### Issue 1586 - Tuesday 12th April, 2022

## In Today's Issue

- Robocar "escapes" from police in San Francisco
- Atlassian's cloud services not doing so well the past week
- Etsy strike, Netflix Two Thumbs Up, Sony & Lego invest in Epic, Apple facing fresh antitrust charges in EU, Google & iFixit's DIY Pixel repairs
- Home Sweet Homepage
- Cheap Bose NC700 headphones, JBL studio monitors, Free prepaid Telesim 30-day SIM, The Last of Us Part 2, Logitech webcam, Xiaomi 25Ah powerbank, Pro-Ject turntable

## The News

### Robocar "escapes" from police in San Francisco

There's a video going around social media of a robocar in San Francisco "escaping" from the police. It's not very dramatic, but it is kinda funny to see some cops trying to pull over a Cruise-branded car for not having its headlights on and the car moving away to try and find a safe spot to pull over. Ultimately the police contacted Cruise, the car was disabled remotely and Cruise said they've fixed whatever stopped the headlights turning on automatically. Bit of a non-event I reckon.

### Atlassian's cloud services not doing so well the past week

If you're one of their customers you probably already know this, but Atlassian's flagship cloud products Jira and Confluence have been rough as guts lately. The business critical services have been lifeless since the 5th of April for a decent chunk of customers and as of today are still inaccessible for a "small number". Atlassian says that a routine maintenance script "unintentionally" disabled a small number of sites, that when considered with emails sent to those customers that restoration of services will take 2 weeks, it's a good bet data was deleted by the maintenance script and backups aren't cooperating. Ouch.

### Etsy strike, Netflix Two Thumbs Up, Sony & Lego invest in Epic, Apple facing fresh antitrust charges in EU, Google & iFixit's DIY Pixel repairs

- A large group of Etsy sellers are on strike between April 11-18, demanding the platform they derive a living off be less hostile and more human. A full list of their demands is available here. Good luck comrades.
- Netflix's new "Two Thumbs Up" feature will join the existing Thumbs Up and Thumbs Down buttons. If you really really like something, give it Two Thumbs Up and more like that will appear on your feed. Innovation baby!
- Sony and Lego have dumped US$2b into Epic Games. CEO Tim Sweeney said that "this investment will accelerate our work to build the metaverse and create spaces where players can have fun with friends".
- A "person familiar with the matter" has told Reuters that Apple will be stung with an additional antitrust charge in the EU, centered around "distorting competition in the music streaming market via restrictive rules for its App Store".
- Google is partnering with iFixit to offer genuine parts and guides for DIY smartphone repairs in various countries, including Australia. The Pixel 2 through to the Pixel 6 Pro will be supported by the program.

## Something I Saw On The Internet

### Home Sweet Homepage

I identified a bit too much with Home Sweet Homepage, a short webcomic about a teenage girl living in Mississippi, making personal websites in Notepad and generally messing around with computers while barely tolerating school. I was obviously not an teenage girl, but I had such a similar experience with the internet in the 90s. This line killed me - "computers are logical and code is logical but you can use them to express your emotions, make art and communicate to other people". That's how I feel about computers too. I think most of the 30-somethings reading this will get a kick out of it.

## Bargains

- Bose NC700 headphones - $407 from Amazon
- JBL LSR-305 MKII studio monitor - $200 each/$400 pair at Belfield Music
- Free Telesim prepaid 28-day SIM with 30GB data (porting can be slow/iffy)
- The Last of Us Part II for PS4 - $19 at JB Hi-Fi, Big W & Amazon
- Logitech C922 Pro Webcam - $99 from Amazon
- Xiaomi QB826G 25Ah powerbank - $129.99 from Amazon
- Pro-Ject Debut RecordMaster Turntable - $538 from West Coast Hi-Fi

## The End

📻 Happy Djong - Twelve Point Buck

😎 The Sizzle is curated by Anthony "@decryption" Agius and emailed every weekday afternoon.

💬 Checked out the paid subscriber only forum? It's a tidy little place to discuss tech with like minded Aussies.

👋 Forums not your thing? The Sizzle has a Slack group you can procrastinate in and chat with other nerds bored at work.

💳 Paid subscriber looking to manage your billing info or change email address? Visit the customer portal.

📚 Browse The Sizzle Archive. A few issues are missing and it's not searchable, but it's better than nothing.

## Affiliate Links

Fastmail. Email where you are the customer, not the product. Loads of features, smooth no-nonsense web interface, plus calendar and contact hosting. They've been around for 20 years and I've been a customer for over 10. Use this link and get 10% off your first year and I get around 30c/month you remain a customer.

Aussie Broadband. Great customer service and responsive to community needs (they have an "unofficial" Discord, they publish their CVC!). I've been a customer since 2017 and don't plan on going anywhere. Use my referral code (1001031) to get $50 credit when signing up for an NBN plan and I get $50 credit towards my next bill.

Vultr. All my Australian-based hosting needs (3x VPSes) are handled by Vultr. Easy to use admin interface, automatic backups, built-in firewall, custom ISO support and reasonable prices. Sign up with my link and score US$100 credit. I get US$35 credit if you're active for 14+ days and use at least US$35.

## Always Was, Always Will Be Aboriginal Land

The Sizzle is created on Wathaurong land and acknowledges the traditional owners of country throughout Australia, recognising their continuing connection to land, water and community. I pay my respect to them and their cultures and to elders both past and present.