Social media giant Facebook will restrict publishers and people in Australia from sharing or viewing Australian and international news content, the company has said, adding that this is in response to the news media code that was passed by the House of Representatives on Wednesday night.



At 11.57am, an email arrived with an "Optus Network Update at 11.15am" that "services are now being restored".

OPINION: With Facebook now blocking Australian news sites from posting their news stories to Facebook, along with many organisations like the Australian Bureau of Meteorology an unexpected casualty, has Facebook begun a descent into Myspace-like irrelevance?

Facebook is right in its assessment that Australian news content and the interactions it leads to with the social media site's users do not create much revenue, an academic at the University of Sydney's School of Computer Science says.

The majority of Australians now have a preference for digital engagement with government, and for that engagement to be tailored to them, according to a new report which also found that almost nine in every 10 Australians looked for government services online in 2020 and that Australians aged 15-and-over transacted with government on average more than once a week. 

Both Google and Facebook have demonstrated to the Australian Government in no uncertain terms who exactly is calling the shots in the stoush over the news media code, but in diametrically different ways.

A total of $78 million in bonuses was paid to employees of NBN Co, the company that is rolling out Australia's national broadband network, in the 2020 financial year, when the country went into recession.

The world's biggest contract chip manufacturer, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, has shifted 1000 engineers to its facilities in Tainan's Southern Taiwan Science Park to meet the massive demand for its 5nm chips.

Global cloud provider OVHcloud and consulting firm Capgemini have agreed on a partnership to address the cloud transformation needs of both public and private organisations.

The Facebook pages of the Bureau of Meteorology and numerous government organisations are among those that cannot be viewed after the social media firm instituted a ban on Australian publishers and people from sharing or viewing Australian and international news content.

Jaguar Racing has gained the support of enterprise software provider Micro Focus for its tilt at the Formula E championship.

And of course, there's plenty more today, so for all the news, please visit www.itwire.com

Alex Zaharov-Reutt, Afternoon Newsletter Editor, iTWire


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