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November 17, 2025 | Read online
# I wrote this edition without the internet (mostly) But the Sizzle must go on...
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    <<< Edition 2462 >>>

    Good morning!

    This is somewhat of an unusual Sizzle because I wrote it without the internet (mostly).

    I’m in the middle of an unscheduled NBN outage. At least, I think I am because TPG’s messages about an outage direct me to a dead link. Also, my 5G connection is so bad that it’s unusable for anything other than loading a single webpage. (Speedtest says my upload speed is 0.02 Mbps; is that good?)

    But the Sizzle is a daily newsletter. And today is a day. And there's news! So I have endeavoured to produce something with what I could see on my phone, what I have available offline, and what’s in my head.

    Enjoy!

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    NEWS
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    <<< AUSTRALIA JUST REMEMBERED IT CAN MAKE ITS OWN TECH RULES AGAIN >>>

    In the past few weeks, there has suddenly been a flurry of tech law-related activity from the Albanese government. On Friday night, Communications Minister Anika Wells opened consultation on a “digital duty of care”. It’s a tech policy that places a requirement on tech platforms to proactively consider and take steps to mitigate potential risks and harms from using their services. It’s a policy that was recommended by a previous review of Australia’s Online Safety Act, has support from both civil society and the tech industry, and is in place in the EU and in the UK.

    This follows the opening of consultation on the new version of the news media bargaining ~~code~~ levy and the local streaming content quotas.

    <THE SIZZLE>

    In some early 2025 Sizzle editions, I wrote about speculation that fears of retaliation from the Trump administration had frozen the government's tech agenda.

    Friend of the Sizzle and Capital Brief media reporter John Buckley wrote about this in his excellent newsletter, the Signal, over the weekend: “Did Australian government officials come to some sort of understanding with the Trump administration that gave Labor confidence to move ahead on both streaming quotas and the bargaining incentive in the last fortnight, or could Australia yet expect some sort of US reaction? That was the question doing the rounds among some entertainment and media executives through the week.”

    Whatever the reason, it’s great to see the government get on with business. As critical as I have been about some of its policies — I imagine I don’t need to tell you which one I’m thinking of — I want Australia governed by Australian tech laws that Australians can influence, rather than leaving it to the whims of the US.

    <<< GOOGLE ADDED AI SEARCH AND NOW IT SENDS YOU TO CENTRELINK SCAM SITES >>>

    After Josh Taylor’s story about Google’s AI Overviews sharing misinformation about road rules, Pickr.com.au’s Leigh Stark uncovered a network of websites that have managed to hijack the search engine’s AI answers and use it to promote lies about an “upcoming Centrelink $4100 payment” and other scams aimed at Australian users (also UK, Canada and the Phillippines). This was made possible by the old trick of domainjacking, i.e. snapping up old domains, and host content that influences Google’s AI summaries.

    <THE SIZZLE>

    Out of all of the companies that have embraced generative AI, few have diminished their own services more than Google and its search product. And it’s weird how Google’s own success paved the way for this to happen.

    The complete dominance of Google search meant manipulating SEO became so lucrative that it became an enormous cottage industry and ruined search in the process.

    So rather than wading through links promoting “10 BEST toilet brushes, cheapest, colourful, buy online, deliver fast” packed full of affiliate links and paragraphs of pointless text that is meant to read by Google's crawlers, people began to turn to generative AI for its comparatively short, specific answers (even if they’re wrong). Google, seeing this and fearing being disrupted, jammed AI into its search to disrupt itself.

    Except that’s how you end up with the world’s most visited website telling users that the government really is about to give all seniors a special one-off payment if you log into Centrelink.gov.fjlajkdfbjsdfujsdhfkjhg.com.ru. And Google’s old excuse — we’re just showing you what’s on the web, it’s up to you to be careful once you go off this website — doesn’t work because now it's Google giving you an answer, and not 10 blue links where your answer might be.

    <<< I CRACKED MY IPHONE SCREEN BUT, LIKE JAZZ, IT’S ALL ABOUT THE SCREENS I DIDN’T CRACK >>>

    Over the weekend, I smashed my iPhone 16 Pro’s screen. I can't really be mad. I have a dodgy silicone case that essentially offered no protection at all, and I drop my phone all the time.

    What’s surprising to me is that it didn’t happen sooner. Remember the early iPhones and Android phones around the early-to-mid-2010s which would break if you looked at it wrong? Remember when a broken screen became a symbol of a life well-lived? Remember when Gorilla Glass was something that you cared about in the announcement of a phone's specs?

    I’m not sure when but at some point in the past ten years, this largely stopped being an issue. Sure, it happens — me being a case in point — but the durability of phones has drastically improved. It’s probably one of the reasons that phone upgrade cycles are slowing (in addition to the lack of innovation in form factors). But on the positive side, I feel better about spending a bazillion dollars on a new phone if I don't have to price in several screen repairs before the next one.

    Have you had the same experience? When was the last time you broke a phone? Do you remember the moment you stopped treating your phone like a precious Fabergé egg and instead more like the indestructible Nokia 3315? Let me know!

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    LEFTOVERS
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    OK, I don’t have links for you today for the aforementioned reasons. But maybe this is a good opportunity to share a very, very, early prototype of something I’ve been working on.

    Meet the Sizzle Feed: https://camwilson90.github.io/sizzlefeed/

    It’s a website I've been building that pulls from many of the sources that I use to write the newsletter. It grabs news from Australian and global outlets, government announcements and posts from Australian tech posters all in one place.

    It’s another way of fulfilling the Sizzle’s mission of letting you see everything you need and want to know about what’s happening in tech, without needing to wade through all the garbage of social media feeds and bad websites.

    Have a look, let me know if you think something like this is useful to you! Or if there’s anything else you’d like to include. (Again, this is just a proof-of-concept at this point!)

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    BARGAINS
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    Again I can’t really access any deals right now, so in lieu of those, here are some recommendations for some tech things that have improved my life.

    * Extra USB-C chargers with long cables: life is too short to be unplugging and plugging cables everywhere. Do yourself a favour, buy at least one extra charger so you have AT LEAST one next to your bed and in your living room.
    * Temperature sensors: You can pick up little Bluetooth temperature sensors with batteries that are supposed to last for a year or two for like $20. I put one in our two-year-old’s bedroom and check it all the time to make sure her room hasn’t gotten too hot, and it’s great for peace of mind. It's also helped supercharge my Dad Mode so now I can make small talk about the temperature inside AND outside.
    * Wireless extenders/mesh: in 2025 there’s really no good reason to deal with dodgy Wi-Fi in your house. Extenders/mesh systems work much better than they used to, and they’ve become much cheaper.
    * An external webcam: I’ve pretty much always used the iMac/MacBook inbuilt webcams until I bought a $90 Logitech external one recently and I was blown away by its image quality. Plus, it’s so handy to be able to fiddle with what the camera’s showing without needing to move your whole computer (and often contort your body). Turns out, there are camera angles other than “slightly looking up at you” or “showing you looking off to the side”.

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    GOOD-BYE
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    OK, it took me about 20 minutes to get this text into my email platform but I think we're ready to send.

    The Sizzle should be back to normal tomorrow… I hope.

    Bye!

    P.S. just got a text message from TPG saying that the issue is fixed and that the outage is over. It’s not.
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