Plus: in defence of running a government agency on a single Excel spreadsheet ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌

March 12, 2025 | Read online
# We're in a gizmo slump, new Chinese AI thing getting hype and police ignore surveillance safeguards... again Plus: in defence of running a government agency on a single Excel spreadsheet
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Issue 2289 - Wednesday 12 March 2025
# In Today’s Issue
We’re in a gizmo slump A new Chinese AI thing, Manus, is getting hype because it can click on stuff for you Police ignore previous surveillance safeguard warnings, keep breaking the law In defence of running a government department on a single Excel spreadsheet
# The News
### We’re in a gizmo slump
Global smartwatch sales fell for the first time ever last year (Counterpoint Research). Analysts blamed the majority of the 7% decrease on an Apple sales slump that they reckon was due to a lack of compelling new Apple Watch features. Meanwhile, the consumer hardware divisions of big tech companies have become a victim of Silicon Valley’s enormous big AI bet, leading to layoffs and a lack of an appetite for new, audacious products (Bloomberg, archived). With the first wave of AI devices like the Humane pin flopping, and the fact that most AI is using existing tech (microphones, cameras, even the good ole’ fashioned keyboard) there’s little interest in trying to create crazy new gizmos! As mentioned many times before, the Sizzle is a pro-gadget newsletter and our official position is that there should be more fun little gadgets to play with. We’ve been sorely disappointed lately, and we’re not the only ones feeling it.
### A new Chinese AI thing, Manus, is getting hype because it can click on stuff for you
The latest AI thingo getting hype is Chinese startup Butterfly Effect’s Manus. It’s a agentic AI product, which means it’s supposed to navigate and interact with (i.e. click around) other websites for you so it can do more things. The company has opened up Manus for testing which means it’s out there in the wild, but on an invite-only basis. I’ve put their hype video below to give a sense of what it looks like. As usual, these AI demos use insane examples — who in their goddamn right mind is going to ask an AI to rank job candidates? Actually, now that I’ve said it I know exactly that some people will — but I will admit the idea of sending AI to go away and do some task for me in the “real world” (as in, outside of its sandbox and on someone else’s website) is intriguing. Other companies have agentic AI products coming too. Are we there yet? Reviews of it suggest no (TechCrunch). Will we ever get there? I’m not going to say never, but geez, doesn’t it feel a bit insane that we’re training robots to be like humans instead of just building APIs so robots can just be robots.
Introducing Manus: The General AI Agent
### Police ignore previous surveillance safeguard warnings, keep breaking the law
State police forces have ignored previous warnings and are continuing to use surveillance powers illegally to access Australians’ communications (InnovationAus, $). This was the finding of the Commonwealth Ombudsman’s look into how various government agencies were using covert electronic surveillance (APH). They found police forces keep ignoring safeguards like thresholds, mandatory privacy considerations and record-keeping when accessing data, and some agencies hadn’t even improved after previous adverse findings! I mean, come on! Also on government transparency, a review of the government agencies’ AI transparency statements — at least those that bothered to publish them — found that these statements were, erm, not very transparent (Information Age).
#### Leftovers
News Corp rolls out NewsGPT AI tool for staff in Australia (Capital Brief, $) Earth's atmosphere is shrinking and thinning, which is bad news for Starlink and other LEO Sats (The Register) What Really Happened With the DDoS Attacks That Took Down X (WIRED, $ Why extracting data from PDFs is still a nightmare for data experts (Ars Technica) TikTok will try instituting a 10pm curfew on most teens (Engadget) How longer-lasting, faster-charging batteries are coming via software updates (The Verge) AI-Generated Voice Evidence Poses Dangers in Court (Lawfare Blog) Apple patches 0-day exploited in “extremely sophisticated attack” US unveils new app for 'self-deportations' (BBC)
# Oh, Also
### In defence of running a government department on a single Excel spreadsheet
There was quite a few “lols” and “omgs” to the news that NZ Health had managed NZD$28 billion finances on a single Excel spreadsheet, according to a review of the agency (New Zealand Herald). On top of a few other problems, Deloitte had “significant concerns” that NZ Health’s solo spreadsheet was making it harder to find data problems. Not great. But I’m going to zag here and say it’s not as bad as some people are making it out to be. If you look at the report, it shows that the Health NZ spreadsheet was pulling from other sources of data about different districts, meaning it was just doing a bit of aggregation — it’s not like every line-item was jammed together on Sheet1! Although, you’d have to think that health ITV workers would be more careful after England Health lost 16,000 COVID-19 tests in 2020, meaning that “50,000 potentially infectious people may have been missed by contact tracers and not told to self-isolate”, because of an Excel row limit (The Guardian).
# Bargains
Electrical & electronics
SanDisk 64GB Extreme SDXC UHS-I Memory Card - $15 at Centre Com / Amazon AU Duracell Coppertop Alkaline Batteries at Amazon AU AAA 40 pack - $20 AA 50 pack - $27 LED lamps at Lightsup online store Table lamp - $30 Floor lamp - $50 TP-Link Tapo C220 2K Pan/Tilt AI Home Security Wi-Fi Camera - $59 at JB Hi-Fi Philips Hue Smart Lighting at Amazon AU Play Light Bar Base Kit for $70 Impress Outdoor Wall Light for $132 Xiaomi 165W Power Bank 10000 with Integrated Cable - $79 at Mostly Melbourne Arovac HEPA Air Purifier White - $119 at Ausbrilliant Brands Amazon AU Samsung Jet 65 Pet Stick Vacuum - $299 at Samsung Dyson Omni-Glide Cordless Vacuum Cleaner - $299 at MYER Ninja Creami Deluxe Ice Cream Maker NC501 - $308 at Appliances Online TP-Link Deco X68 Whole Home Mesh Wi-Fi 6 System Wireless Router - $349 at Harris Tech eBay Kogan 65" LED 4K Smart Roku TV - R95T - $505 at Kogan/Dick Smith eBay Bluetti AC70P Portable Power Station 1000W 864Wh - $799 at Mud Tracks Sony ZV-E10 Mirrorless Vlog Camera with 16-50mm Lens Kit Black - $891 at JB Hi-Fi
Computing
SanDisk Ultra USB 3.0 Flash Drive 64GB - $10 at JB Hi-Fi Logitech G440 Hard Gaming Mouse Pad - $27 at Amazon AU KAMRUI GK3PLUS 8/256GB 12th Gen N95 Mini PC - $167 at KAMRUI Official via eBay AMD Ryzen 7 5700X CPU - $158 at SZCPU Store AliExpress AMD Ryzen 7 7700 CPU - $245 at Computer Quality Global Store AliExpress Apple iPad Air M3 11" Wi-Fi 128GB - $919 at Apple Education Store
Mobile
Sitfit – Chair Yoga for Seniors Lifetime Premium - $0 at Apple App Store Belong Mobile Starter Kits at JB Hi-Fi $30/M 25GB/M for $15 $45/M 100GB/M for $20 iPhone 16 128GB - $1279 at Dick Smith / Kogan
# The End
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