Japan has drafted up a law that "will create a list of what OS providers must not do in order to stop them favoring their own services and payment platforms" - OS providers here being Apple and Google and iOS and Android. The law will "oblige Apple and Google to allow users to download from app stores other than theirs if enough security and privacy protection measures are taken for the stores", "allow users to pay through third-party platforms" and "allow users to delete the apps easily and required not to give preferential treatment to their own services in their search engines". This Japanese law, plus the EU's Digital Markets Act, are really putting the squeeze on these walled gardens to open up and I am loving it.
Starlink competitor, OneWeb, has signed a deal with Telstra to use the satellite network as backhaul for "Telstra's most remote mobile sites across Australia, improving the use of real-time applications such as voice and video calling". The agreement will see 25gbit/s of capacity on OneWeb's low earth orbit constellation assigned to Telstra's mobile most remote phone towers and help Telstra expand its network to cover an additional 100,000 square kilometers by the mid-2025. Telstra is also testing the use of OneWeb as a back-up to fixed backhaul for "selected critical sites".
Yesterday, I wrote about a hospital that got fucked over by ransomware so bad that it had to close. Today there's a story about Fire Rescue Victoria still suffering the impacts of a "cyber incident" from December 2022. Very little was said about the incident at the time, but it was so bad, FRV had to take down all its computer systems, including its computer aided dispatch system, leaving front-line staff using "radios, mobile phones and pagers". Over 6 months later, none of FRV's systems are back online and the "timeframe for retrieval of data stored in those systems, and access to systems and applications is still unknown". Big oof.
If you've been in the market for an electric car but put off by the price, the new MG4 hatchback might be the car for you. The base model with a very usable 351km of WLTP range, will go on sale 1st of July in Australia, starting at $38,990 before on-road costs. Considering there's $6,000 off a new EV in QLD, that makes it almost the same price as a petrol car in the same size-class, let alone any other EV. In NSW you'll get $3,000 off that price and you don't have to pay stamp duty, so the actual drive away price in NSW is very sharp too. Deliveries start late-August. Will be interesting to see how BYD price the very similar Dolphin hatchback at its Australian launch later this week.
Advertisement for SimCity 2000 in Wired's January 1994 magazine. (warmidge / Internet Archive)
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