### Issue 1648 - Wednesday 13th July, 2022

## In Today's Issue

- OAIC officially investigates Kmart and Bunnings over facial recognition antics
- Twitter lays out its beef with Elon Musk while he and Trump trade insults
- BMW back on its subscription bullshit, Jony Ive & Apple are done, more gorgeous JWST pics, Deakin Uni data breach, Nothing Phone 1 looks cool
- A Better Route Planner and PlugShare are useful apps for EV drivers
- Cheap Philips Hue stuff, Jabra earbuds, 18TB HDD, GL.iNet wi-fi 6 router, Rode headphones, Huawei Watch Fit, Bose NC700, Crucial external SSD, Echo Dots, MagSafe charger, refurb HP AIO, TerraMaster NAS, Monument Valley game, Logitech headset, Corsair SSD, Alienware & LG monitors

## The News

### OAIC officially investigates Kmart and Bunnings over facial recognition antics

The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) has officially opened an investigation into "the personal information handling practices of Bunnings Group Limited and Kmart Australia Limited, focusing on the companies' use of facial recognition technology" and "commenced preliminary inquiries with Good Guys Discount Warehouses (Australia) Pty Ltd following public reports that the company has paused its use of facial recognition technology". Big props to Choice for revealing this practice and EFA/DRW for chasing it up. Without this work the OAIC wouldn't have bothered to investigate anything. Fingers crossed this leads to some regulation around facial recognition use in Australia.

### Twitter lays out its beef with Elon Musk while he and Trump trade insults

Twitter's lawsuit against Elon Musk has emerged. It basically says Elon made an unsolicited bid to buy Twitter, Twitter agreed to the offer, nothing on Twitter's end has changed since Elon agreed to buy it, so there's no reason the agreement to purchase Twitter should be cancelled. Musk responded to this news by tweeting a shitty meme, as is usual for this gormless fuckwit. Also in Elon news, he said Donald Trump is too old to be president again. Trump responded at a rally by calling Musk a bullshit artist (most true thing Trump has ever said). Elon then tweeted that "it's time for Trump to hang up his hat & sail into the sunset", to which Trump let loose with a hilarious rant on Truth Social that without government grants adn subsidies his businesses would be worthless. Trump 2 - Musk 0.

### BMW back on its subscription bullshit, Jony Ive & Apple are done, more gorgeous JWST pics, Deakin Uni data breach, Nothing Phone 1 looks cool

- People are losing their shit over BMW's subscription pricing for physical car options. Today it's heated seats for US$18/m in South Korea. Previously it was CarPlay for $80/yr. The hardware is there but if you wanna use it, cough up the cash. Everyone hates it but BMW keeps on trying! IMHO this is a great opportunity for hackers to unlock features for a small fee.
- The New York Times is reporting that that "Mr. Ive and Apple have agreed to stop working together, according to two people with knowledge of their contractual agreement". LoveFrom was sick of Apple have to approve all their clients and Apple was sick of staff leaving to work for LoveFrom. End of an era.
- The promised dump of pics from the James Webb Space Telescope is now available. There's heaps of pretty sparkly photos of galaxies, nebulas, cosmic cliffs and dying stars to gawk at on the JWST website. This one of a "stellar nursery" in the Carina Nebula is my favourite. Compare the difference in image quality versus Hubble, it's amazing.
- The dark web just got a fresh load of data thanks to a Deakin Uni staff member's compromised login details. That compromise lead to 9,997 students receiving "a parcel delivery scam" SMS and a breach of "46,980 current and former Deakin students, accessing names, student IDs, mobile numbers, email addresses and comments which included recent unit results".
- Nothing took the wraps off their new Nothing Phone 1. Specs wise it's a rather boring mid-range Android device and priced accordingly ($799), but it looks like an iPhone and has a cool clear back and a bunch of lights around ports and cameras that change colour when stuff is happening with them. Engadget has a hands on preview video.

## Something I Saw On The Internet

### A Better Route Planner and PlugShare are useful apps for EV drivers

Did you know I have a blog? I don't post to it very often, but it exists and is mostly articles I wrote hoping to flog off for cash to other publishers, but nobody wanted to pay for (fools, utter idiots!). The latest one is a short piece about two apps I use regularly as an EV driver - A Better Route Planner and PlugShare. ABRP is indispensable for anyone wanting to plan a road trip as it formulates routes based on your vehicle's range, the road terrain and charger locations. PlugShare is a map of charger locations, of which there are many, but PlugShare is the most comprehensive and the user reviews of chargers are invaluable for avoiding duds.

## Bargains

More Amazon Prime Day goodies:

- Philips Hue Play smart LED bar 1-pack or 2-pack - $86.95/$149.95
- Jabra Elite 4 wireless earbuds - $124
- WD 18TB Elements Desktop External Hard Drive - $384.43
- GL.iNet AX1800 Flint Wi-Fi 6 Router - $108
- Rode NTH-100 Headphones - $155
- Huawei Watch Fit - $99
- Bose Noise Cancelling Headphones 700 - $349
- Crucial X8 1TB Portable SSD - $115.40
- 2x Echo Dot 3rd-gen or 2x Echo Dot 4th-gen - $29/$59
- Apple MagSafe Charger - $57
- Refurb HP EliteOne 800 G2 all-in-one PC (i6-6500, 23" 1080p, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD) - $404
- TerraMaster F4-422 4-bay NAS with 10GbE & Intel J3455 CPU - $519.99
- TerraMaster F5-221 5-bay NAS with J3355 & dual 1GbE - $479.99

Non-Amazon deals:

- Monument Valley: Panoramic Collection for PC - $16.60 from Steam
- Logitech USB Headset Black H340 - $27 from Officeworks
- Corsair MP600 CORE 2TB NVMe Gen4 M.2 SSD - $249 from BPC Tech
- Alienware AW3423DW QD-OLED 34" monitor - $1496.65
- LG 34WP65C-B 34" VA 34" monitor - $524 from JB Hi-Fi
- dghdf5h

## The End

📻 Biblical Violence - Hella

😎 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.

## 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.