Disinformation bill craps out because nobody except the ALP wants it

The federal government's naive plan to regulate misinformation and disinformation has shit the bed as nobody in the Senate agrees with them about how this issue should be tackled. If you're unaware, the ALP's idea was to "put legal obligations on social media platforms to address false, misleading or deceptive content, or content reasonably likely to cause serious harm, as well as equip the Australian Communications and Media Authority to regulate such content" but everyone with half a brain realised it's a bad idea for governments to decide what individuals can and can't say on the internet, including the Australian Human Rights Commission who reckon despite multiple revisions, "freedom of expression is not sufficiently protected" under the law.

Plan to ban kids under 16 from social media weakens the closer it comes to a vote

Liberal senators are getting wobbly on banning kids under 16 from social media as Matt Canavan and Alex Antic are rightfully upset at the idea of everyone having to give their ID to use social media. A good reminder to give your federal senator a call to tell them this law sucks - the more people that annoy the senator's teams (particularly non-ALP ones) the more likely they are to vote against it this week as the ALP does not have a majority in the senate and needs other senators to help them turn the proposal into law. 15,000 people/groups managed to submit feedback on the bill during the government's pathetic 24 hour feedback period on Friday - which is very impressive considering the short time frame. If you feel like melting your brain, the entire 4 hour senate inquiry that took place this morning is on YouTube.

Plex has a new app in the works

Plex released preview of a "newly reimagined Plex experience" for their Android and iOS apps. According to The Verge, "the new app is redesigned navigation that more clearly delineates between media you might have on your Plex server and the company's streaming and on-demand offerings". Plex also re-wrote the apps to have a shared codebase that'll create a "more consistent experience" across different platforms. The app currently doesn't have a lot of features the current one does, but they're working on weekly preview updates until the new app is launched in early 2025. I don't really use the smartphone apps for Plex, but I hope they don't do a Sonos and shoot themselves in the foot, or worse, give their shit-tier streaming content priority over a user's own library.

I will never pray to an AI Jesus

In another episode of "your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could that they didn't stop to think if they should", we have a church offering up an AI Jesus to parishioners. The catholic church in Lucerne, Switzerland (absolutely stunning city btw) installed Deus in Machina in a confessional booth. Visitors were "invited to pose questions to a long-haired image of Jesus beamed through a latticework screen. He responded in real time, offering up answers generated through artificial intelligence". Out of the 1,000 people that had a chat to his virtual holiness, "230 users suggested two-thirds of them had found it to be a spiritual experience". Some of you heathen atheists reading this might say talking to an AI Jesus is no different to a real Jesus, but that's why you're all gonna burn in hell.