Hello and welcome to the Geeky Brummie Tech Round-Up!

Each week I’ll be deep diving into the world of technology. Bringing back some new pearls from Birmingham and beyond! If you want to send any local tech articles over, feel free to reach out to me at ryan@geekybrummie.com.

US. Infrastructure Bill gets hung up on crypto regulation

If you’ve been keeping up with world news recently you’ll have noticed the world of crypto currency has been very volatile. There’s has been a large scale crypto mining exodus from China as the CCCP as they move the country towards Digital RMB, so they can keep tighter controls.

In the US however, the wild wild west of regulation is finally catching up. As part of the US Infrastructure Bill, which is in the US Senate at the time of writing. The $1 trillion dollar package is to invest in the aging US infrastructure (roads, rail, internet, etc) and has a provision around charging a tax on crypto brokerage transactions, to help pay for it.

Brokers – people who manage the transactions for purchase, sale, or exchange of cryptocurrencies – will have to collect the personal information of the payers and payees involved in the financial settlement. That data can then be reported to America’s tax agency, the Internal Revenue Service. Then, they can collect those sweet sweet tax dollars, to the tune of an estimated $28 billion.

However the wording is very fast and loose about what constitutes a broker? Does if this includes miners, software developers and mining hardware sellers possibly being caught in the basket too?

Crypto advocates have stated this could have far reaching impacts on the development of crypto in the US space, lagging behind the rest of the world in digital currency innovation.

Further Reading:

https://www.theregister.com/2021/08/09/us_cryptocurrency_regulations/

https://www.ft.com/content/6a398ea8-e5d8-4489-bf7c-06932618e45b

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/08/09/senate-rejects-compromise-crypto-tax-amendment-to-infrastructure-bill.html

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-infrastructure-bills-cryptocurrency-amendment-provide-clarity-taxes-yellen-2021-08-09/

Fan-made render (Image Source: u/Shockwave98 on Reddit)

Asus and Noctua rumoured to team up to add more brown to your PC

If you’re a fan-stan in the PC building space you’ll have heard of Noctua – Austrian manufacturer of excellent fans and usually in the colours of Brown and Tan.

Asus has apparently teamed up with the beige boys to develop an RTX 3070 GPU. It’s unknown when or even where this GPU exists but for those wanting to do a custom 70s style PC build it looks to be the perfect accompaniment if the fan render by u/shockwave98 a few years back is close to the current product.

Knowing us unlucky group in the UK don’t expect it over here any time soon. I’m still annoyed that Asus haven’t allowed weebs the Gundam PC of their dreams over here without hefty import costs yet. I mean who doesn’t want this?

Further Reading:

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Asus-may-be-developing-Nvidia-RTX-3070-cards-with-Noctua-coolers.553408.0.html

Return of the Mac-book Pro

According to DigiTimes and expanded on by MacRumours, an all new MacBook Pro in 16-inch and 14-inch guises will be with us in late 2021.

They’re expected to feature a brand new mini-LED display like the one seen on the new iPad Pro, a more powerful Apple silicon chip (possibly either the rumoured M1X / M2) and an updated design in line with their more recent releases.

It’s expected to debut before the end of the year. With as many as 800,000 monthly shipments of the laptop by the end November

Further Reading

https://www.macrumors.com/2021/08/09/redesigned-macbook-pros-entering-mass-production/

And that’s it for this week, if you have anything tech related you want me to shout about, let me know at ryan@geekybrummie.com! See you next week!

Birmingham OpenHack Returns and goes to SPAAAAAAAACE.

Returning for October 2-3, 2021, Birmingham Open Hack is working on NASA’s Space Apps this year.

Led by a student community called BCU Tech Guild. Birmingham Open Hack, is a hackathon that aims to bring the community together to represent Birmingham. Their aim is to help current students and newcomers make an impact.

For 2021 the Open Hack is themed around the NASA International Space Apps Challenge, the largest global hackathon on Earth!

In honour of the 10th anniversary of the Space Apps challenge, the theme for Space Apps 2021 is “The Power of Ten.”

This year, NASA will commemorate ten amazing years of community, collaboration, and solving by forming a power-team of ten international space agencies who will work together to make Space Apps accessible to more communities worldwide.

The 2021 challenge statements will also echo The Power of Ten theme. It includes challenges for participants of all ages and skill levels that feature empowerment and “super powers.”

Further reading and registration information at the link below.

https://openhack.tech/

https://2021.spaceappschallenge.org/locations/birmingham-west-midlands/