NEWS
Peter Thiel is a shitheel and the Silicon Valley elite kinda don't care
Big news around the Silicon Valley startup scene today that Peter Thiel (yeah the same guy who sued Gawker into oblivion) has given Donald Trumps campaign US$1.25m. Why does Silicon Valley care? Well Peter Thiel is on the board of Y Combinator (a big startup incubator thingo) and Silicon Valley, being the left leaning place it is, thinks a board member of the Silicon Valley poster child giving cash to the reprehensible Trump campaign, is against everything Silicon Valley stands for.
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US cops are overreaching into citizen's smartphones again
It's recently been revealed that back in May, the US DoJ asked a court for permission to search a property in California, which isn't that unusual. But added in that court filing was a request that the police be allowed to force everyone in the room to use their fingerprints to unlock their smartphones. It also wanted to force people in the location being searched to hand over any passwords, encryption keys and any other things that the police may need to access any computers or smartphones found in the premises. This is bad because the police don't know what's on those devices - it could be nothing. They're supposed to have a reasonable basis to begin a search. I don't know what the deal is here in Australia though. Which is kinda sad, as I should know, because I'm Australian, not American.
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China sends first manned crew to its space station
Earlier today, two Chinese blokes called Jing Haipeng and Chen Dong went into space on a Chinese Long March-2F rocket inside the Chinese Shenzhou-11 spacecraft and some time tomorrow, will dock with the Chinese Tiangong-2 space station. Looks like the Chinese are trying to go for the Space Victory method of winning Civ. I love how most of this came about because the USA told China to get fucked when it wanted to take part in the "International" Space Station. Look at China now!
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German authorities tell Tesla owners to rein in Autopilot expectations
Germany has had enough of Tesla advertising the Model S as a self-driving car and sent letters to all Model S owners to say that the Autopilot feature is simply an assistant, not a replacement for a driver. The German government is also asking Tesla to stop using the term Autopilot in its advertising so people don't think the Model S drives itself and keep their eyes on the road and hands on the wheel at all times. Meanwhile, in Australia, the Model S by far the best selling car over $100k and is the 2nd best selling car over $70k.
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Don't go on a plane with a Samsung Note 7
You can't take a Samsung Note 7 on a plane anymore. All Australian airlines have banned it coming on their planes. The US Department of Transport has banned it too and so have airlines in Asia and Europe. Gotta play it safe when up in the air - a lithium fire across the ocean would be very, very bad thing.
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COOL SHIT
Get Civ 5 and all the DLC and expansions for just $12
Civ 6 comes out Friday (yeeeahhhh baby), but to get yourself in the mood or if you haven't played Civ at all, grab the complete version of Civ 5 on Steam for just $12. $12! You'll get hours of game time out of that $12, so it's amazing value.
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Coen Brothers are writing a movie about The Silk Road
The story of the Silk Road and Ross Ulbricht (who is currently rotting in jail for the rest of his life) is gonna be turned into a movie. *mumbles* Yeah, cool, I might watch that *double takes* By the Coen brothers. Fuck yeah. It's titled the Dark Web and is based on a Wired article (which is great btw, you should read it) about all the fun times before, during and after The Silk Road's infamous operation.
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Look what $50 of stuff from the Huaqiangbei electronics markets gets ya
This is a great story about trying to get $50 worth of stuff from Huaqiangbei electronics market area of Shenzhen into a box and shipping it overseas. The scale of the joint is crazy and everything there is so damn cheap! Smart watches, with a GSM radio, a CPU, LCD, battery and all that stuff costs only US$6 to manufacture. I also love how everything out of China is shipped covered in yellow sticky tape that makes the box look like a kilogram of heroin.
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Here endeth the sizzle (until tomorrow!)
--Anthony
The Sizzle is curated by Anthony "@decryption" Agius and emailed every weekday afternoon. Today's subject line is from My Friend Robot, by Regurgitator