Stadia & GeForce Now announce iOS Safari betas & Microsoft tests xCloud in Australia
- Dilapidated Arecibo radio telescope to be decommissioned before it hurts someone
- Pope's social media team gets horny on main
- Cheap Audible subscription, SanDisk high endurance microSD, Seagate 8TB HDD, IKEA smart bulbs, Samsung SSDs, UniFi access points, Nintendo eShop & Google Play gift cards, Lenovo cashback & Amazon black friday sale preview

## The News

### Audit office reckons ABS isn't fully prepared for a reliable 2021 digital census

Are you ready for another Censusfail? Because that's what the ANAO discovered when it did an audit of what the ABS has planned for next year's census. Cyber security measures for the census, along with the development of IT systems were found to only be "partly appropriate" or partly "effective". There's apparently 30-plus IT systems supporting the census and all of them have "not been consistently used to build ABS systems". There also isn't appropriate access controls and each system did not "utilise a common enterprise architecture during implementation". I smell a clusterfuck waiting to happen.

### Stadia & GeForce Now announce iOS Safari betas & Microsoft tests xCloud in Australia

iOS gamers can now enjoy some streaming action thanks to Google Stadia and Nvidia's GeForce Now platforms working in Safari, bypassing the App Store. Apple, in their infinite wisdom, has made these types of setups impossible on the App Store because they insist on reviewing the content being streamed. In practice that means every time a new game is added to Stadia or GeForce Now, it can't be released to iOS users until Apple gives it a tick of approval. Let alone the 30% cut they want to take of the platform's revenue. Project xCloud, Microsoft's take on streaming games, is now in beta for Australians - but unlike the others there's no love for iOS. You win some, you lose some.

### Dilapidated Arecibo radio telescope to be decommissioned before it hurts someone

The famous Arecibo radio telescope, that massive one nestled into a Puerto Rican crater and was harnessed by SETI to search for aliens, has fallen into such disrepair that the National Science Foundation is dismantling it. An additional cable has snapped that hold the instrument panel up and further damaged the dish. It's sad to see what was a crowning achievement in US scientific primacy just erode away. It's not like the facility is useless, it's still a valuable asset for many astronomical research projects, just nobody figured it important enough to keep paying for. China's larger, newer, dish is ready to pick up the ball the USA dropped.

## Something I Saw On The Internet

### Pope's social media team gets horny on main

The Pope's official Instagram account got busted favouriting a photo of a "scantily dressed Brazilian model" Natalia Garibotto when the model's agency posted on her Instagram account that she had "received the POPE'S OFFICIAL BLESSING". As hilarious it would be to imagine His Holiness getting horny on main, it's probably one of his social media team. Nobody's owned up so the Vatican has "turned to Instagram for explanations" about what's going on, following in the footsteps of Australian politicians like health minister Greg Hunt who got the AFP to investigate a similar incident only to be told "nah mate, you weren't hacked you dirty dog".

## Bargains

- 50% off first 6 months of Audible, new subscribers only
- SanDisk High Endurance 128GB MicroSD card - $29.34 from Amazon
- Seagate IronWolf 8TB SATA HDD - $279.20 from Futu Online's eBay store
- IKEA Tradfri E27 1000lm LED smart bulbs - $9 at IKEA
- Samsung 970 EVO 1TB/500GB M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD - $175/$95 from Centrecom
- UniFi UAP-AC-Lite/UAP-AC-LR wi-fi access point - $119/$147.26 from Titan Gear's eBay store
- 15% off Nintendo eShop & Google Play gift cards at Coles on the 25th of Nov
- 13% cashback at the Lenovo online store via Cashrewards
- Amazon have give a sneak peek at next week's Black Friday sale, stuff like PS+ subs, Echo gear, soundbars, Kindles, etc.

## The End

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