The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has joined forces with its UK and German equivalents in an agreement to prevent tech giants from using mergers and acquisitions to maintain market dominance. In a join statement, the three groups state that stronger control over mergers is required to create room for competition in the market, particularly in new areas of innovation.

Microsoft has added new settings to Outlook that can enforce breaks between meetings in an effort to overcome the problem of wall-to-wall meetings and general digital overload. The setting can make meetings start five minutes after the usual hour or half hour, with Microsoft's own research suggesting even small breaks can have a positive impact when people are feeling overloaded. Now if only they could automatically mute everyone at the scheduled end time to stop overrun that would be good too.

The EU is moving forward with its proposal to impose strict rules upon the use of artificial intelligence. Seen in draft form last week, the plan aims to outlaw the use of AI for general social scoring, the use of remote biometric detection in real-time policing, and more. The rules also demand compulsory transparency obligations whenever AI is used to interact with humans, to generate or manipulate content, like with deep fakes, or to perform social or emotional detection. If the rules go ahead they're expected to have widespread impact on AI technology initiatives across the world.

In Britain, the country's former children's commissioner is taking legal action against TikTok over the collection of personal data about child users. The lawsuit, brought by Anne Longfield, claims the company's collection of personal information, phone numbers, location data and the videos themselves may be illegal in the absence of transparent consent of parents given children cannot give legal consent. The case claims to represent millions of British children. No word on why the case singles out TikTok over Instagram or Snap.

In backyard science, it's the right time of year to catch the Lyrids meteor showers, with the best time to head outside and take a look around one hour before sunrise over the next few days. Expect to catch meteor sightings with the naked eye every 3-5 minutes. Look toward the north to spot them.

In video games, Xbox owners can now play free-to-play games online without needing to pay for an Xbox Live Gold subscription to do so. The change was flagged earlier in the year by Microsoft, but the change is now officially in the system after a number of recent adjustments to Xbox networking arrangements.

And if you're hunting for something great to play on PlayStation and you had held out on buying Horizon Zero Dawn, the Complete Edition of the game is now free for all PS4 and PS5 owners. Sony's PlayStation at Home program has made a number of games available over recent weeks from its back catalogue for free – you have a few more hours to grab nine others before they exit the offer.

Finally, Australian esports organisation Order, mentioned on Bits recently for Valorant tournament management efforts and a number of team victories, has raised $5.3M in new investments as it aims to establish itself as a local leader in the esports scene. It has also appointed a new CEO, Marc Edwards, and revealed plans for a dedicated facility in Melbourne's Collingwood. The team has a number of big brand partnerships with Puma, Optus, Alienware and Logitech.

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