Author: Brett Venter

Any time you see a website on the internet asking you to fill out surveys for cash, expect that they’re about to rip you off. Except, perhaps, in the case of Google Opinion Rewards. This is an app supported by Google that offers users rewards. For expressing their opinion. Seems kinda obvious, based on the name. The app first launched in the States in 2013. Users download the app, answer questions when they’re available, and are rewarded with Play Store credit. And now, the app has finally landed in South Africa. That’s just, like, your opinion, man At least, that’s…

TymeBank launched in South Africa in 2018. At the time (heh), it billed itself as SA’s first digital-only bank. Now it’s time for something a little different. TymeHealth is set to be an app-based medical insurance offering from the company. The service aims to offer private medical care to people who might not have been able to afford it previously. Plans from TymeHealth will start at R140/m and signing up is… pretty easy. Making time for your TymeHealth  There are three plans available to users, all of which may be accessed by signing up via the company’s app. MediClub Connect…

The saga of Samsung’s Game Optimising Service (GOS) has been a quick and nasty one. First, it was found that GOS was artificially limiting app performance for more than 10,000 apps. Then, Samsung came along and said it wasn’t supposed to do that. Now the South Korean company has taken speedy action. Speedy action in South Korea, and just for its Galaxy S22 devices, to be fair, but it’s fast all the same. XDA Developers reports that Samsung has launched an update for the S22 that fixes GOS’ behaviour. Samsung kills the golden GOS The outlet reports that South Korean…

Who would have thought that taking NFTs, an obtuse item for people with more money than sense, and putting them in a vending machine was a good idea? Oh, right, a company called Neon was positive that it was on to a winner. And, to be fair, we would have given it a shot. While we would have loved to travel to New York in order to buy an NFT from a vending machine, we’re South African. It’s hard enough to keep the lights on in this country. We’re not about to travel roughly 13,000km to buy a URL. Someone…

If you’re interested in Apple’s newest compact powerhouse, the Mac Studio, you might have noticed a strange discrepancy. There are two versions of the little desktop replacement. One uses Apple’s M1 Max processor, the other the new M1 Ultra chip. If you peer a little closer at Apple’s official specs list, you’ll see quite a weight difference between the two. The M1 Max machine weighs in at 2.7kg. The M1 Ultra version? 3.6kg. That’s a 900-gram difference. Turns out, there’s a serious reason for the weight change. The Mac Studio is cool Both models, internally, are almost entirely identical. Apple’s…

And now for some good news, mostly for the olds out there. If you were a gamer back when the Sega Genesis and Ninty’s SNES were a thing, you probably played one of Konami’s Ninja Turtles games. Well, they’re all coming back, thanks to the pending launch of the Cowabunga Collection. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Cowabunga Collection (TMNT: CC for short) collects thirteen classic titles together in one place. The games hail from the arcade, the NES, SNES, Sega Genesis and the Game Boy, but they’ll all be playable on… well, basically all the modern consoles. The PS4, PS5,…

Children are important. They’re our future, even. But there’s starting early, and then there’s going too far. VTech’s Level Up Gaming Chair, a gaming chair designed for toddlers, might just be the latter. Yup, proper lumbar support and excellent wrist placement don’t have to wait until your child is pre-pubescent. It’s possible to start them before preschool, simply by purchasing this slightly horrifying home addition. It looks like a gaming chair collided with Tex Dinoco from Cars and it’s… it’s kinda growing on us, actually. VTech just kicked in, yo The chair features a kiddified version of the moulded seat…

You might have heard that, despite some efforts on the part of Telkom, there’s a spectrum auction happening in SA. And the internet provider might be pleased about that. Telkom, along with ISP Rain, have both won a significant portion of the so-called “digital dividend” band. But it wasn’t cheap. For its two 10MHz sections of the 800MHz band, Telkom entered (and won) a bid of R1.5 billion. Rain secured three 10MHz chunks of its own — two in the 700MHz band, and one in the 2.6GHz band. It’s paying R1.15 billion for that access, so the company arguably got…

Loads of companies are excited about the so-called urban air mobility space. To people who don’t invest for a living, that means ‘flying taxis’. Everyone from AirBus to NASA to Honda is playing in the space. It shouldn’t be surprising that Phractyl, a South African company you’ve probably never heard of, is also working on something. The ‘something’ the company is developing is the Macrobat. And, as vertical takeoff and landing aircraft goes, it’s got one of the most expressive designs we’ve ever seen. It’s far more birdlike than other concepts we’ve seen, which basically try and turn a taxi…

Apple’s new Studio Display is a weird creature. And we’re weirdly fine with that. It’s as if the company took a 27in Retina display, stuck the internals for an iPad to the back of it, and then stuck it on a stand. It’s… honestly not a terrible idea. Apple’s tablets have been awesome for a while now. This might well seal the deal for some users unsure about the hardware. The Studio Display contains all of its internal components in the back, much like an iMac. But it’s much skinnier, and not quite as powerful as a full-fat desktop PC.…