Twitter Blue is now live in Australia and Canada. They're testing it out in the former British colonies first before deciding if it's something they want to inflict on their fellow Americans. It's $4.49 a month here and you sign up for it within the Twitter smartphone app. For that princely sum you get Reader Mode (turns threads into "easy to read text"), the ability to organise tweets into folders for future reference and an Undo feature that adds a 30 second delay to your tweets so you can edit/delete the tweet before it goes live. The feature everyone wants, getting rid of ads, is nowhere to be seen.
Apple is tweaking an AirTags feature designed to prevent them being used to stalk people. According to details Apple gave CNET, Apple is "changing the window of time they'll make noises when potentially being used to track another person. Initially, the Apple device would play in three days. Now it'll begin to play at a random time inside a window that lasts between 8 and 24 hours". In addition to that, Apple will also be making an Android version of the Find My app later this year to help people detect any AirTags traveling with them without the need for an iOS device. Good stuff Mr. Cook.
Symantec's Norton range of products have been utter shit for decades (Ghost in the early 2000s was probably the high point) but they've sunk to a new low this week with Norton Crypto. According to Symantec, "for years, many coinminers have had to take risks in their quest for cryptocurrency, disabling their security in order to run coinmining and allowing unvetted code on their machines that could be skimming from their earnings or even planting ransomware". Now they can run Norton's mining software, which they reckon is more trustworthy than other sources. Norton Crypto will be made available to all Norton 360 customers in a few weeks.
Readers of a certain vintage will remember Second Life - a 3D virtual world very dorky people logged into during the early 2000s that's kinda like Minecraft, but without the game element. You can read all about it on Wikipedia. The reason I bring Second Life up today is Cam Wilson's story on Gizmodo about the ABC's foray into the virtual world. Our national broadcaster built "an auditorium for events, a underground club for triple j (which wanted to distanced from the ABC branding), sculpture walks, a futuristic space for an invention show and even a ‘news dome’ which displayed RSS feeds of headlines projected above the characters heads", which was moderated by volunteer furries. As funny as it is now, it reminds me of a better time in internet history.
📻 Juicy Socks - Cherry Glazerr
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The Sizzle is created on Wathaurong land and acknowledges the traditional owners of country throughout Australia, recognising their continuing connection to land, water and community. I pay my respect to them and their cultures and to elders both past and present.