The Federal privacy commissioner of Canada has plans to take Facebook to court
Their investigations have apparently found that the website broke a number of privacy laws and failed to take responsibility for protecting Canadians’ personal info
Reports estimate that the Cambridge Analytica scandal from back in 2016 resulted in 87M users worldwide having their information disclosed, including more than 600,000 Canadians
They’re accusing Facebook of breaking a number of laws by
Failing to obtain valid and meaningful consent of installing users.
Failing to obtain meaningful consent from friends of installing users.
Having inadequate safeguards to protect user information.
Failing to be accountable for the user information under its control.
Facebook has publicly acknowledged a “major breach of trust” but disputes the report, saying that there’s no evidence that Canadians’ data was shared with Cambridge Analytica and that they’ve improved their platform to protect people’s personal info
Fact is though, at the end of the day, Facebook has a pattern of stealing data, minimizing the impact when reporting, and then slowly “discovering” that everything’s actually worse than they thought
Sony’s releasing a documentary on the creation of the new God of War called Raising Kratos
Three years in the making, the film will be released on YouTube and cover the years of work on the 2018 rebirth into Norse mythology
It’ll cover not only the development, but a lot of the decision making that went in to Kratos’ new direction
Also, as part of God of War’s anniversary, Sony’s offering a free dynamic theme and avatar pack
The theme has Kratos and Atreus sitting in their canoe, and the avatar set shows a bunch of different characters in a runic-inspired linear design
Overwatch is introducing a new Workshop mode soon, which will apparently allow players to make custom game modes and heroes
Described as a power user mode, the new tools will be a much more robust set than those currently allowed in custom game types now, paralleling some of the tools the developers and programmers currently use
It will also include some debugging features, and they’ll be creating a support forum to connect with the developers
Some of the examples given were a Molten Floor mode where the ground deals damage, enhancements to the existing fan-made Hide and Seek mode, and Mirror Deathmatch, which swaps the entire pool of players to the same character on a one-minute rotation
Tidbits
It turns out the Alexa monitoring that Amazon is doing is even worse than we first thought in episode 246
Apparently employees have access to not just your name, account number, and device serial, but also your full GPS coordinates via location data
Samsung is officially delaying the release of the Galaxy Fold after review units hit a whole batch of issues related to the display and hinge that we talked about in the last episode
iFixit, in their teardown of the device, noted that there are sizable gaps in the device’s bezel where the two halve meet that could easily allow debris inside behind the flexible screen
You have to wonder how many people internally knew about these issues but were silenced by the marketing teams, which is doubly damning after the Note 7 battery fire fiasco
Sprint’s lawsuit against AT&T for the misleading “5GE” branding on 4G networks has apparently been “amicably settled”, which I’m guessing means Sprint got a payoff and they don’t actually care of accuracy of what their customers think. They got the PR boost for trying, cash in hand for backing off, and are calling it a day
Smash Ultimate’s new Stage Builder mode includes portals, allowing characters to blip between areas on the map, and people have made some crazy DBZ-style fight videos by having everything arranged to facilitate some ridiculous combos
Alan recommends Seven Blades in Black by Sam Sykes
Much in the same way his Bring Down Heaven trilogy I recommended last year in episode 218 is a love letter to D&D, this one is for Final Fantasy
It’s a fantasy world with a mage-ruled empire vs technologic rebellion, a really interesting system of magic and costs, powerfully written and relatable characters, and also giant birds that people ride instead of horses
All that and the cover is gorgeous enough that I bought a physical copy
Tons of fun, and came out just this month
Literally Misleading
GAME – Animal rights activist takes the fight to the war mongering industrial tycoon.
If you have a Literally Misleading Description, message Josh directly on our Discord, or Twitter @fushigiyami
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After fan outcry over Assassin’s Creed Odyssey’s forced heterosexual relationship and child in their latest DLC, and despite initially saying there wouldn’t be any changes, Ubisoft has announced they’ll be changing the cutscene and dialogue to “better reflect the nature of the relationship for players selecting a non-romantic storyline”
They’ll also be addressing the achievement earned after the child is born called “Growing Up”, which many saw as a comment that being gay or childless was a phase to grow out of
Free games of the fortnight
Epic Games
Jackbox Party Pack (until Feb 7th)
2014
Pack of party games playable using your phone as a controller, ranging from head-to-head trivia to made-for-streaming lie detection with audience participation
Security
Collection #1 has been released this week, containing more than 700M email addresses and 1.1B unique username/password pairs
This collection compiles more than 2000 different leaks dating all the way back to 2008
If you’re curious about your credentials you can go to haveibeenpwned.com and type in your email address to see if it was included
They also provide a secure password checker, but I’m too paranoid to use it
Either way, the big bullet point here is to make sure you don’t re-use passwords, and use 2FA whenever possible. Stay safe out there
Also, it looks like Apple’s released security updates for pretty much everything so you should update if possible
Soulja Boy is at it again, shaking up the video game world by putting his name on illegal emulators
We missed reporting on it before, but apparently late last year he “released” game consoles, including a Game Boy clone, that were just rebranded bootleg Chinese Linux boxes with the price cranked up that run a bunch of emulators and unlicensed ROMS
My favourite part is how the SouljaGame Handheld (which comes with 3,000 games) is marketed as running Switch games
Well in a surprise to absolutely no one he was forced to stop selling them, presumably due to legal action, and souljagame.com now redirects to Nintendo’s 3DS store
And now he’s back at it again, showing off his latest project that supposedly has 800 games preinstalled from consoles like PlayStation, Game Boy, and Genesis
He’s now saying that they’re all licensed, and that Nintendo originally approached him because they wanted in
To top it off, when asked if it’ll play Fortnite he said “Yes, we’re working on it.” “Not this one, on the next one you can”
When asked for comment, Epic Games just said “No, you can’t play Fortnite on a rooted or jailbroken device due to anti-cheat measures”
YouTube has officially banned users from sharing videos of dangerous pranks and stunts
After a blindfolded teen crashed into another vehicle while attempting the Bird Box challenge, YouTube is finally stepping in
They’ve updated their guidelines to disallow videos “that can cause death and/or have caused death in some instances”
Specific examples cited were the Tide Pod challenge, which had people eating laundry detergent, and the Fire challenge, which had people dousing themselves in rubbing alcohol and setting themselves on fire
Yes, apparently the fire challenge is a thing. The flames are sometimes not visible to the naked eye, and in many cases the resulting burns require skin grafts
So that was my daily dose of what the fuck this week
They’ve also added that they don’t allow “pranks that make victims believe they’re in serious physical danger”, and “pranks that cause children to experience severe emotional distress”
We have yet to see policies against hateful or racist rhetoric, but hey, baby steps
In Japan: Man arrested for selling a modified figure
You’re known by your friends as ‘the dependable one’, a trust-worthy type, loyal to those you care about. You’re a deep thinker, using your knowledge to your strategic advantage. Your only real flaw is your tendency to get distracted by petting dogs in need of belly rubs! Who can really blame you for that?
There is something I like about each faction
Cherrystone Kingdom
Traditional look of European Knights
Silver armour and red cloth
Heavensong Empire
Outfits have a Samurai flair
They also wear Golden animal masks that reflect their role and discipline
Cloth and leather armour, yellow is their primary colour
Felheim Legion
Viking look
Undead and supernatural beings in their ranks
Blue cloth and heavy brown wool for their outfits
Floran Tribes
Plant people, some very humanoid
Looks like Dryads
Celtic and/or Druid look
Primarily green, they have a natural colour palette
I like the look a lot, going to want to watch some gameplay and maybe pick it up for myself.
Tidbits
Move over Korea, Google’s new AlphaStar AI system is crushing pro Starcraft II players
Even after it was tweaked with slower-than-human reaction times and fewer actions per minute than professional human players it managed to win 10 of its 11 matches
Metroid Prime 4 is being delayed after Nintendo decided to reboot the project and shift development back to the series’ original developer, Retro Studios
In a development update video they said that they didn’t make the decision lightly, but the existing development hadn’t reached the standards they were looking for
Windows 10 Mobile is becoming de-supported this December
In other news, Windows 10 Mobile is apparently still supported in 2019?
They’re recommending that users switch to an iPhone or Android device, since they’ll stop releasing any updates on December 10, 2019, which is amusing after their funeral procession for the iPhone when it released
Get ready for the bounty of Pokemon movies on its way
Detective Pikachu sequel is already in development, and they’re working on adapting Red and Blue as well as a spinoff centered on Mewtwo
Ale & Blood mini review
Really entertaining novella in the Bring Down Heaven series by Sam Sykes
Great taste of his style if you’re interested but didn’t want to commit to a full novel
Recommend Newsflesh trilogy by Mira Grant (and all the side novellas)
Summary from GoodReads
The zombie apocalypse happened more than twenty years ago. Contrary to popular belief, we didn’t all die out, largely because we’d had years of horror movies to tell us how to behave when the dead start walking. We fought back, and we won…sort of. The dead still walk; loved ones still try to eat you if you’re not careful; the virus that caused the problem in the first place is still incurable. But at least we lived, right?
The Newsflesh Trilogy is a story about blogging, politics, medical science, espionage, betrayal, the ties that bind, the ties that don’t, how George Romero accidentally saved the world, and, of course, zombies. It’s thoughtful horror, and horrific science fiction, and I’m very fond of it.
For more content, Patreon supports get access to upcoming ideas and more!
A huge thanks to Dalton, our favourite fan. And thanks to all our Official Fans that support us. And if you want to support us too, its as easy as clicking this link!
Also, make sure to check out RIPT Apparel for sweet 24 tee shirt designs. And don’t forget to use the coupon code PS2JSHOW for 10% off!
