Just a quick reminder that I'm still giving out a free 3-month trial of The Sizzle to the fully vaccinated! Give your double dosed mates this link: https://thesizzle.com.au/vax and tell em how sweet The Sizzle is. At the rate we're getting needles into arms, looks like the promo will end on November 4th. I can't wait.
Can you believe it is still legal for COVID-19 contact tracing check-in data to be used by police, even after incidents in WA, VIC and QLD? The Greens are planning to introduce a bill into Federal Parliament to get a nationwide ban on cops digging up this health data for their investigations, based on research by the Australian Privacy Commissioner saying that leaving this door open for police "undermines" contact tracing. It's debatable how a federal law will impact the data collected by state based check-in apps and as we get enter COVID normal situations, I don't know how much longer contact tracing will be a thing, but at least someone is taking it seriously.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has weighed in on a recent High Court decision regarding defamation laws online, saying "social media has become a coward's palace where people can go on there, not say who they are, destroy people's lives, and say the most foul and offensive things to people, and do so with impunity" - and went on to say that social media companies not revealing the identities of users turns them into a publisher and "you know what the implications of that means in terms of those issues". This is a nice insight to the government's thinking while the Attorney-General does a review into who is liable for what when someone says something defamatory online. Going by the PM's statement, it's companies like Facebook and Twitter.
Facebook sent a cease and desist letter to Louis Barclay, the maker of a nifty browser extension called Unfollow Everything that unfollows everyone you're friends with automatically so you can rebuild your News Feed to be less shitty. Not wanting to get into an expensive legal fight with one of the world's wealthiest and saltiest companies, he removed Unfollow Everything from the internet. Louis was also banned from Facebook and Instagram permanently. Facebook is totally within their rights to do this, but it sends such a strong message that anyone trying to make Facebook a better place for others by messing with Facebook's dark patterns will be threatened. Total hypocrites.
Firefox has a few feature nobody asked for, called Firefox Suggest. It's "website suggestions in the address bar" that Firefox describes as "a trustworthy guide to the better web, surfacing relevant information and sites to help you accomplish your goals". Sounds innocent enough, but scroll a bit further down and you'll see "for sponsored results, our preferred partner is adMarketplace". Oh, ads in the address bar in Firefox. Has anyone at Mozilla read the room lately? The reason I use Firefox is precisely to avoid shit like this. I can turn it off, but it bothers me Mozillz even thought it was a good idea.
Here's five interesting discussions over on The Sizzle's paid subscriber forum for you to enjoy over the weekend. If you are not a paid subscriber but want to get involved, visit https://thesizzle.com.au/payme to get onboard.
📻 Never Gonna Sleep - Free Kitten
😎 The Sizzle is curated by Anthony "@decryption" Agius and emailed every weekday afternoon.
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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.