A report by the Commonwealth Ombudsman has found "serious compliance issues" with law enforcement and government agency access to telco metadata and content. Most of the issues were coppers getting their hands on the entire "stored communications" instead of "only" the metadata or the officers not clearly having "sufficient information" to make the request in the first place. They made "29 recommendations in relation to 6 agencies" along with "386 suggestions and 116 better practice suggestions across the agencies inspected". Unfortunately this is the third straight year issues have increased, a worrying trend. NSW Police is the least compliant, receiving 9 of the 29 recommendations.
Today is World Electric Vehicle Day, so here's some recent-ish EV related news:
Laurene Powell Jobs, Jony Ive, and Tim Cook announced at the Code conference yesterday that they're starting the Steve Jobs Archive. It's a website collecting media (video, audio, photos, emails, texts, interviews, etc) of Steve. Laurene said "my hope is that the Archive will be a place to draw inspiration from Steve’s life and work, spurring new generations to make their own contributions to our common future". There's not much on there now, but I assume over time they'll fill it up with all the media they can about Steve, including stuff we've never seen before. The archive is also "building programs, fellowships, collections, and partnerships that reflect Steve's values and carry his sense of possibility forward".
Two years ago (I'm still sifting through my 2,000+ bookmarks) Gizmodo asked a bunch of academics and a VC dude a delightful hypothetical question - "what might happen if Zuckerberg were to suddenly delete all of Facebook". Almost all the responses saw this as a positive thing and fantasise about the prospect of new entrants in the social media area. Perhaps ones that learn from Facebook's mistakes around addiction, black patterns and data hoarding. A few responses touch on lonely people becoming even lonelier if Facebook went away. Some people (maybe millions) actually do use it to nurture friendships. I kinda forget that.
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.
📻 God Save The Queen - Sex Pistols
😎 The Sizzle is curated by Anthony "@decryption" Agius and emailed every weekday afternoon.
💬 Checked out the paid subscriber only forum? It's a tidy little place to discuss tech with like minded Aussies.
👋 Forums not your thing? The Sizzle has a Slack group you can procrastinate in and chat with other nerds bored at work.
💳 Paid subscriber looking to manage your billing info or change email address? Visit the customer portal.
📚 Browse The Sizzle Archive. A few issues are missing and it's not searchable, but it's better than nothing.
🫂 Friends of The Sizzle is a small group of businesses or organisations operated by Sizzle subscribers. Support your fellow Sizzler!
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.