• The US House of Representatives is doing something vaguely useful for once: It just passed a bill banning the sale of your private information to the nation's enemies.  (The Verge)
  
  No, not Washington DC.  They already have your information.  The other enemies.
  
  
  

Tech News

• Dungeons and Dragons is dying of acute woke poisoning but I still kind of want this D&D Lego set.  (The Verge)
  
  It comes with a dragon, a beholder, a displacer beast, a gelatinous cube, an owlbear, and a mimic, as well as a team of adventurers for them to menace.
  
  
  
• MacOS 14.4 may have another trick up its sleeve: Deleting your files.  (MacRumors)
  
  If you're using iCloud for storage because you bought a 256GB MacBook Air and it filled up instantly and you can't upgrade the storage, well, if you delete the local copy of a file you have on iCloud it might just delete all the backups on iCloud as well.
  
  This is not good.
  
  
  
• The Asus Vivobook 15 OLED has received a little upgrade this year.
  
  While it still has a Ryzen 7730U CPU and comes with 16GB of RAM upgradable to 40GB (8GB soldered and one SO-DIMM slot), the screen has improved from a 1920x1080 60Hz panel to 2880x1620 120Hz.
  
  So 50% better in X and Y and 100% better in T.
  
  It costs A$1200 vs. A$2200 for the Zenbook 15 OLED I mentioned recently (about $800 vs. $1450).
  
  The differences are:
  
  * It has a Ryzen 7730U vs. the 7735U in the more expensive model 
  * It's half a pound heavier
  * Despite that, it actually has a smaller battery
  
  So obviously the Zenbook is built and priced as a premium model, but the screen in the cheaper Vivobook is identical (and excellent), the CPU performance is identical, and it's 40% cheaper.
  
  I looked at getting the previous model Vivobook a couple of years ago but passed it up.  With the updated screen I think I'll get one, and swap in 32GB of RAM and a 4TB SSD from my old HP laptop which has developed a couple of minor issues...  Like just switching itself off whenever it feels like it.
  
  My preferred online store says they'll have it in stock on Monday.
  
  
  
• And that should solve my Minecraft modpack woes.