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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER 16 - 21 SEPTEMBER, 2024
Hello and Welcome,
NSW Council Elections, Saturday, Sept 14, 2024 (TODAY)
NSW Council Elections
Residents across 128 councils in NSW will cast their vote for their local government elections next month.
The NSW Electoral Commission will conduct the elections for 126 councils, while Liverpool and Fairfield City Councils will use a commercial election provider.
Local government elections ARE COMPULSORY and are held every four years on the second Saturday in September.
When is the local government election?
The election is on Saturday, September 14. Polls open at 8 am and close at 6 pm.
Pre-poll voting will open on September 7. However, voting will not be open on Sunday, September 8.
Telephone and assisted voting applications also open on September 7.
How do I vote?
If you are voting in person, you must vote in your enrolled council area at a polling place.
You can find your local polling place and early polling places using the NSW Electorate's address lookup tool.
You can vote from 8 am until 6 pm on September 14.
You can register for a mail-in vote here.
You cannot vote in person if you are interstate during the election. You must register for a mail-in vote.
— Ed.
Meetings This Week
2024/09/17 — 10:00-12:00 — September, Tue — Tuesday Group
2024/09/21 — 14:00-16:00 — September, Sat — Web Design
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86141133224
Meeting ID: 861 4113 3224
Passcode: WebDesign
Meetings Next Week
NO MEETINGS
Schedule of Current & Upcoming Meetings
First Tuesday 18:00-20:00 — Main Meeting
Third Tuesday 10:00-12:00 — Tuesday Group
Third Saturday 14:00-16:00 — Web Design
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Go to the official Sydney PC Calendar for this month's meeting details.
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ASCCA News:Tech News:
Social media companies to face fines for allowing children under 14 on their platforms under proposed SA laws
See the ABC News article by Josephine Lim | Topic: Information and Communication | Sept 8, 2024.
Social Media Use
In short:
The South Australian government has drafted a bill to ban children 13 and under from using social media by putting the responsibility back on corporations.
An independent review was commissioned in May amid concerns social media use negatively impacts children's mental health.
What's next?
Consultation on the proposed regulations will begin this week.
Social media giants would be forced to ban children under 14 from their platforms or face hefty penalties under proposed laws in South Australia that could be replicated in other states.
The SA government has released a 276-page report by former High Court justice Robert French on how companies providing social media services like Facebook and TikTok would need to take "systemic responsibility" for restricting children from using their products.
The report outlines how the draft legislation is "available for other state governments to pursue" if they choose to and could be rolled out nationwide.
SA Premier Peter Malinauskas said the proposal was fuelled by concerns social media was harming young people and affecting their mental health, leaving parents "almost powerless".
"The government is now going to step in; we're going to ban kids from accessing these accounts," he said.
"We're going to ban the social media services from providing access in that first place, and where they do it and do it knowingly, they are subject to severe punishment, heavy financial penalties that will act as a major deterrent to ensure this doesn't occur in the future."
SA Premier Malinauskas
Mr Malinauskas said the proposed regulation put "a positive obligation and duty" on social media companies to ensure children under 14 cannot access such platforms.
"That positive duty and obligation doesn't just extend to prevent individual children from getting access to the platform but creates a systemic responsibility on the social media platforms to ensure they are undertaking all reasonable steps to prevent children from getting access," he said.
"At the moment, it's a free-for-all; at the moment, these companies are effectively operating unregulated … that leaves parents almost powerless.
"What this [legislation] does is put the power back into the hands of parents."
If companies breach the rules, Mr Malinauskas said parents or a regulator on behalf of a child could seek compensation or financial penalties.
"The regulator can also, at the most severe end, pursue civil penalties that would be of a seven-figure sum or more against these social media platforms if they breach and break the law with impunity," he said.
"We want to create a big, massive deterrent against these giant companies where they harm our children."
Mr Malinauskas said he acknowledged that not all social media sites were "bad' and the draft bill would exempt some services that positively impact young people in an "education" or social support context.
Under the proposed law, 14- and 15-year-olds need parental consent to access social media accounts.
How would it be enforced?
The review's author, Mr French, said some of the major social media companies were already looking at banning children under 13 in response to digital privacy legislation in the United States.
"But the question is, how rigorous is that age restriction? Who does the age assurance?" he said.
"If the social media service companies are confronted with the need to comply with the duty — and it's not just happening in the state of South Australia, I mean these challenges are happening in the US and around the world — it would be in their interest to come to the party in terms of age assurance.
"It's something they [social media companies] already claim to do to a large extent; we're just ramping it up a bit."
Mr French said that under the draft bill, service providers would need to show that they had taken "reasonable steps" to stop children under 14 from accessing their platforms.
He said technology around age verification or age estimation was evolving.
"The question of what reasonable steps are is not written into the proposed legislation; that would be a judgement call from time to time, but the regulator would be expected to guide what reasonable steps would be," Mr French said.
"And that guidance would change from time to time according to the state of the technology."
The draft bill includes appointing a regulator overseeing compliance, issuing sanctions for breaches or seeking significant penalties through the Supreme Court.
...
Going at it alone
'Ban not the right approach'
...
"It means that young people won't feel they can talk to their parents or educators if and when they encounter content that is confronting online," Dr Page Jeffery said.
You May Not Want to Switch to Linux for These Reasons
See the How-To Geek article by Sydney Butler | Published Aug 31, 2024.
Quick Links
Your Software Won't Run on Linux.
You're a Hardcore PC Gamer.
Your Hardware Doesn't Have Linux Drivers.
You Need Official Software Support.
You Don't Like Getting Your Hands Dirty.
Before you say anything, Linux is great. I've been writing Linux advocacy pieces for more than a decade. Desktop Linux has come along by leaps and bounds but has yet to reach its full potential. However, for those who have never used Linux in any of its flavours, there are still reasons to think twice before diving in.
//1 — Your Software Won't Run on Linux
If you need to use specific software that doesn't have a native Linux version, then that's a pretty good reason not to use Linux. After all, what matters is the software apps we need.
That said, there are plenty of ways to run Windows software (for example) on Linux. The number-one stop for this is WINE which stands for WINE Is Not an Emulator. Oh those open source goofs with their recursive acronyms!
If your apps of choice have good ratings for solutions like WINE, then hey, it might not be a problem. Of course, there's no harm in trying it out for yourself, though I'd recommend using Linux in a Virtual Machine while you're testing whether your software will work or not. WINE is also just one approach to getting non-Linux software running. You could also use a virtual machine in some cases.
//2 — You're a Hardcore PC Gamer
Dedicated Hardware
If you're a PC gamer, Linux might not be for you. At least not yet. Linux can run many Windows games flawlessly these days thanks to projects like Proton, and Linux flavours like SteamOS are designed to take advantage of it as much as possible. Still, you don't get 100% compatibility and the best performance you would using Windows. After all, you're running the game through a compatibility layer. So, if you're all about PC gaming, I'd say Linux is one to watch but not yet one to embrace unless you know the only games you play will work.
//3 — Your Hardware Doesn't Have Linux Drivers
Linux Needs Drivers
When installing your Linux distribution of choice, you may find that some things don't work out of the box. The common culprits are Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and GPU acceleration features. Finding and installing drivers for Linux is easier than ever, of course, and a lot of hardware will work out of the box, but in a Windows-focused world, you can expect to spend some time getting more obscure hardware to play nice or at all.
//4 — You Need Official Software Support
If you run into issues with Windows or macOS, you have a customer support line you can call or email. This is absolutely necessary for many people outside our relatively small computer geek bubble. Linux, as an open-source operating system, has no central support channel, so you'll have to visit forums or other user-supported resources to get the help you need.
That's not to say that you can't get dedicated Linux support! There's an entire industry built around supporting Linux, such as Red Hat Enterprise or Ubuntu Pro, but these are generally aimed at enterprise customers, and not regular desktop users. So, whether you can switch to Linux would depend on whether the type of support you need is available.
//5 — You Don't Like Getting Your Hands Dirty
I can already hear the comment section gearing up for this one, but let's face facts — compared to Windows or macOS, the chances that a Linux user will have to dip into the Terminal or spend time doing technical stuff that the average person just doesn't want to deal with are far higher. Windows and macOS do a more aggressive job of hiding the nuts and bolts from their users, and it's both a strength and a weakness of Linux in general that the inner workings are more exposed.
Remember that most people use computers as a means to an end — solving a problem or getting something done. The actual computer isn't all that interesting to them. Linux is often like the weekend project car a lot of people have. Tinkering with it is the point, but most people want a minivan that won't break down even if you forget to change the oil on time. Desktop Linux for regular day-to-day users isn't quite there yet.
Fun Facts:
Another little-used Windows DOS command (ATTRIB)
If you want to protect your DOS files from being altered or deleted, use the ATTRIB command.
> attrib /? (the attrib help command)
Displays or changes file attributes.
ATTRIB [+R | -R] [+A | -A] [+S | -S] [+H | -H] [+O | -O] [+I | -I] [+X | -X] [+P | -P] [+U | -U] [drive:][path][filename] [/S [/D]] [/L]
+ Sets an attribute.
- Clears an attribute.
R Read-only file attribute.
A Archive file attribute.
S System file attribute.
H Hidden file attribute.
O Offline attribute.
I Not content indexed file attribute.
X No scrub file attribute.
V Integrity attribute.
P Pinned attribute.
U Unpinned attribute.
B SMR Blob attribute.
[drive:][path][filename] Specifies a file or files for attrib to process.
/S Processes matching files in the current folder and all subfolders.
/D Processes folders as well.
/L Work on the attributes of the Symbolic Link versus the target of the Symbolic Link.
>
For example, make a directory "test" and file-protect a few files.
> attrib
A C:\Users\bob\test\aaa
A C:\Users\bob\test\d1
A C:\Users\bob\test\d2
A C:\Users\bob\test\d3
> attrib +r (Make the files Read-Only. You don't even have to say *, aaa* or d*)
A R C:\Users\bob\test\aaa
A R C:\Users\bob\test\d1
A R C:\Users\bob\test\d2
A R C:\Users\bob\test\d3
> copy d1 d2
Overwrite d2? (Yes/No/All): y
Access is denied.
0 file(s) copied.
>
This is the easiest way to protect your DOS files from alteration or deletion.
— Ed.
Meeting Location & Disclaimer
Bob Backstrom
~ Newsletter Editor ~
Information for Members and Visitors:
Link to — Sydney PC & Technology User Group
All Meetings, unless explicitly stated above, are held on the
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