### Issue 2218 - Monday 18th November, 2024

## In Today's Issue

- Trials of age verification & assurance tech won't be complete before legislation introduced
- Netflix's boxing match probably the most live-streamed thing so far on the internet
- Half-Life 2 gets a mild remaster & is free today
- If I was rich and had friends, I would build a house like this
- Cheap refurb laptop, Canon R5 II camera, Alienware & Dell 34" monitors, lots of video games, 6x4 photo prints, WiiM Ultra, Cricut Joy, GameSir controller, Seagate refurb HDD, Ultimate Ears portable speakers, Kindles, 10th-gen iPad

## The News

### Trials of age verification & assurance tech won't be complete before legislation introduced

The Communications department let loose that their trial of age verification technology that's supposed to inform the legislation that'll ban kids under 16 from using social media, will not be complete for at least six months as the tender for the trial was only awarded last week to UK not-for-profit Age Check Certification Scheme. This is a separate trial to what the eSafety Commissioner is currently running on "age assurance". None of these trials will be done before the government plans to introduce the legislation by the end of November. Laws based on vibes and moods, awesome, fantastic governance.

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### Netflix's boxing match probably the most live-streamed thing so far on the internet

Netflix announced that 60 million households decided to stream the Jake Paul vs Mike Tyson boxing match that was exclusive to their platform on Saturday afternoon. Some outlets reckon this is a record for live online streaming but some Indian cricket streams may have had a handful more viewers. When I watched the stream it dropped to potato quality for the bulk of the event and shit itself entirely a few times despite a hard-wired gigabit internet connection. This caused a lot of buffering/pre-loading, so what I was seeing was actually delayed a few minutes and not live. Awful experience and would infuriate me if it was something important.

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### Half-Life 2 gets a mild remaster & is free today

I'm ashamed to say this, but I have never played Half-Life or Half-Life 2. Yeah I am a bad nerd, what have I been doing with my life (playing much superior Rockstar games!) and so on, but I plan to change that as there's now a cool remaster of Half-Life 2 that was released this week to celebrate the 20th anniversary of this legendary game. Valve has "fixed bugs and restored some content, added new graphics settings, updated gamepad controls, and a whole lot more" - the full list of updates is on Steam. Half-Life 2 is free for a few more hours so if you're uncultured swine like me, now is the time to grab it along with the original Half-Life for just $1.45.

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## Something I Saw On The Internet

### If I was rich and had friends, I would build a house like this

A very wealth nerd made a website about the custom designed and build LAN gaming room in his house. It's a basement with 12 computers built-in to the walls that fold up into cabinets that all run off a bunch of servers in a different room with everything plugged in via long fibre optic USB and DisplayPort cables. His buddies rock up and they play games in a dedicated room and there's guest bedrooms for them to sleep in if they've traveled from far away. There's even a Dance Dance Revolution pad built-in to the floor. The setup is cool and all, but imagine having 12 friends!

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## Bargains

- Refurb B-grade stock Toshiba Dynabook Portege X30W-J (i5-1135G7, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD) - $231.57 from ACT's eBay store
- Canon EOS R5 II camera body - $5224.96 after cashback via Ted's Cameras
- Alienware AW3423DWF 34" curved OLED monitor - $1132.55 from Dell
- Dell S3422DWG 34" 144Hz curved VA-panel gaming monitor - $385.10 from Dell
- Untitled Goose Game - $13.49 on Steam
- 50x free 6x4 photo prints if you sign up for Harvey Norman's PhotoCentre newsletter
- WiiM Ultra Wireless Audio Streamer - $479 from West Coast Hi-Fi
- Monument Valley 1, 2 & 3 and Civilization VI: Platinum Edition are free for Netflix subscribers
- Destiny Collection - $29.95 on the PlayStation and Xbox stores
- Sid Meier's Civilization VI - $4.79 on the Xbox store
- Cricut Joy Cutting Machine - $179 at Officeworks (might get Spotlight to price beat an extra 10% off)
- The Orange Box Bundle - $2.95 on Steam
- GameSir X2 Bluetooth 5.0 Mobile Gaming Controller - $39 + shipping from Centrecom
- Seagate Exos X18 14TB 3.5" SATA HDD Factory Recertified - $249 from Pongobyte Computers
- A bunch of the Ultimate Ears "boom" portable Bluetooth speakers are on sale at Myer
- Kindle 11th-gen, Paperwhite or Paperwhite Signature e-ink devices - $167, $247, $267 from Officeworks
- Apple iPad 10th Gen 64GB Wi-Fi - $487 from Amazon, JB Hi-Fi or Officeworks

## Image Of The Day

Camouflage Cell Tower (CharClarPhoto / Flickr)

## The End

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