Destiny 3 may never exist—to that end, the series will wipe older campaign content - Ars Technica | Canada News Media
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Destiny 3 may never exist—to that end, the series will wipe older campaign content – Ars Technica

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Enlarge / Expansions will continue apace for Destiny 2, since the studio has no plans to make a Destiny 3 at this time.

After revealing the next regularly scheduled Destiny 2 expansion pack, launching on September 22, the game’s creators at Bungie used the Tuesday opportunity to describe a three-year plan for the series. On the eve of a new console generation, fans might have expected teases for a brand-new, next-gen sequel. Bungie put such questions to rest conclusively: “We don’t believe a sequel is the right direction for the game.”

Instead, Destiny 2 will persist for the foreseeable future as a cross-console product, upgraded to run at higher resolutions (up to 4K) and higher frame rates (60 fps) on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X and designed to transfer all purchases and progress from older systems to newer ones. As of press time, Bungie has only confirmed that purchases on PlayStation 4 will transfer to PS5, while purchases made for the Xbox family of consoles will support “smart delivery” to automatically transfer to XSX. And if you jump to a newer console and still have friends on the older one, you can continue matchmaking together (as in, XB1 and XSX, or PS4 and PS5; Destiny 2 still does not support cross-platform play, but Bungie has finally hinted that this may change as soon as 2021.)

However, Bungie has not yet clarified whether cross-save progress, entitlements, and purchases will all cleanly move to next-gen consoles. Want to take your purchases and content from PS4 to Xbox Series X? Or did you pay for content on PC or Stadia and want to continue with the Beyond Light expansion content on PlayStation 5? Cross-save has worked this way in the past, but Bungie has yet to clarify whether a new generation of consoles will work this way.

Into the vault

Bungie was more forthcoming about a staggering plan to revamp the game as we know it, which it’s calling the Destiny Content Vault (DCV). From here on out, every major Destiny 2 content update will cycle old content (including Destiny 1 locations and raids) back into Destiny 2… and it will delete existing content, including campaign missions.

<a href="https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/destiny-new-map.jpg" class="enlarge" data-height="1080" data-width="1920" alt="Driving today's point home, Bungie released this preview of the future Destiny 2 map, complete with older destinations being deleted entirely.”><img alt="Driving today's point home, Bungie released this preview of the future Destiny 2 map, complete with older destinations being deleted entirely.” src=”https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/destiny-new-map-980×551.jpg” width=”980″ height=”551″>
Enlarge / Driving today’s point home, Bungie released this preview of the future Destiny 2 map, complete with older destinations being deleted entirely.

The first DCV turnover will wipe a whopping four destinations, and their campaign content, from the Destiny 2 client, both in solo and co-op modes: Io, Titan, Mercury, and Mars. This move will effectively destroy the existing campaign progression track for the base game and its Curse of Osiris and Warmind expansions—coincidentally, this is the very content used to tease new players to try the game in last year’s free-to-play transition. (Bungie has hinted to any removed content returning in future updates, as well.) Since the game works as a live product, their original forms will not exist in any “offline” mode for new players to access and catch up with the series’ plot. Destiny 2‘s September wipe will also remove the Leviathan raid.

Bungie’s consolation to fans of older content is a return of Destiny 1‘s Cosmodrome starting this September, though it will launch at that time in a limited fashion; its strikes and other content or zones won’t show up in Destiny 2 until later in the game’s 13th “season.” In September, Cosmodrome will include a campaign path “to expand the new Guardian origin story to the world of Destiny.”

Bungie’s explanation for this shift is player metrics. As one example, only 0.3 percent of all recent connected players accessed Warmind’s campaign content, even though that content accounts for 5 percent of the game’s installable size, Bungie’s announcement claims. The announcement goes on to say that Destiny 2‘s sprawling game client, currently above 100GB, takes too long for Bungie to reliably patch, test, and update. As the game grows, the number of moving pieces involved to push an update takes days, not hours, the studio says. (Bungie has made such points in the past, and those statments made us wonder whether something else was to blame.)

The content that Bungie wants to send to the DCV “isn’t relevant anymore—and can’t remain relevant—as we evolve the world and introduce new experiences that will take center stage instead.” The studio continues down this rhetorical track by saying, “Maintaining that much content in perpetuity slows down our ability to update the game with fresh experiences, reduces our ability to innovate, and delays our reaction to community feedback.” Which makes us wonder: why not, uh, just shelve so much older content so fans can continue to access it, then make a start-from-scratch sequel?

Bungie seems to regret doing just that with its jump from D1 to D2, though:

We left behind all of Destiny 1‘s content and many of the features players grew to love. We believe now that it was a mistake to create a situation that fractured the community, reset player progress, and set the player experience back in ways that took us a full year to recover from and repair. It’s a mistake we don’t want to repeat by making a Destiny 3.

Bungie’s update doesn’t mention how D2 skirted around the idea of player progression from D1 by having its plot nuke the original game in its entirety. Why worry about progress if all your favorite guns no longer exist? We’d like to think Bungie could implement a wiser move-to-a-sequel path this many years later, but the studio is clearly not bullish to try that route. When the developer overtook control of the series from Activision in early 2019, reporters like Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier claimed that Bungie wanted to avoid fracturing its playerbase with continued sequel releases.

The developer’s metrics may very well bear out, in terms of keeping D2‘s most interested players seeded with brand-new and higher-level content instead of dealing with the bloat of barely used campaign content of old (and it may mean last year’s F2P transition didn’t entice new players to try the older campaign content, after all). We wonder how long it will take for this MMO-ization of D2‘s world content, complete with older destinations being destroyed (perhaps for the sake of the plot) and ultimately driving fans to demand a vanilla client launch. Such a development would make an alliance with Blizzard-Activision more lucrative, but alas.

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Ottawa orders TikTok’s Canadian arm to be dissolved

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The federal government is ordering the dissolution of TikTok’s Canadian business after a national security review of the Chinese company behind the social media platform, but stopped short of ordering people to stay off the app.

Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne announced the government’s “wind up” demand Wednesday, saying it is meant to address “risks” related to ByteDance Ltd.’s establishment of TikTok Technology Canada Inc.

“The decision was based on the information and evidence collected over the course of the review and on the advice of Canada’s security and intelligence community and other government partners,” he said in a statement.

The announcement added that the government is not blocking Canadians’ access to the TikTok application or their ability to create content.

However, it urged people to “adopt good cybersecurity practices and assess the possible risks of using social media platforms and applications, including how their information is likely to be protected, managed, used and shared by foreign actors, as well as to be aware of which country’s laws apply.”

Champagne’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment seeking details about what evidence led to the government’s dissolution demand, how long ByteDance has to comply and why the app is not being banned.

A TikTok spokesperson said in a statement that the shutdown of its Canadian offices will mean the loss of hundreds of well-paying local jobs.

“We will challenge this order in court,” the spokesperson said.

“The TikTok platform will remain available for creators to find an audience, explore new interests and for businesses to thrive.”

The federal Liberals ordered a national security review of TikTok in September 2023, but it was not public knowledge until The Canadian Press reported in March that it was investigating the company.

At the time, it said the review was based on the expansion of a business, which it said constituted the establishment of a new Canadian entity. It declined to provide any further details about what expansion it was reviewing.

A government database showed a notification of new business from TikTok in June 2023. It said Network Sense Ventures Ltd. in Toronto and Vancouver would engage in “marketing, advertising, and content/creator development activities in relation to the use of the TikTok app in Canada.”

Even before the review, ByteDance and TikTok were lightning rod for privacy and safety concerns because Chinese national security laws compel organizations in the country to assist with intelligence gathering.

Such concerns led the U.S. House of Representatives to pass a bill in March designed to ban TikTok unless its China-based owner sells its stake in the business.

Champagne’s office has maintained Canada’s review was not related to the U.S. bill, which has yet to pass.

Canada’s review was carried out through the Investment Canada Act, which allows the government to investigate any foreign investment with potential to might harm national security.

While cabinet can make investors sell parts of the business or shares, Champagne has said the act doesn’t allow him to disclose details of the review.

Wednesday’s dissolution order was made in accordance with the act.

The federal government banned TikTok from its mobile devices in February 2023 following the launch of an investigation into the company by federal and provincial privacy commissioners.

— With files from Anja Karadeglija in Ottawa

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 6, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

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Here is how to prepare your online accounts for when you die

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LONDON (AP) — Most people have accumulated a pile of data — selfies, emails, videos and more — on their social media and digital accounts over their lifetimes. What happens to it when we die?

It’s wise to draft a will spelling out who inherits your physical assets after you’re gone, but don’t forget to take care of your digital estate too. Friends and family might treasure files and posts you’ve left behind, but they could get lost in digital purgatory after you pass away unless you take some simple steps.

Here’s how you can prepare your digital life for your survivors:

Apple

The iPhone maker lets you nominate a “ legacy contact ” who can access your Apple account’s data after you die. The company says it’s a secure way to give trusted people access to photos, files and messages. To set it up you’ll need an Apple device with a fairly recent operating system — iPhones and iPads need iOS or iPadOS 15.2 and MacBooks needs macOS Monterey 12.1.

For iPhones, go to settings, tap Sign-in & Security and then Legacy Contact. You can name one or more people, and they don’t need an Apple ID or device.

You’ll have to share an access key with your contact. It can be a digital version sent electronically, or you can print a copy or save it as a screenshot or PDF.

Take note that there are some types of files you won’t be able to pass on — including digital rights-protected music, movies and passwords stored in Apple’s password manager. Legacy contacts can only access a deceased user’s account for three years before Apple deletes the account.

Google

Google takes a different approach with its Inactive Account Manager, which allows you to share your data with someone if it notices that you’ve stopped using your account.

When setting it up, you need to decide how long Google should wait — from three to 18 months — before considering your account inactive. Once that time is up, Google can notify up to 10 people.

You can write a message informing them you’ve stopped using the account, and, optionally, include a link to download your data. You can choose what types of data they can access — including emails, photos, calendar entries and YouTube videos.

There’s also an option to automatically delete your account after three months of inactivity, so your contacts will have to download any data before that deadline.

Facebook and Instagram

Some social media platforms can preserve accounts for people who have died so that friends and family can honor their memories.

When users of Facebook or Instagram die, parent company Meta says it can memorialize the account if it gets a “valid request” from a friend or family member. Requests can be submitted through an online form.

The social media company strongly recommends Facebook users add a legacy contact to look after their memorial accounts. Legacy contacts can do things like respond to new friend requests and update pinned posts, but they can’t read private messages or remove or alter previous posts. You can only choose one person, who also has to have a Facebook account.

You can also ask Facebook or Instagram to delete a deceased user’s account if you’re a close family member or an executor. You’ll need to send in documents like a death certificate.

TikTok

The video-sharing platform says that if a user has died, people can submit a request to memorialize the account through the settings menu. Go to the Report a Problem section, then Account and profile, then Manage account, where you can report a deceased user.

Once an account has been memorialized, it will be labeled “Remembering.” No one will be able to log into the account, which prevents anyone from editing the profile or using the account to post new content or send messages.

X

It’s not possible to nominate a legacy contact on Elon Musk’s social media site. But family members or an authorized person can submit a request to deactivate a deceased user’s account.

Passwords

Besides the major online services, you’ll probably have dozens if not hundreds of other digital accounts that your survivors might need to access. You could just write all your login credentials down in a notebook and put it somewhere safe. But making a physical copy presents its own vulnerabilities. What if you lose track of it? What if someone finds it?

Instead, consider a password manager that has an emergency access feature. Password managers are digital vaults that you can use to store all your credentials. Some, like Keeper,Bitwarden and NordPass, allow users to nominate one or more trusted contacts who can access their keys in case of an emergency such as a death.

But there are a few catches: Those contacts also need to use the same password manager and you might have to pay for the service.

___

Is there a tech challenge you need help figuring out? Write to us at onetechtip@ap.org with your questions.

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Google’s partnership with AI startup Anthropic faces a UK competition investigation

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LONDON (AP) — Britain’s competition watchdog said Thursday it’s opening a formal investigation into Google’s partnership with artificial intelligence startup Anthropic.

The Competition and Markets Authority said it has “sufficient information” to launch an initial probe after it sought input earlier this year on whether the deal would stifle competition.

The CMA has until Dec. 19 to decide whether to approve the deal or escalate its investigation.

“Google is committed to building the most open and innovative AI ecosystem in the world,” the company said. “Anthropic is free to use multiple cloud providers and does, and we don’t demand exclusive tech rights.”

San Francisco-based Anthropic was founded in 2021 by siblings Dario and Daniela Amodei, who previously worked at ChatGPT maker OpenAI. The company has focused on increasing the safety and reliability of AI models. Google reportedly agreed last year to make a multibillion-dollar investment in Anthropic, which has a popular chatbot named Claude.

Anthropic said it’s cooperating with the regulator and will provide “the complete picture about Google’s investment and our commercial collaboration.”

“We are an independent company and none of our strategic partnerships or investor relationships diminish the independence of our corporate governance or our freedom to partner with others,” it said in a statement.

The U.K. regulator has been scrutinizing a raft of AI deals as investment money floods into the industry to capitalize on the artificial intelligence boom. Last month it cleared Anthropic’s $4 billion deal with Amazon and it has also signed off on Microsoft’s deals with two other AI startups, Inflection and Mistral.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

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