Author: Brett Venter

In case you weren’t aware, last week an Iranian woman, Mahsa Amini, died after being assaulted by that country’s morality police. The assault was carried out shortly after Amini was arrested for allegedly contravening Iran’s hijab law. The 22-year-old woman’s death has sparked a wave of protest in Iran. Now, Iran’s government is restricting access to the internet, including WhatsApp and Instagram. Stop them talking, that always works ⚠️ #Iran is now subject to the most severe internet restrictions since the November 2019 massacre. ▶️ Mobile networks largely shut down (MCI, Rightel, Irancell – partial) ▶️ Regional disruptions observed during…

Most women and (we’re sure) some men on the internet have horror stories about the vast quantities of dong that parades through their private messages. Instagram, and its parent company Meta, are working on a tool that’ll prevent quite so many er… tools from turning up on the platform. We’re not sure what it is about the male member (pun intended) of the species. Put some of them in the vicinity of a camera and they think that sharing grainy pictures of their schlong with everyone is okay. It isn’t. But that doesn’t seem to have stopped the sausage parade.…

This year’s Comic Con Africa is at yet another new venue, having already tackled Kyalami and Gallagher Estate in previous outings. The event, this time around, takes place at Nasrec in Johannesburg. Earlier today, Stuff got a very brief tour of the still-under-construction venue and it’s looking huge. Comic Con Africa is (mostly) go That’s mostly in terms of dimensions. When Stuff was present this morning, the venue was quite bare-bones. Most of the larger stands were in various phases of undress, but everything should be up and running by tomorrow morning. All of the smaller stands were present, though…

We’re not sure what you want an armoured Toyota Land Cruiser for, but you can have one. If you can afford it. There is a catch, though. It’s got six wheels instead of the standard four. There are also a few aftermarket customisations included that probably won’t prove very useful on the 4×4 trail. The vehicle is known as the MAX 3 Six-Wheeler and is built around the Land Cruiser 76 chassis. It even hangs on to Toyota’s 4.5l V8 turbodiesel engine. It’s almost reassuring that the vehicle’s creators SVI Engineering decided the stock components were worthy of sticking around.…

Spotify intends to be the only place you go to listen to anything. Except maybe your parents. You’ll only listen to them when you’re older and know better. In the meantime, you’ll keep telling your parents stories. Speaking of stories… Spotify has officially added an all-new feature — audiobooks. Audiobooks aren’t completely new on the platform. You’ll find them there now if you search for them, but they may not be officially sanctioned. Spotify is booking it This time around, it’s purchasable. As in, the audiobooks are purchasable. Spotify is adding some 300,000 books to the platform but listeners won’t…

One of the biggest problems with any modern games console is just how reliant they are on the internet. The Xbox lineup does it. Sony’s… historically been a little better, but it’s also prone to a few issues. Well, Microsoft’s made one little change that should have a large difference. If you’re used to running into issues with sketchy internet and Xbox One discs, they will now largely be a thing of the past. The September 2022 software for Microsoft’s consoles now largely disregards the online compatibility check when users stick a disc in. Xbox-ing match Yes, this is true…

If you’ve ever wandered a construction site, you might have seen arcane markings on the floor. Those can become walls and doors, depending on what the architect had in mind. And now, HP’s new SitePrint autonomous robot can scribble them on the ground so humans don’t have to. The HP SitePrint is a small robot about the size of a vacuum cleaner. It’s designed to mark out sections of a building’s floor plan, based on an actual plan and with the assistance of an app. Obviously. SitePrint it out https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kyc9vn7YwLE Normally, this is work that human beings would do. But…

Usually, when Stuff does something with a flippant headline like the one above, it means the subject actually is a big deal. This review of the Galaxy Fold 4 from Samsung is a rare exception. Samsung’s newest phone really is its best foldable phone so far. It just so happens that the gap between this and the Galaxy Fold 3 isn’t nearly as wide as we’d like it to be. Oh, there’s a gap. The problem is that it’s not where it’s supposed to be. The folding-in-half part of the phone, the major reason you’re paying the price of entry,…

It must be really fun working in Apple’s marketing department. Take an inconvenience like, say, a hole in the display, call it something like a Digital Island, and people will love you for it. Or, at the very least, start using your terminology instead of calling it a ‘bloody big hole in the screen’. The totally-intentional ‘feature’ seen in Apple’s newly announced iPhone 14 Pro lineup might have proved more popular than anyone expected. It’ll reportedly show up in every one of Apple’s iPhone 15 handset in 2023. This also means that yes, iPhone 15 rumours have started. Digital Island…

So you’ve decided that a folding smartphone is a device that you need in your life. Finally, there’s a choice. You can have Huawei’s Mate Xs 2 folding handset or you can drop some cash on Samsung’s Galaxy Fold 4. The latter’s review will be along shortly. Today’s all about Huawei. The Huawei Mate Xs 2 will set you back R40,000, unless you give the company a R1,000 deposit. If you do, you can score a R5,000 discount on the final price. This is a weird bit of marketing intended to spark the sort of uptake Netflix demands from new…