Nvidia admitted that not only is its deal to buy Arm from Softbank under deep regulatory investigation in the EU and UK, the USA's FTC is sniffing around too. Nvidia didn't detail what the FTC is looking at specifically, just saying that the FTC has "expressed concerns" and is in discussions about "remedies to address those concerns". I'd be shocked if it's any different to the concerns the EU and UK have around Nvidia stiffing Arm's current customers like Qualcomm, AMD, Apple and Google, who also happen to be Nvidia competitors too. If I had to bet on this, I reckon the regulators will stop the deal going ahead.
A bunch of strangers calling themselves ConstitutionDAO managed to raise US$47m in order to purchase an original 1787 copy of the US Constitution (11 known surviving copies, 9 in museums, 2 privately owned) and put it on the blockchain. Their goal was to allow people that buy the tokens to "own" the US Constitution - which in reality means they have a say on what the real owners (the entity that buys it at auction) do with the precious document. Unfortunately/fortunately ConstitutionDAO was outbid and now has to figure out how to return all that Etherum. James Hennessy's The Terminal had a great story about ConstitutionDAO this week.
The ACCC released some NBN related stats in their NBN Wholesale Market Indicators Report today. The most popular speed tier is 50mbit, with 58% of premises on the NBN settling on that speed. Only 7.8% of premises are on speeds above 100mbit and even more surprising to me, only 9.8% are on 100mbit. Also interesting is that the average CVC per users is 2.8 Mbps. I figured it would be higher. Telstra is still the big dog in ISP land, snatching 44.3% of the market. TPG (23.9%) and Optus (14.5%) fill out the top 3. Meanwhile, TPG is working with the ACCC on a functional separation plan to make itself a "more robust competitor to NBN Co".
Geoff Huntley has published a blog post about the heavy duty mobile broadband setup attached to his van. He's got three LTE modems (one for each Vodafone, Telstra and Optus) hooked up to three antennas that are bonded together using Speedify. He's also got two other antennas that act as a wi-fi access point, turning the van into a giant mobile hotspot. Oh and a 5G modem for shits and giggles when he enters a 5G area. To top it all off, now he's adding Starlink to the mix. This is a wild setup for a van, but it's exactly what I would do if I was into living in a van and needed rock solid internet access. If anyone here is seriously thinking about this but you're unsure about the networking stuff/what to buy, I'd love to help you do it.
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.
📻 The Hardest Cut - Spoon
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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.