### Issue 2016 - Monday 29th January, 2024

## In Today's Issue

- Nobody is pleased with Apple's implementation of EU DMA regulation
- Taylor Swift AI-generated deepfake porn is worrying people
- AFP caught using Clearview AI again
- Amazon's stranglehold on ecommerce is bigger than I thought
- Cheap Sonos One SL, refurb Pixel 6 Pro, CatchConnect SIM, 2.5GbE NIC, Coursera Plus, Acer 45.5" monitor, Seagate 22TB HDD, GL.iNet routers

## The News

### Nobody is pleased with Apple's implementation of EU DMA regulation

Apple's cynical changes to the App Store and iOS to appease the EU have pissed off practically everyone it was supposed to benefit. Mozilla told The Verge is "extremely disappointed" and the changes Apple made make it "as painful as possible for others to provide competitive alternatives to Safari". Spotify made a blog post with their take on the situation and their summary is "Apple has proposed an unworkable alternative" and "Apple is forcing developers to stay with the status quo - this alternative that offers no alternative at all completely negates the goal of the DMA". The Coalition for App Fairness said "Apple clearly has no intention to comply with the DMA" and is "a shameless insult to the European Commission and the millions of European consumers they represent". Fun times ahead.

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### Taylor Swift AI-generated deepfake porn is worrying people

AI-generated art is doing what it does best - making deep fake nudes of Taylor Swift - and now that those lewd images escaped the creepy nerd part of the internet and serendipitously viewed by Swifites on normie social media, something needs to suddenly be done about it. The White House's press secretary said they want Congress to make new lews against it and begged social media platforms to "enforce their own rules". Of course the social network doing nothing about the spread of AI-generated deep fake nudes of Taylor Swift is X. It wasn't until this morning that X just blocked people searching for "Taylor Swift" and said they are "actively removing" the images, but they're still easy to find on X.

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### AFP caught using Clearview AI again

Cam Wilson over at Crikey busted the AFP using Clearview AI again, despite previously saying it doesn't, any third parties it works with doesn't and that AFP staff who participate in task forces only use "approved tools" - which Clearview AI is not. The usage was part of Operation Renewed Hope, a global program to review unsolved cases of child sexual exploitation by running material in Interpol's Child Sexual Exploitation and the USA's Homeland Security databases through Clearview AI to see if there's any people they can identify and question. The AFP supplied material for Interpol's database and that's how AFP data fell in to Clearview AI without the permission of the victim in the data and who was already known to the AFP anyways as they had already gone to police to disclose their abuse. When confronted about this, the AFP "gave Crikey a general statement that didn't seem to answer our question about whether the agency believes it should have access to Clearview AI’s technology" - i.e: they don't care.

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## Something I Saw On The Internet

### Amazon's stranglehold on ecommerce is bigger than I thought

We all know Amazon dominates online retail I didn't realise the immense capture of the online retail market Amazon has until I read this 2021 report from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. Their research found that Amazon earned US$121b in seller fees in 2021, which if it was split out into its own company, would be in the top 25 businesses in terms of revenue in the world. 60% of Americans that want to buy something online "start their product search on Amazon, rather than a search engine" and "in 15 of 23 major product categories, the tech giant captures more than 70% of online transactions". As the report surmises, "companies large and small must either sell on Amazon or forfeit access to much of the market" - which is a problem as Amazon keeps jacking up the cut of each sale they keep for themselves, knowing they have sellers by the balls.

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## Bargains

- Sonos One SL speaker - $199 at JB Hi-Fi
- Refurb Google Pixel 6 Pro 128GB - $459 from Mobile Federation's eBay store
- CatchConnect 365-day prepaid SIM, 60GB/120GB data, unlimited calls & SMS - $99/$119 from Finder.com
- IOCREST 2.5Gbps Realtek RTL8125B PCIe NIC - $13 from Aliexpress
- Coursera Plus Annual Subscription - $306 via Coursera
- Acer Nitro XZ452CU V 45.5" 5120x1440 165Hz Freesync curved monitor - $999 from Acer
- Seagate Exos ST22000NM001E X22 3.5" 22TB SATA HDD - $416 from East Digital
- GL.iNet Opal, Slate Plus, Beryl AX & Slate AX travel routers - $52.41/84.48/$114.86/$156.75 from Amazon

## Image Of The Day

Zen and The Art Of Macintosh by Michael Green (Sketch the Cow / The Internet Archive)

## The End

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