Bits: daily tech news bulletin

Welcome to Bits, your daily tech news bulletin, for Thursday, May 20, I'm Seamus Byrne.Microsoft has announced a year long process for taking Internet Explorer off life support. In August, Microsoft 365 will stop supporting Internet Explorer, and on June 15, 2022, most versions of Windows 10 will officially put the 25 year old web browser out to pasture. IE arose in the '90s to beat the OG dominant integrated browser, Netscape Navigator. Microsoft Edge is already considered the new home for default browsing on Windows 10, and it will include an Internet Explorer emulation mode for those who really, really need one.https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2021/05/19/the-future-of-internet-explorer-on-windows-10-is-in-microsoft-edge/Meanwhile, at Google, the Chrome browser is soon to test the inclusion of a 'Follow' feature that will allow users to get updates direct to the new tab page from websites with RSS feeds. Yes, many may remember that Google killed its beloved Google Reader back in 2013, and now in 2021 it's bringing back an RSS Reader direct within Chrome. If you haven't been using RSS lately, it's still alive and well thanks to great tools like Feedly, though some sites have stopped offering RSS altogether, sadly. But not Byteside - smash that follow button when it appears in a browser near you.https://9to5google.com/2021/05/19/chrome-follow-rss-feed/Twitter has released the results of an investigation into whether its cropping algorithms had an inherent racial bias and found that it really did preference white people and women. In recent weeks, Twitter made a move to support showing the full image in a tweet instead of offering a crop at all, and it turns out this is because the company considered its options and decided no crop was better than sticking with an algorithmic bias in its cropping tool. Twitter's Director of Software Engineering, Rumman Chowdhury, said "One of our conclusions is that not everything on Twitter is a good candidate for an algorithm." Listen up, Silicon Valley.https://blog.twitter.com/engineering/en_us/topics/insights/2021/sharing-learnings-about-our-image-cropping-algorithm.htmlSpotify has announced a series of five pre-recorded live concerts set to take place every week for five weeks starting May 27. The concerts will be offered as a livestream only and users will need to buy tickets to attend the virtual performances, priced at $19 each. Bands include The Black Keys, Bleachers, girl in red, Rag'n'Bone Man, and Leon Bridges. It's an interesting experiment, and in similar fashion Zoom has announced the launch of paid virtual events to allow organisations to hold conventions and conferences via its platform, with ticketing and registration processes as well as multi-session planning and virtual lobbies for networking. The effort to make online events more like the real world continues apace.https://newsroom.spotify.com/2021-05-19/must-see-your-favorite-artists-perform-with-spotifys-virtual-concert-experience/https://blog.zoom.us/coming-soon-zoom-events-virtual-experiences/Apple has announced a wide set of software updates to expand its already impressive accessibility offerings for users of its products. Updates include SignTime, which will allow users to book a sign language call via video link for online shopping and support, and iPad eye tracking to allow for device control with eye movement. A new AssistiveTouch mode is being added to Apple Watch that will allow a cursor to control the screen via subtle muscular movements. And there's even a new Background Sounds mode to play white noise or other subtle sounds for neurodiverse folks who prefer to have distracting noises reduced. New VoiceOver support for images, and new Memoji to show people with Cochlear implants or oxygen tubes, plus more. All up a very impressive accessibility update.https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2021/05/apple-previews-powerful-software-updates-designed-for-people-with-disabilities/h...

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Welcome to Bits, your daily tech news bulletin, for Wednesday, May 19, I'm Seamus Byrne.Google I/O kicked off overnight, the company's festival of new toys, and this year we see a very new look for Android ahead of the launch fo the version 12 update. They're calling it a "Material You" design, and the colours of the whole OS, including settings and menu areas, will change to follow your theme. Google also showed off new features for Google Workspace, including better video meetings layouts, and there are many upgrades to how Google Photos will work, including creating animations from still shots and creating a locked folder where you can keep photos that you don't want to see when you're scrolling through your library.https://events.google.com/io/?lng=enhttps://www.theverge.com/22439777/android-12-design-features-widgets-first-look-googlehttps://www.theverge.com/2021/5/18/22435419/google-io-2021-event-recap-biggest-announcements-pixel-android-12-wear-os-workspacehttps://techcrunch.com/2021/05/18/google-photos-update-adds-new-memories-and-a-locked-folder-previews-cinematic-moments/On the hardware side, Google announced it is unifying its WearOS with Samsung's Tizen platform along with more input from Fitbit to bring Android wearables back into a more cohesive platform experience. WearOS 3.0 is claiming to be 30% faster than the current version and will get features like an offline music mode for YouTube Music. Another big hardware concept revealed was Project Starline, that uses a booth full of cameras to create 3D models in real-time so you can feel like you're sitting across from a real person.https://www.cnet.com/news/google-and-samsung-are-combining-to-reboot-android-watches-with-a-dose-of-fitbit-too/https://www.wired.com/story/google-project-starline/Here at home, the Fair Work Commission has ruled that a Deliveroo rider should be classified as an employee in a landmark ruling against gig economy contractor arrangements. The rider brought an unfair dismissal case against the delivery company after they had been kicked off the platform in April last year. The case looked at the way the booking system gives preferential treatment to riders who operate in more employee like ways, contrary to the argument that these platforms are all about freedom and flexibility for workers. Deliveroo says it will appeal the decision. https://www.innovationaus.com/deliveroo-loses-test-case-as-rider-ruled-an-employee/Microsoft has officially given up on launching a dedicated lightweight version of Windows known as Windows 10X, instead opting to incorporate the ideas developed as part of the project into future updates to the core Windows 10 operating system. The original idea was to build a dual-screen optimised version of Windows, which then refocused on being a competitor to Google's Chrome OS that has been a big hit in education markets. Microsoft says some features from its development work on Windows 10X is already making its way to the core OS, including optimised on-screen keyboard designs and enhanced voice typing.https://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-officially-acknowledges-windows-10x-isnt-happening/With all the attention on the energy usage of cryptocurrency transaction processing, the world's second biggest crypto by market cap, Ethereum, has announced plans to change the way it operates in order to reduce power consumption by 99.95%. The concept shifts the security process from a "Proof-of-Work" system to a "Proof-of-Stake", a technical shift that Ethereum claims testing shows will generate the massive reduction in power consumption – and that consumption will not rise when the value of Ethereum does, as has been the case in the past. In one comparison, they suggest that if Bitcoin power usage today was the equivalent of the height of the Burj Khalifa, then current Ethereum usage is the height of the Tower of Pisa, and the new power consumption for Ethereum after the changes would be the height of...

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Welcome to Bits, your daily tech news bulletin, for Tuesday, May 18, I'm Seamus Byrne.Leading today's bulletin is esports, with an amazing result in the wee hours this morning as Perth's Pentanet defeated one of the world's biggest brands in esports, Cloud9. Cloud9 was the North American champion team at the Mid-Season Invitational event we've been covering in recent weeks, and while Pentanet had already lost its 7th game and could not progress in the tournament the team played with the same flair and meme-filled attitude they've brought to the whole tournament that has won them fans around the world. Think Perth Wildcats beating the LA Lakers and we're in the right ballpark. A joyful moment for the local League of Legends scene. The European hosts of the MSI 2021 broadcast celebrated Pentanet's win with a Red Bull shoey. They bow out but take many hearts back to WA from this event.https://liquipedia.net/leagueoflegends/Mid-Season_Invitational/2021/Rumble_StageNBN Co has once again had to push back the timing on selling new hybrid-fibre coaxial connections, but now it's not due to shortages in termination equipment. This time it's due to NBN's system for assigning work to contractors is having major problems. NBN contractors have held protests across the country in recent weeks due to the new work scheduling system causing major delays in jobs, which has reduced how many jobs they can complete in a day or causing delays to starting jobs for customers. More widely, internet service providers have also been complaining about the issues, which is also impacting on fault rectification appointments as well as new connections. For HFC, no new date for resumption of connections has been offered by NBN.https://www.itnews.com.au/news/nbn-co-pushes-back-hfc-sales-restart-as-workforce-system-bugs-bite-564658In NSW, the state government has announced a trial to make it easier to find a parking spot on Sydney streets. The smart kerbsides trial will run in Liverpool for 12 months, giving app-based visibility of where parking spots are available in real time. The app can also manage "park now, pay later" services to only charge drivers for the time they actually spend at a parking spot. Further, Liverpool Council Mayor Wendy Waller says the data related to the trial will help in planning for pedestrian and cycling flows and other aspects of road safety and parking availability.https://www.zdnet.com/article/nsw-to-undergo-trial-of-smart-kerbsides/In music news, Apple has announced it is launching a new lossless audio quality tier as a free upgrade for its entire music catalogue. Starting in June, people can choose to stream music at up to 24-bit 192 kHz lossless audio quality, with support for Spatial Audio and Dolby Atmos for musicians who choose to support such listening formats. Apple's AirPods and most wireless earphones do not support lossless formats because they use Bluetooth connectivity that requires compression, but AirPods will support the new Spatial Audio with Dolby Atmos features. At the same time, Amazon has also updated its services to now deliver Amazon Music HD service to all Amazon Music Unlimited subscribers for free. The HD version of its music service was previous $5 more per month.https://www.macrumors.com/2021/05/17/airpods-apple-music-lossless-audio/https://www.billboard.com/articles/business/9573513/amazon-music-hd-unlimited-hi-fi-price-streamingMicrosoft has today launched a personal edition of its Teams collaboration software, which has evolved rapidly during the pandemic as a workplace collaboration platform. Think of it as a Slack competitor, letting you share documents, make digital video and audio calls, and generally chat with friends and family under this new product option. If you use a lot of Microsoft products, this is worth checking out.https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/blog/2021/05/17/microsoft-teams-now-brings-family-and-friends-together-to-call-chat-and-make-plans/...

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Welcome to Bits, your daily tech news bulletin, for Monday, May 17, I'm Seamus Byrne.The Australian Signals Directorate, in response to Senate Estimates questions, has told parliament that it knows who was behind an attack on parliamentary email servers in March, but it is not saying who that was publicly as it feels that is a matter for the government. ASD said it was an unsophisticated attack, but that due to a lack of two-factor authentication on access it was more successful than it should have been. Users were forced to implement 2FA when they were allowed back into the system.https://www.zdnet.com/article/asd-knows-who-attacked-the-aph-email-system-but-isnt-revealing-who/eBay has announced it is closing its "adults only" section of the website in what it calls a move to enhance "safety" on the platform. The site maintained a dedicated section of the site as a home for such items, but this will end in one month's time. However, some exceptions are being carved out for sex toys and collectible magazines. The move continues a trend that makes it harder for sex-related content and services to find a place in legitimate marketplaces.https://www.vice.com/en/article/7kvb7z/ebay-is-banning-hentai-and-other-adult-contentRumours of Twitter launching a subscription service have been around for a long time, but now more details have been revealed by hidden feature hunter Jane Manchun Wong. The service is set to be called Twitter Blue, with a suggested price of US$2.99 per month. The paid service will offer features like Bookmark Collections, an Undo Send timer on tweets, and improved news reading experience. No word on timings or what other features may be included, but there's certainly no mention of that edit button many users crave.https://www.macrumors.com/2021/05/15/twitter-blue-subscription-service/A report by US non-profit organisation Center for Countering Hate has found that the vast majority of disinformation about vaccines and COVID on social media were distributed by just 12 people. An analysis of activity between the start of February and mid-March showed that 65% of anti-vaccine content on Twitter and 73% on Facebook originated with the same 12 people across a network of accounts they control. Despite repeated violations of Facebook, Instagram and Twitter rules, nine of the twelve remain active on the platforms.https://www.npr.org/2021/05/13/996570855/disinformation-dozen-test-facebooks-twitters-ability-to-curb-vaccine-hoaxesFrom the serious to the more entertaining, a security researcher has published proof of concept code for a major security flaw in a computer system that, thankfully, no one should be worried about. The flaw allows for arbitrary code to be executed on a 1967 design for a Universal Turing machine designed by the late Marvin Minsky. While the conceptual hack has the air of entertainment, researcher Pontus Johnson suggests it speaks to a fundamental question of security design – where in the design process does security enter the picture?https://www.theregister.com/2021/05/11/turing_machine_0day_no_patch_available/In videogames, the Final Fantasy XIV Fan Festival over the weekend offered a surprise for local fans, with news that an Oceanic data centre is set to open later this year. Launching seven years into the life of the game, such a server will see much improved latency and a potentially improved sense of local community for players from this region. No specific date was announced, but it is expected to launch ahead of the game's new expansion, Endwalker, which was given its launch date of November 23 this year.https://www.shacknews.com/article/124389/final-fantasy-14-adding-new-oceania-online-data-centerIn esports news, Pentanet.gg has struggled in the Rumble stage of the League of Legends Mid-Season Invitational, with an 0-6 record over the weekend. Four games remain to be played and while it's still mathematically possible to make the semi-finals, it's a cliff-like...

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Welcome to Bits, your daily tech news bulletin, for Friday, May 14, I'm Seamus Byrne.The federal parliament has been asked by a parliamentary committee to trial a ban on smartphones during question time to improve the perception of how business is conducted in the House and the attentiveness of parliamentarians. The House Standing Committee on Procedure called for public submissions and a survey on improving Question time that started in 2019 , with respondents feeling conduct was poor and real questions were not being answered or even asked, and that parliament was setting a bad example for society, especially children, about how debate should be conducted. Mobile phones were first allowed into the Chamber in 2015, and after many public responses mentioned phones being a 'bad look' the committee has proposed a trial to restrict their use. Whether the trial will even take place remains to be seen.https://www.itnews.com.au/news/parliament-asked-to-trial-a-mobile-phone-ban-in-question-time-564503Eftpos is aiming to roll out a network of QR codes to create new opportunities to pay for goods and services through the payment platform, with its recent acquisition of Beem It providing the basis for the new move. Beem It was previously owned by Commonwealth Bank, National Australia Bank, and Westpac. Eftpos has lost a lot of ground in digital payments, with most tap and go payments associated with Visa and Mastercard instead of the traditional Cheque or Savings options that used Eftpos to perform the transaction, so providing new avenues to grow its share of transaction opportunities is a big deal. As people have become more comfortable with QR codes over the past year, Eftpos thinks Beem It could become useful in both physical and online payment processing.https://www.zdnet.com/article/eftpos-uses-beem-it-acquisition-to-build-out-qr-payment-system/SpaceX has signed a deal with Google to provide its Starlink satellite broadband services to Google's Cloud data centres. The deal will see Google's cloud services get the added assurance of an additional connectivity option that is fast and gives a boost to redundancy, while Starlink will sell Google Cloud services to its customers through its channels. Starlink made a similar deal with Microsoft Azure last year.https://www.theverge.com/2021/5/13/22433982/elon-musk-spacex-internet-connectivity-deal-google-cloudIn Europe, Google has been fined over €100M for abusing its competitive advantage to control the Android Auto interface. An EV charging station app called JuicePass was barred from being available on the Android Auto interface, effectively stunting the app's ability to grow its audience and utility in the market. The app had been blocked for two years and the court has ordered Google allows the app to be available through Android Auto. Google says it disagrees with the finding and is considering its options.https://techcrunch.com/2021/05/13/google-hit-with-123m-antitrust-fine-in-italy-over-android-auto/Elsewhere at Alphabet, CNET has reported that YouTube recently banned dozens of channels that were posting videos related to the QAnon delusion after they were brought to the company's attention. The channels had been evading detection by deleting their own videos within days of posting, using YouTube more like an ephemeral video platform. In all, 40 channels were removed after CNET's Rich Nieva had shown the evidence to the YouTube while questions are raised about the tricks channels are deploying in their effort to spread disinformation while generating views to earn ad revenue.https://www.cnet.com/features/qanon-channels-are-deleting-their-own-youtube-videos-to-evade-punishment/For Final Fantasy fans, this weekend sees a virtual fan festival taking place to celebrate the massively multiplayer Final Fantasy XIV. The game's next major expansion, Endwalker, is arriving in coming months and the event will reveal more details while also offering developer panels...

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Welcome to Bits, your daily tech news bulletin, for Thursday, May 13, I'm Seamus Byrne.Tesla has announced it is changing its stance on trading Bitcoin for its cars, announcing it will no longer accept payments in the cryptocurrency. Tesla CEO Elon Musk cited concerns over the environmental impact of the mining process used by the world's most prominent and highest valued cryptocurrency. The change comes just seven weeks after Tesla began accepting Bitcoin and even saw its first quarter profits boosted by an increase in the value of its Bitcoin holdings, worth $1.5 billion. Musk said the company will not sell any of its holding and is looking for alternate cryptocurrencies that have lower energy requirements for their use.https://www.theverge.com/2021/5/12/22433153/tesla-suspend-bitcoin-vehicle-purchase-cryptocurrency-elon-muskA wireless security researcher has published a paper that finds a wealth of security vulnerabilities in Wi-Fi at both a design and implementation level, dating back to the origins of Wi-Fi in 1997 through to the latest versions on the market today. The flaw is only exploitable at close range, but enables an attacker to trick the security protocols into allowing data to be decrypted and read. 75 devices were tested across all major operating systems and all were affected by at least one of the flaws. The good news is that the flaws were disclosed to the industry and patches have been rolling out over recent months. Yet again, make sure you check your computers, smartphones and your router are updated to the latest versions to stay safe out there.https://www.theregister.com/2021/05/12/krack_hack_wifi/The Epic vs Apple battle continues, and not just in the courtroom. Apple has emphasised that its tight control of the App Store ensures safety standards are well managed, but revelations in the case have suggested the company has at times allowed malicious apps to slip through the net. For example, in 2015, internal emails showed Apple had found 2,500 apps were downloaded 203 million times by 128 million users. As a form of rebuttal to these concerns, Apple has announced via its newsroom blog that while some things may slip through a lot has been caught along the way. The post says that in 2020 alone, $1.5 billion in potentially fraudulent transactions were stopped in the App Store, with 3 million stolen credit cards blocked from making purchases. Over 200,000 apps were rejected for privacy violations, 48,000+ were rejected for having hidden features and over 470,000 developer accounts were banned permanently.https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2021/05/app-store-stopped-over-1-5-billion-in-suspect-transactions-in-2020/In more exciting Apple news, benchmarks are beginning to flow through as people get a chance to test the new M1-based iMac. Geekbench test scores suggest the entry-level M1 iMac is performing around 56% better than the previous top of line 21.5-inch Intel models. These were last specced in 2019 so they're running older 8th Generation Intel Core processors. For the high-end 27-inch Intel iMac, the new M1 iMac runs faster in single core tasks but not for multicore, so users with those models should stay where they are until any potential iMac Pro appears in future.https://www.macrumors.com/2021/05/12/m1-imac-benchmarks/In science, a new study published in Nature this week has showed that brain-computer interfaces are making it possible for humans to type words into a computer by just thinking about writing the words in handwriting. The study worked with subjects whose hands were paralysed due to spinal injuries, and they achieved typing speeds of 90 characters per minute at an accuracy of 94% or 99% with autocorrect switched on. This is considered a big improvement over systems that focus on controlling a cursor or other typing mechanism.https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/05/neural-implant-lets-paralyzed-person-type-by-imagining-writing/In games, an interesting new games stud...

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Welcome to Bits, your daily tech news bulletin, for Wednesday, May 12, I'm Seamus Byrne.The federal budget happened last night, and over the past week the government pre-announced many aspects that are important to technology and digital culture industries, including the tax offset scheme for videogames and the new AI centre at the CSIRO. Unfortunately the university sector continues to be treated with disdain by the government, with almost 10% of further cuts that will see yet more jobs lost in the sector. And never forget the government's continued negligence on climate change.https://www.innovationaus.com/local-tech-gets-overlooked-by-govt-again/Intel has unveiled its 11th-generation H-Series Core processors for high-end mobile performance overnight. Codenamed Tiger Lake, the new hardware is aimed at people who want to take serious gaming or graphics processing on the go. Alongside the news, NVIDIA also unveiled its mobile edition RTX 30 Series GPUs alongside Intel's announcements, with Dell, HP, Lenovo, Gigabyte, MSI and Razer all having new high-end laptops ready to roll based on the new hardware combination.https://www.anandtech.com/show/16668/intel-launches-11th-generation-core-tiger-lakeh-eight-core-10nm-mobile-processorshttps://blogs.nvidia.com/blog/2021/05/11/geforce-rtx-studio-laptops-3050-ti/To go with your shiny new gaming laptop why not grab a shiny new VR headset? HTC is holding its ViveCon virtual event this week and revealed the new Vive Pro 2 and Vive Focus 3 headsets. The Vive Pro 2 is a big upgrade over the previous generation, with a 120-degree field of view, 120Hz refresh rate and 2448x2448 pixel resolution for each eye. The Focus 3 features similar specs but is a wireless all-in-one VR system that requires no PC and no sensors and is targeted toward business users.https://uploadvr.com/vive-pro-2-vive-focus-3/Good news for smart home technology today, with a leading interconnectivity standard getting a brand overhaul ahead of full rollout to the market. The tech is now called Matter, with a logo that will appear on supporting hardware. Matter is being supported by Apple HomeKit, Amazon Alexa, and Google Assistant standards and can run over Ethernet, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth Low Energy, or Thread networking technologies.Matter is run by an industry alliance, formerly known as Zigbee and now the Connectivity Standards Alliance, that is sponsored by Apple, Google and Amazon, the project is open source and royalty free, and market leaders like Philips are saying they can send software updates to existing products to support Matter.https://www.cnet.com/home/smart-home/amazon-google-apple-back-alliance-to-certify-smart-home-devices-that-work-together/Ebay has announced it will allow the sale of NFTs on its platform, adding yet more legitimacy to selling all manner of digital things as collectible tokens on blockchains. NFTs are typically bought and sold using cryptocurrencies, but that doesn't have to be the case, so eBay may lead to a mainstreaming of the concept. eBay has also recently said it is looking at the possibility of accepting cryptocurrencies as a payment in future.https://www.reuters.com/business/retail-consumer/ebay-taps-into-nft-frenzy-allows-sale-platform-2021-05-11/The little space probe that could, Voyager 1, keeps on delivering fascinating new insights into the great beyond, with a new report in Nature Astronomy looking at how its instruments are now detecting the constant drone of interstellar plasma waves. This is valuable insight into the nature of particles and plasma in the very-nearly-full-vacuum beyond our solar system. Launched in 1977, it is now over 22 billion kms from home and sends data back at a rate of 160-bits-per-second from its 70 kilobytes of memory.https://phys.org/news/2021-05-space-voyager-plasma.htmlIn games news, for those lucky enough to have gotten their hands on a PlayStation 5, Sony's Remote Play app for iOS has received an update to support ...

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Welcome to Bits, your daily tech news bulletin, for Tuesday, May 11, I'm Seamus Byrne.In the local side of the battle between Epic Games and Apple, the ACCC has asked the court to allow it to weigh in on the matter. The Australian case was paused by Justice Perram until the US proceedings that are now underway have concluded, though Epic appealed the decision. The ACCC has applied to participate in this appeal process, asking to make a submission regarding public policy on whether the case here in Australia is different to the case in the US.https://www.zdnet.com/article/accc-wants-to-appear-in-epic-apple-lawsuit-to-provide-its-public-policy-views/A major malware attack on a US oil pipeline has caused big concerns over recent days, but the hacking group behind the attack has apologised and claimed it will do more to vet companies it targets in future. The group, known as DarkSide, says it is apolitical and just wants to make money, not to cause problems for society. The organisation says it has a code of ethics that say it will not attack healthcare and other critical infrastructure targets. This pipeline situation still returns to the fact many organisations still desperately need to improve their security hygiene to stay safe from attack.https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/darkside-ransomware-will-now-vet-targets-after-pipeline-cyberattack/Facebook has announced it is testing a notification to ask users if they'd like to actually read an article before they share it. The company says the test will run with a small percentage of users on Android phones. The move comes roughly one year after Twitter started doing the same thing, and Twitter has reported improvements in how people engage with content and sharing by giving them a nudge in this way. An improvement, but not a panacea.https://www.vox.com/2021/5/10/22429240/facebook-prompt-users-read-articles-before-sharingIn AI research, you might remember Google's DeepMind project from when it became a god of games like Chess and Go, and then shifted gears and learned how to beat the world's best at StarCraft. Well now the AI project has partnered with football club Liverpool to see if it can apply its digital brainpower to improving strategy and tactics on the soccer pitch. With the sensor data and detailed video footage now deployed on players and around the game, Liverpool provided DeepMind with three seasons of granular player data. The research paper looked at AI 'ghosting' techniques to make predictions and see if the predictions were replicated in what happened in the real world. Let's keep an eye out for any new tricks Liverpool throws at the game next season.https://www.wired.co.uk/article/deepmind-football-liverpool-aiIn science, astronomers recently announced the observation of a star that was trapped by a supermassive black hole and has slowly been ripped apart at its edge. It is officially known as tidal disruption but more lovingly called "spaghettification". Previously such events were mostly noticed via fast radio bursts but this research is the first time the filaments of a star being wrapped around a black hole have been more directly observed.https://www.space.com/spaghettified-star-observed-near-black-holeIn video games, if you've been hoping to get your hands on a PlayStation 5 when demand slows down, Sony suggests you're not going to be casually walking into a store to grab one until sometime in 2022. Silicon supplies remain constrained, and while the company has increased production since launch, Sony CFO Hiroki Totoki said they do not expect to be able to drastically increase supply until well into 2022. So far the company has sold 7.8 million PS5 consoles and expects to sell another 15 million this financial year.https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2021/05/sony-says-ps5-could-be-difficult-to-find-into-2022/Also in games, those eager to scratch the nostalgia itch for the early days of World of Warcraft should note that th...

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Welcome to Bits, your daily tech news bulletin, for Monday, May 10, I'm Seamus Byrne.A big moment for Australian esports overnight, with Perth's Pentanet.gg becoming the first local team to make it out of the group stage of an international League of Legends competition. Pentanet split its victories with main group rival Unicorns of Love, 2-2, resulting in a play-off match to decide who would progress. Pentanet secured the victory and made history for the Oceanic region. At the end of 2020 League of Legends closed down the local region's official league, with top Australian talent largely moving to the USA to continue their careers. A new association formed to create a new local competition and to see Pentanet succeed on the world stage after such uncertainty and change is a spectacular moment for the local esports scene.https://liquipedia.net/leagueoflegends/Mid-Season_Invitational/2021The federal budget takes place tomorrow, and a pre-announcement late last week saw the government reveal it aims to establish a new National AI Centre to coordinate AI expertise and help drive adoption of AI opportunities across Australian businesses. The centre will sit within CSIRO's Data61. A number of additional initiatives were also announced, including encouragement for more AI-related graduate programs as well as programs to encourage the use of AI in regional Australia to solve both local and regional problems.https://www.innovationaus.com/govt-to-establish-50m-national-ai-centre/In a submission to a parliamentary enquiry into digital surveillance, the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission has argued there is no legitimate reason for using encrypted communications and that such tools are used almost exclusively by criminals. In a submission that seemed to ignore Apple Messages, WhatsApp, Signal, and other everyday encrypted communication tools used by millions of Australians, the ACIC in no way made a distinction between other dedicated forms of criminal communication. In a statement to iTnews, however, ACIC did clarify it was focused on very specific tools in its argument. Hopefully it explains that to parliament better next time too.https://www.itnews.com.au/news/crims-using-encrypted-platforms-almost-exclusively-acic-claims-564255Social audio service Clubhouse has now launched on Android after a year of exclusive access for iOS users. After a lot of attention at the start of 2021 which slowed in recent months as Twitter, Facebook, Reddit and Discord have all launched similar services, the Android launch maintains the platform's invite-only focus. Whether it's too little, too late will be seen in coming weeks.https://www.joinclubhouse.com/blog/welcome-android-usersIn what sounds like a meme but is apparently very real, SpaceX has announced it will launch a lunar mission in 2022 named DOGE-1, which the Elon Musk led space company says is being funded entirely by Dogecoin. The mission will send a cubesat payload into lunar orbit, but details on why remain vague. The press release says Geometric Energy Corporation is the organisation funding the mission.https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/spacex-to-launch-doge-1-to-the-moon-301287016.htmlIn more substantial science, researchers at the US National Institute for Standards and Technology have observed the effects of quantum entanglement at a macroscopic level. A pair of tiny aluminium drums, one-fifth the width of a human hair – positively gargantuan in quantum terms – were seen to move in a highly correlated fashion that could only be explained by entanglement. The research has long-term potential in continued development of quantum network and communication technology.https://www.sciencealert.com/quantum-entanglement-has-now-been-directly-observed-at-a-larger-macroscopic-scaleFinally, in other esports results, ESL crowned the Season 12 ANZ Champs winners for CS:GO, with Order defeating Dire Wolves for the title on Sunday night. Dire Wolves took the...

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Welcome to Bits, your daily tech news bulletin, for Friday, May 7, I'm Seamus Byrne.IBM has today revealed the first 2nm microchips have been produced as part of the ongoing race to shrink chips ever smaller. Using the Extreme Ultra Violet production technique has enabled the continued scaling down beyond 7nm sizes, which TSMC has dominated in recent years as it has pushed to 5nm and 3nm processes. IBM says it expects the 2nm chip to give 45% more performance at the same power level as a 7nm chip, or use 75% of the energy at the same performance levels.https://www.anandtech.com/show/16656/ibm-creates-first-2nm-chipThe Tokyo Olympics has announced it will have a Twitch channel for this year's games. In an extension of its partnership with US broadcaster NBC, a channel will run on Amazon-owned Twitch during the games, including live broadcasts, highlight shows, and Olympic-themed games and competitions featuring other Twitch creators. It doesn't seem so long ago the Olympics wanted to ban every form of streaming possible, so this effort to reach a younger audience that doesn't care about linear TV will be an interesting experiment.https://www.adweek.com/media/nbc-olympics-twitch-team-up-on-150-hours-of-content-from-tokyo-2020/Twitter is trialling a new Tip Jar feature for users to be able to add a tipping payment option to let followers to drop them some fiscal encouragement. Tip Jar supports Bandcamp, Cash App, Patreon, PayPal and Venmo, and Twitter takes no cut of the tip. The tipping option is inside a user profile view, but Twitter says it will also be available directly from within a Twitter Spaces session. Right now it's limited to certain users to switch it on but anyone will be able to send tips to those lucky folks starting today.https://blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/product/2021/introducing-tip-jar.htmlLots of space news lately, and this latest is a big one, with news NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab is funding a phase two of research into creating a Lunar Crater Radio Telescope on the far side of the moon. As part of NASA's Innovative Advanced Concepts program, the concept is exploring sending robots to the moon to build a telescope out of wire mesh suspended across a giant crater, which would be shielded from Earth's radiation and potentially reach back into the darkest history of the universe.https://www.cnet.com/news/nasa-thinks-that-giant-moon-crater-telescope-idea-might-work/In videogames, the Epic vs Apple court case has revealed some future plans at Epic Games for its Rocket League franchise that will see the full game head to mobile. We already know about Sideswipe after its recent announcement, which is a 2D version of the game designed just for mobile play. But a 2021 planning presentation revealed in the court fight suggests a rebuild of the core game will see the main Rocket League become a full cross-play experience – Epic pulled it off with Fortnite, so it makes sense it can make it happen for Rocket League too.https://www.gamespot.com/articles/rocket-league-could-be-coming-to-mobile-in-addition-to-spin-off-game-leaked-epic-games-doc-shows/1100-6491100/In tabletop games, Magic The Gathering and Dungeons & Dragons have teamed up more than once already – they're owned by the same company, of course – but we'll soon hear more about the first full D&D themed Magic set. Instead of a Core set for the collectible card game this year the game will get 'Adventures in the Forgotten Realms' in its place. We've also now heard there will be four new Commander decks designed around the new set, so there will be a LOT of ways to explore the crossover. More details are expected in late June.https://dotesports.com/mtg/news/mtg-adventures-in-the-forgotten-realms-releases-with-4-new-commander-preconshttps://wpn.wizards.com/en/products/adventures-forgotten-realmsAnd in esports, Pentanet's start to its MSI run in Iceland got off to a shaky start with losses to China's RNG and its key group rival the U...

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