Plus: A simple, cheap and no-brainer way to protect yourself from facial recognition ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌

March 20, 2026 | Read online
# (Some) self-driving cars are safe, OpenAI's plans going awry and The Sizzler Say Plus: A simple, cheap and no-brainer way to protect yourself from facial recognition
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Edition 2526
"Ideal-Computer Tele-Match Cassette (French)" by José Antonio Ortigueira Amor is licensed under CC BY 4.0
Mentioned in today’s edition: Waymo, FSD, Anthropic, Meta, Android, 4chan and the Insane Clown Posse. Plus, deals on Sennheiser headphones, Samsung soundbars and Asus mesh routers.
# The News
### Some self-driving cars seem very safe. Others, not so much
Waymo's self-driving cars continue to be much safer than human drivers, even as its fleet grows and adds new cities (The Verge). The Google-owned autonomous car company has updated its public safety data which shows its cars have 92% fewer crashes with serious injury or worse, and 92% fewer pedestrian crashes than human drivers (Waymo). Safety advocates note that Waymos drive a fraction of the distance of human drivers, in fewer areas and scenarios, and a few other quibbles. Meanwhile, Tesla is reportedly moving towards a potential US recall over its FSD assisted driving because of incidents in poor conditions (Reuters).
The Sizzle: It seems pretty clear that self-driving can be much safer than human driving in the real world. I know it's not cool to give too much credit to big tech, and there are definitely questions about Waymo commercialising, but completely self-driving cars is like sci-fi, but it's real! The big risk for Waymo? Now Tesla, which opted for cameras over LIDAR for cost reasons, is now rushing into this. Clearly, not all self-driving cars have the same safety standards. And if Tesla continues to recklessly rollout its self-driving, I can definitely see it feeding a backlash that will make it harder for more ethical providers. And not to be dramatic, but if self-driving cars are really safer, then slowing down their roll out will literally cost lives in another way.
Discuss in Slack or Forum.
### OpenAI's world domination plans aren't going as well as they hoped
Things are looking increasingly stormy for OpenAI. Its top execs have told OpenAI staff to stop "doing sidequests" and instead focus on enterprise and coding (WSJ, gift link). ChatGPT's user growth is slowing (TechCrunch) and businesses that are using AI for the first time are going to Anthropic (X). The ChatGPT maker has ditched its in-app product buying feature because no one was using it, despite once having high hopes it would be a massive money maker (Futurism). What does this mean? Well, Mumbrella of all places had a great read on this: this is all putting an insane amount of pressure on OpenAI to make a lot of money through ads very quickly. And nothing we've seen yet suggests that it can beat the well-oiled ad machines of Google and Meta.
Discuss in Slack or Forum.
### The Sizzler Say: Dad jokes, pair programming and killing cancer with a gun
As always, if you wanna get involved (or even be able to read what's on Slack) you can join the Slack server and forum via these links.
Completely against my wishes, the dad jokes from the Slack have spilled over into the forum. Charles on Slack made a smart comparison between AI-assisted coding and pair programming Barry emailed in regarding the "ChatGPT cured my dog's cancer"***** story: "The AI cancer thing is really interesting - that said, finding something that cures cancer actually isn't that hard, it's finding one that doesn't also kill the patient that's the hard part. A well-aimed gun will kill a tumour, but it'll kill the patient too." Graham has appealed on Slack to help boost the subscriber count of the Brisbane iOS programming community, the CocoaHeads. Toss em a sub! On the forum, we've had call-outs for recommendations on soundbars and accounting software for sole traders
****** it didn’t really
Discuss in Slack or Forum.
# Leftovers
Australia:
I forgot to mention this last week but there's a sick new Australian physical gaming mag called CONTINUE that's been launched by two legends. Here's an article about it: Inside the Australian videogame magazine (Infinite Lives) Shields up! Australian organisations are bearing the brunt of cyber-warfare attacks (Cyber Daily) Government takes step towards opening up Digital ID to private sector (iTnews) AirTrunk taps battery tech to handle surging power demand (The Australian, $)
Rest of World
This year's world happiness report found that "social media, gaming and browsing for fun are associated with lower life evaluations" in students (World Happiness Report) Google reveals it will require a one-time, 24-hour cooling-off period before letting you sideload apps on Android (The Verge) Meta isn't shutting down its VR metaverse after all (Engadget) ???? Shot: 4chan fined £450,000 for not protecting children from online pornography (Ofcom). Chaser: US messageboard 4Chan mocks £520,000 fine for UK online safety breaches (BBC) Nearly half of Europeans want X banned if it continues to break the law (People vs Big Tech) Prediction markets promised better information. Instead they're creating powerful incentives to corrupt information (Techdirt) Reading the world's smallest hard drive (Hackaday)
Discuss in Slack or Forum.
# Oh, Also
### A simple, cheap and no-brainer way to protect yourself from facial recognition
It's harder than ever to stay anonymous in public because of facial recognition software that's in everything from smart glasses to ubiquitous CCTV. But, as it turns out, we've had the solution all along: in 2018, someone noticed that the typical make-up of Juggalos, the fans of hip-hop duo, Insane Clown Posse, thwarts typical facial recognition software by obscuring the shape of the face.
So, next time you go to pick up the kids or pop down to the corner shops, do yourself a favour and paint up.
Discuss in Slack or Forum.
# Bargains
Electronics
Ring Battery Video Doorbell + Chime Pro - $105 at Ring (Down from $269) hmmmm not a fan of ring but it's a good deal I guess if you wanna buy into Amazon's surveillance state Momentum 4 Wireless 80th Anniversary Special Edition Headphones - $289 at Sennheiser (Down from $639) Samsung Q930F Q Series 9.1.4ch Dolby Atmos Soundbar HW-Q930F-XY - $663 at Retravision (Down from $773) Nikon Nikkor Z 28-400mm F/4-8 VR - $1300 at Amazon (Down from $2188) Roborock Qrevo Curv 2 Flow Robot Vacuum & Mop - $1399 at Costco (Down from $2499) TCL 85" C7K Premium QD-Mini LED 4K 144Hz TV - $2020 at RetraVision (Down from $2495)
Computing
Anker 543 USB-C Hub (6-in-1, Slim) - $35.98 at AU Anker Store (Down from $89.95) Asus ZenWiFi Pro ET12 AXE11000 Tri-Band Wi-Fi 6E Mesh Router (1 Pack) - $250 at Amazon (Down from $1549)
Mobile
Dodo Mobile Prepaid SIM Starter Kit with 50GB data - $8 at Coles (Down from $23) Boost Mobile Prepaid SIM 365 Days (Activated by 4 May for 290GB) - $229 at eBay (Down from $300)
# The End
😎 The Sizzle is written by Cam Wilson and emailed every weekday. It was created by Anthony “decryption” Agius.
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