Eskom halts load shedding (again)
Much of the country groaned when Eskom announced on Friday that Stage 3 load shedding had returned for the weekend. At the time, the country’s power utility expected the power cuts to last until the morning of Monday, 10 March (today) as a result of the sudden loss of 2,700MW of generating capacity (thanks Kusile).
Luckily for, well, everyone, Eskom managed to recover enough generating capacity come Sunday, 9 March by successfully bringing Kusile back online.
“Coal operations at Kusile Power Station are at optimal levels. All units that were offline as of Friday are now back in service. Progress on the recovery of Koeberg Unit 2 is well underway.Eskom reassures the public that Koeberg Unit 2 remains safe,” reads a statement shared via X.
Eskom continued, saying planned maintenance outages would go ahead in preparation for the coming winter and that it maintains that “load shedding is largely behind us due to structural improvements in the generation fleet.” That last bit doesn’t feel as reassuring as it did after 200 days without power cuts.
Death Stranding 2 releases this June
The much-anticipated sequel to Hideo Kojima’s 2019 Death Stranding finally has a release date – 26 June 2025. Called Death Stranding 2: On the Beach, the new title received quite a bit of attention in the form of a new ten-minute trailer which Kojima presented on stage yesterday at South by South West in Austin, Texas.
Like the first game, the sequel boasts a cast with plenty of appeal. Norman Reedus returns as central protagonist Sam. He’s joined by many of the first game’s chracters, including Fragile (Léa Seydoux), Deadman (Guillermo Del Toro), Higgs (Troy Baker), and Heartman (Nicolas Winding Refn). They’re joined in the sequel by Elle Fanning as Tomorrow, George Miller as Tarman, and Shioli Kutsuna as Rainy.
Following the game’s launch in June, Kojima also announced that ‘The Strands of Harmony World Tour’ would bring the music of Death Stranding, performed by a live orchestra, to 19 cities. Presumably none of which are in South Africa.
Death Stranding 2: On the Beach will be available for preorder from 17 March for $70 (~R1,284). Or, if you open your wallet wide enough, you can get the Digital Deluxe Edition for and extra $10 or the Collector’s Edition for a whopping $220 (~R4,220).
Warner Bros. DVDs are ‘rotting’
If you’re one of the last remaining believers in collecting your favourite movies in physical form, you might want to check on your DVDs if you haven’t in a while. It turns out there could be a problem with Warner Bros. DVDs from 2006 to 2008 with folks claiming their disc have fallen victim to the dreaded ‘disc rot’ disease.
It isn’t really a disease in the same sense as meningitis, but rather a chemical deterioration of a disc’s reflective layers that causes it to stop working. It is also by no means a new thing but DVDs should last a whole lot longer than 20 years, unless there was something in the manufacturing process that causes it to occur earlier.
Chris Bumbray from movie news and reviews site JoBlo first brought the issue with these particular DVDs to light and, thanks to him, Warner Bros. has issued a statement and is offering to replace the affected discs. It shared the following statement:
Warner Bros. Home Entertainment is aware of potential issues affecting select DVD titles manufactured between 2006 – 2008, and the company has been actively working with consumers to replace defective discs.
Where possible, the defective discs have been replaced with the same title. However, as some of the affected titles are no longer in print or the rights have expired, consumers have been offered an exchange for a title of like-value.
Consumers with affected product can contact the customer support team at whv@wbd.com.
Apple’s foldable could see 2026 launch
Don’t let our archive of foldable iPhone speculation dissaude you from believing that this time the analysts will get it right. Apple has been working on a foldable iPhone for many years and a new report from notable analyst Ming-Chi Kuo now points to a 2026/27 launch window.
Kuo reckons Apple’s folio-style foldable will target a high-end $2,000 to $2,500 price point (~R36,600 – R45,750) and will feature similar specs to currently available folding phones, like a large 7.8in inner display. Although, this inner display is said to be ‘creaseless’ and the devices’ outer display is set to be smaller than current devices, at 5.5in. Other rumours have said Apple could use an e-ink display for the outer screen.
According to Kuo, Apple won’t be winning any ‘thinnest phone’ awards with the device only measuring “9–9.5mm thick when folded and 4.5–4.8mm when unfolded.”
This isn’t the first time we’ve heard of Apple’s folding iPhone (or iFold, if you will) and it probably won’t be the last. In 2021 Kuo said we’d have iFolds by 2023. It’s two years later and we’re still waiting, so what’s a few more years? Unless Apple decides to cancel the device entirely – won’t that be funny?
