Author: Brett Venter

Everybody has to launch something that keeps on earning money, thanks to Fortnite. Learning that Diablo IV is getting cosmetic microtransactions isn’t much of a wrench. That’s been obvious since 2019. Finding out that it’ll cost money to be fully involved in the upcoming ARPG’s Seasons hurts a little more. Activision Blizzard has detailed how its post-launch content will work in Diablo IV. To its credit, the company is trying to be as transparent about how it’ll all work, upfront. It’s taken a little flack for Diablo Immortal, an actually fun-to-play mobile title designed to siphon money out of some…

Now that cryptocurrency is taking a few hits, it looks like distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks are rising again. Google Cloud recently held off the largest Layer 7 attack ever recorded. The attack was launched in June this year against one of the company’s Cloud Armour customers. Google hasn’t shared who was targeted, only how badly things might have gone if its services hadn’t been there to take the hit. The scale of the attack was also considerably larger than the previously-reported record of 26 million requests per second (RPS). Driftin on a Google Cloud Google Cloud’s software detected, on 1…

Stuff has kept track of all sorts of meat substitutes turning up in recent years. Major brands around the world have all taken a crack at it. Now, Nandos is joining in on the whole thing. The chicken specialist has brought a plant-based meat substitute over from Australia. It’s used the same marketing that was used in Oz. The meat substitute is known, officially, as The Great Pretender. Because Nando’s is nothing if not slightly sarcastic. Real Nandos, fake meat The company doesn’t go so far as to claim that its Great Pretender meals include substitute chicken. Instead, it’s “plant-based…

Turtle Beach is a name we associate most closely with gaming headphones. Products like its Recon controller show that the brand has its place in other areas. If you’re looking for a second controller, are keen on audio features, and don’t mind being connected to your Series X, this one’s for you. The Turtle Beach Recon controller is designed for use with the Xbox Series X but it’ll work just as well with the Xbox One and PC. A little bit of versatility never hurt anyone. And we suspect this controller’s USB connector lets it get around a touch more…

Earlier this week, civic organisation Outa warned that government might take advantage of an expected petrol price drop to fix a few mistakes. Specifically, it would add a little extra to the general fuel levy to fund Johannesburg’s e-tolls. Transport minister Fikile Mbalula has poured cold water on the organisation’s worries. For whom the bell e-tolls Outa head Wayne Duvenage expressed concern that South Africa’s government would bump fuel levies by up to 30c per litre in order to fund e-tolls. The SANRAL-operated project has faced severe opposition from the public since the scheme rolled out. Transport minister Mbalula previously…

If Netflix introduces a new ad-supported tier, and all signs suggest it will, it’ll have a few drawbacks. One of these is less content, according to previous reports. The other, obvious, one is that it’ll contain ads. Turns out, there’s a third one. Ad-bolstered Netflix might yank a very useful feature out of the app, according to hints in the app’s code. Developer Steve Moser spotted the change when poking around in the app. It seems that downloads will be “…available on all plans except Netflix with ads”. Netflix cheap folks in the ‘nads The text Moser found in the…

The thing about setting up a smart home is that it requires several things. Those would be technical skill and large amounts of money. Usually, when you’re confronted by affordable smart home gear, like this batch from Aqara, you should run screaming. That’s not the case here. Cheap smart home kit tends to have several flaws. It’s a mission to set up, troubleshooting is a nightmare, or interoperability doesn’t operate. Usually, it’s all three, with an added side of poor design and/or build quality. We’re running down the list of possible cons here for an obvious reason — Aquara’s gear…

Education, in a country like South Africa, is arguably the most important (and underappreciated) aspect of changing a life. Vodacom — you all know who Vodacom is — is offering bursaries to South African students studying in specific fields. The programme is being run by the Vodacom Foundation. It’s open to school leavers, and first, second, and third-year students studying in various STEM fields. Those chosen for a corporate cash injection will be picked “…based on merit and their neediness for financial assistance.” Vodacom comes to the party The mobile service provider isn’t being totally altruistic. Vodacom, based on the…

Load shedding Stage 2 has returned. This isn’t exactly unexpected, even if it’s unwelcome. South Africa’s recent cold snap, plus a loss of generation capacity, is to blame for the most recent bout. Timed power outages will begin this evening from 16:00 and will continue through until midnight. If you don’t know the drill by now, we’d like to congratulate you on your solar installation. Load shedding blues #POWERALERT1 Due to a shortage of generation capacity, Stage 2 loadshedding will be implemented at 16:00 – 24:00 this evening; with a high probability of loadshedding on Wednesday and Thursday evenings. pic.twitter.com/VwomBFY3tj…

You might have heard that Russia will be leaving the International Space Station, thanks to a variety of ongoing tensions. Well, while the country is on a break, it could well set up ROSS. That’s the name of a proposed Russia-operated space station the country revealed at Army-2022. Army-2022 is a military event held in Moscow, and ROSS is only a model for the moment. But it could well be the future of Russia in space. Based on its initial design, it’s also rather ambitious. ROSS looks… Friend-ly Don’t get the wrong idea, the station isn’t inspired by the Friends…