Company to tighten up guidelines on its Discover service, banning semi-nude photos without editorial value and encouraging fact-checkingSnapchat is tightening up its guidelines for publishers on its Discover service, banning the posting of risque images without editorial value, and clarifying guidelines intended to prevent the spread of fake news on the platform.The changes, according to a spokeswoman for Snap, Snapchat’s parent company, are intended to “empower our editorial partners to do their part to keep Snapchat an informative, factual and safe environment for everyone”. Continue reading...

Capcom’s survival horror series goes back to its origins as a truly shocking, challenging and terrifying experienceWho lives in a house like this? It’s a question the Japanese horror series Resident Evil has been asking of its players since 1996, when it first locked us inside an aristocratic mansion on the outskirts of Racoon City, somewhere in the American mid-west. There, behind creaking doors and sliding oak panels, the answer was a grotesque menagerie of ragged zombies, bloody Doberman hounds and terrifying Homeric snakes. Since then both the locale and the locals have changed, from Resident Evil 4’s sojourn to a dejected Spanish forest to the fifth game’s contentious trip to sweltering African townships.Swampy, buzzing Louisiana is the setting for this, the seventh game, which, thanks to the involvement of the Texan writer Richard Pearsey (Spec Ops: The Line; 1979 Revolution) takes its cues not from Hammer Horror but from Truman Capote’s harrowing non-fiction novel In Cold Blood and the 1974 slasher film Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Protagonist Ethan Winters arrives at the gates of a derelict house on the edge of a fetid bayou on the trail of his presumed-dead wife, Mia. Inside the home he finds the Bakers, a hick family who live in squalor. There’s a dead crow in the microwave. There’s a cascade of offal in the fridge. There’s a mangled deer in the cellar. What else would you expect from a family that built a morgue in the basement? Continue reading...

The new Volkswagen Tiguan is an unlikely blend of two wild animals. See if you can guess what they arePrice: from £23,140

There are too many unanswered questions when it comes to the game’s story, but to get bogged down in these frustrations is to deny its intoxicating thrillPart of the joy of video games is that they can offer a level of control that’s so often lacking from real life. They allow you to take your fate in your own two hands – a cool head and nimble fingers will decide whether you dodge a blow in Dark Souls, pull off an outrageous feint in FIFA, or make Mario leap the extra hair’s breadth that separates life from death.Gravity Rush takes the opposite tack, sacrificing precision and finesse for the thrill of the unpredictable. Your character, Kat, can manipulate gravity, able to decide which way is “down”, allowing her to tumble gracelessly through the sky in any direction, the world tilting and lurching around her. This isn’t flying, it’s falling sideways through crowded cities, crashing through crates and knocking off chimney pots. Continue reading...

Agreement with Federal Trade Commission covers statements Uber made while trying to recruit more drivers to expand its service and remain ahead of LyftUber is paying $20m to settle allegations that it duped people into driving for its ride-hailing service with false promises about how much they would earn and how much they would have to pay to finance a car.The agreement announced on Thursday with the Federal Trade Commission covers statements Uber made from late 2013 until 2015 while trying to recruit more drivers to expand its service and remain ahead of its main rival, Lyft. Continue reading...

A coalition of more than 70 social and racial justice organizations urged Facebook to adopt reforms that would better target abusive content and harassmentFacebook allows white supremacists to spread violent threats while censoring Black Lives Matter posts and activists of color, according to civil rights groups that called on the technology company to fix its “racially biased” moderation system.“Activists in the Movement for Black Lives have routinely reported the takedown of images discussing racism and during protests, with the justification that it violates Facebook’s Community Standards,” the groups wrote in a letter on Wednesday to CEO Mark Zuckerberg and director of global policy Joel Kaplan. “At the same time, harassment and threats directed at activists based on their race, religion and sexual orientation is thriving on Facebook.” Continue reading...

Reversible lanes pose problem for autonomous cars and trucks, but Amazon has worked out a possible solutionAmazon is working on self-driving cars, according to a new patent that deals with the complex task of navigating reversible lanes.The patent, filed in November 2015 and granted on Tuesday, covers the problem of how to deal with reversible lanes, which change direction depending on the bulk of the traffic flow. This type of lane is typically used to manage commuter traffic into and out of cities, particularly in the US. Continue reading...

The place to talk about games and other things that matterIt’s Wednesday! I’ve set up the next three days so I shouldn’t miss one again! Continue reading...

Speaking for the company, which is accused of stealing code from Id Software, Zuckerberg said: ‘It’s common that people claim they own some part of the deal’Facebook’s chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, appeared in court to testify on behalf of the social media giant’s virtual reality company Oculus Rift on Tuesday, as it was accused of stealing trade secrets from Id Software, maker of the Doom and Quake games.“I’m here because I believe they’re false,” Zuckerberg said of the charges, “and it’s important to testify to that.” He characterized the plaintiffs as opportunists: “It’s pretty common when you announce a big deal that people just come out of the woodwork and claim they own some part of the deal.” Continue reading...

Promo videos showed Lily drone filming people autonomously, but court claim says shots were taken by skilled professionals using a more expensive cameraLily Robotics, the defunct manufacturer of the world’s first “selfie drone”, is being sued over allegations that it faked product shots and misled consumers about the capability of its prototype devices.The lawsuit alleges that videos on Lily’s website, presented as though they had been taken by the drone, were in fact shot by a mixture of GoPro cameras and DJI drones, a competitor model that costs up to four times as much and requires a skilled filmmaker to manually control the camera. Continue reading...

By 2025 most of today’s drivers are unlikely to even want to own a car. But will we still have gridlock? Will you need to pass a test? We asked the expertsFrom forecourt to scrapyard, a new car in the UK lasts an average of 13.9 years, which is why if you got one today, it might very well be the last car you buy. Over the next decade, accelerating autonomous driving technology, including advances in artificial intelligence, sensors, cameras, radar and data analytics, are set to transform not only how we drive (or, indeed, are driven), but the notion of car ownership itself. “Autonomous driving has become the next major battlefield for the car industry,” says Luca Mentuccia, automotive global MD at Accenture.The six levels of automation, defined under international standards by the Society of Automotive Engineers, range from “no automation” to “full automation”, explains Sven Raeymaekers, of tech investment banker GP Bullhound. “If you look at the most recent predictions, the majority of car manufacturers estimate the first highly to fully automated vehicles [AVs] will hit the market between 2020-2025,” he says. Continue reading...

Nintendo are back with their latest games console, the Nintendo Switch. The device revealed in full on Friday is being described as a hybrid system. It works as a traditional home console, plugging into your TV, but it can also be slid out of its dock and played on the go, via a built in screen. It will cost $299.99 in US and £279.99 in UK and goes on sale on March 3

At a London launch, we got our first look at Nintendo’s hybrid gaming system, as well as playing Zelda, Splatoon 2 and moreSome are calling it Nintendo’s last chance. At least at manufacturing a games console. The creator of smash-hit machines since the original Nintendo Entertainment System in 1983 suffered an ignoble commercial failure with Wii U. Announced last year and revealed in full on Friday, the new Nintendo Switch machine has a lot to prove.Related: Why I am confident enough to pre-order a Nintendo Switch Continue reading...

Barts health NHS trust warns staff and takes ‘a number of drives offline’ as it urgently investigates phishing ambushThe largest NHS trust in England has been hit by a cyber-attack that could affect thousands of files across at least four London hospitals.Barts health trust, which runs five hospitals in east London – the Royal London, St Bartholomew’s, Whipps Cross, Mile End and Newham – has sent a message to staff urging them not to open email attachments from unknown senders. Continue reading...

Many activists say they were already wary of trusting Facebook-owned app’s promise of total privacyThe exposure of a security flaw in WhatsApp has disappointed activists, diplomats and others who use it regularly for their work, but in a world of increasing surveillance and ever more aggressive hacking, many say they were already wary of trusting its promise of total privacy.Keeping plans and communications hidden from hostile authorities or rivals can be a constantly shifting game of digital cat and mouse. “[I believe] nothing is particularly safe in these messenger systems,” said a western diplomat who regularly uses WhatsApp but not for sensitive information, “just for keeping in touch and logistics”. Continue reading...

On Friday, Nintendo is set to reveal fresh details about its Switch console. Here’s what we’re hoping to discoverThis Friday at 4am BST, Nintendo will reveal its big bet on the future of the video game industry – the Switch.The company announced the successor to the beleaguered Wii U back in March 2015, after that machine dramatically failed to match the huge success of its namesake. Originally codenamed NX, we first glimpsed Switch last October, when Nintendo showed the unusual design concept for the first time. Continue reading...

LinkedIn and eBay founders Reid Hoffman and Pierre Omidyar donate $10m each to the Ethics and Governance of Artificial Intelligence FundThe founders of LinkedIn and eBay are donating a combined $20m (£16.4m) to fund academic research aimed at ensuring the safety of artificial intelligences.LinkedIn’s founder Reid Hoffman and the Omidyar network, the philanthropic investment firm set up by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar, are donating $10m each to the Ethics and Governance of Artificial Intelligence Fund, which will distribute money to researchers working on the tough ethical problems raised by AI. Continue reading...

Two-thirds of Americans believe robots will soon perform most of the work done by humans but 80% also believe their jobs will be unaffected. Time to think againThe McDonald’s on the corner of Third Avenue and 58th Street in New York City doesn’t look all that different from any of the fast-food chain’s other locations across the country. Inside, however, hungry patrons are welcomed not by a cashier waiting to take their order, but by a “Create Your Taste” kiosk – an automated touch-screen system that allows customers to create their own burgers without interacting with another human being.It’s impossible to say exactly how many jobs have been lost by the deployment of the automated kiosks – McDonald’s has been predictably reluctant to release numbers – but such innovations will be an increasingly familiar sight in Trump’s America. Continue reading...

The place to talk about games and other things that matterIt’s Wednesday. Continue reading...

Hans-Georg Maassen says it is not enough for German intelligence agencies to focus only on protecting digital infrastructureThe head of Germany’s domestic intelligence agency has said his country should be prepared to actively counter cyber-attacks in the future rather than focus solely on protecting its digital infrastructure.“We think it’s essential that we don’t just act defensively, but that we are also able to attack the enemy so that he stops continuing to attack us in the future,” Hans-Georg Maassen told the German news agency dpa. Continue reading...

Snap Inc announces it chose Britain due to its ‘strong creative industries’, in move seen as vote of confidence for UK tech following EU referendum resultSnap Inc, the company formerly known as Snapchat, has announced that it will set up its main international hub in the UK, in what is likely to be seen as a vote of confidence for British tech following the EU referendum result.The company says it chose Britain because of the nation’s “strong creative industries” in a move that bucks the trend of US tech companies favouring low-tax jurisdictions such as Luxembourg (where Amazon is based) or Ireland (where Facebook and Apple have their international headquarters). Continue reading...

A US intelligence report claimed RT’s ‘negative’ election coverage of Hillary Clinton was deliberate, which Margarita Simonyan called a ‘sad commentary’The editor-in-chief of RT, the Russian government-backed 24-hour news network, has hit back at claims in a US intelligence report that the news organization engaged in a longstanding effort “aimed at undermining US viewers’ trust in US democratic procedures”.

A Texan schoolgirl accidentally ordered a doll’s house using the gadget. Then, when local news reported the story, it triggered viewers’ own devices. But accidental shopping isn’t its only quirk

The 31-year-old Briton accused of hacking into US army and FBI sites faces extradition to the US – but changes in UK law should protect himWhile Donald Trump and the United States intelligence services argue over who hacked whom, it has been almost forgotten that, for a young British citizen, hacking accusations pack a much heavier punch than political point-scoring. Lauri Love, who has Asperger syndrome, is facing extradition to the US and is now awaiting a date for the appeal hearing that will determine the course of the rest of his life.Related: Amber Rudd orders Lauri Love extradition to US on hacking charges Continue reading...

It is important to be sceptical of redacted intelligence assessments, but the issues raised about Russia’s role in the 2016 US election are too serious to be dismissed so lightlyThe first foreign power to interfere directly in a United States presidential election was not Russia – but France. The date of this interference was not 2016 but 1796, and the intended beneficiary not Donald Trump but Thomas Jefferson. The French ambassador in the US tried to promote Jefferson, a democrat and francophile, against the federalist and anglophile John Adams. The move backfired, and helped Adams to win.Now, fast forward 150 years. During the cold war, and even afterwards, both the US and the Soviet Union tried, mostly surreptitiously, occasionally bloodily, sometimes successfully, to shape elections in many parts of the world. So, whatever else there is to say about Russia’s alleged involvement in the 2016 US election, do not make the mistake of saying that such a thing is unprecedented – because it is not. Continue reading...

Dolans are known for being tough and reliable, like a Le Creuset casserole dishThe snow surprised us when we woke up in the hills above Ullswater. We weren’t very well prepared. With waterproof booties back in Manchester, bread bags had to double as shoeliners, one of us was missing a winter glove and only I had the slightly creepy luxury of a balaclava under my helmet.At least I had the right bike. Though it’s set up for off-road cyclocross racing – the flattened top tube makes the carbon frame easier to lug over obstacles – the Dolan CDX lends itself to winter adventuring. Designed in Ormskirk by ex-pro Terry Dolan, who once made bikes for Olympic gold medallist Chris Boardman, Dolans are known for being tough and reliable, like a Le Creuset casserole dish. The CDX isn’t afraid of a snowstorm, nor the sleet and sunshine that followed us as we rounded the rainbow-framed lake to buy beer and milk at Pooley Bridge. I was glad of the knobbly Continental tyres when we made our way gingerly down the hill from our holiday cottage. There was all sorts of debris in the road and if I’d been on my usual slicks I’d have ended up in the hawthorn waking up hibernating hedgehogs. The older I get, the more I prefer climbing to descending. I’m rarely more scared than when rattling downhill in midwinter, when most of the snow has turned to grubby mush but you can’t rule out black ice. I’m not sure I’d have dared if the CDX didn’t have disc brakes. Rim brakes are about as practical in the wet as suede boots in a Mancunian winter (autumn, spring, summer). Continue reading...

Over a decade ago Alex Hern switched from PC to Mac and never looked back. But the new MacBook Pro’s very expensive so could he finally be tempted to switch again?I’ve been an Apple user for over a decade, ever since I picked up a refurbished 17in PowerBook back in 2005 to replace my ailing Windows XP box. But last month, after Apple announced its most expensive new MacBook Pros in almost 15 years, I reconsidered my decision for the first time and, for the past few weeks, I’ve been back on a Windows PC.I wasn’t always a Mac user. My first three computers were PCs, although the house I grew up in had an ailing, hated Power Mac Performa. My reasons for switching in my teens were fairly simple: I’d been playing fewer and fewer PC games, and spending increasing amounts of time using my computer to manage the music library linked to my iPod. I was one of those switchers, surprised by the elegance of Apple’s music player and convinced to take the plunge into their full desktop operating system. Continue reading...

Daily Caller repackaged footage, days after Facebook removed it for violating community standards, and asked users to share if they ‘think this is a hate crime’A video showing the brutal attack of a young man with disabilities in Chicago that was broadcast on Facebook Live has resurfaced on the social media network, attracting millions of new viewers.The 30-minute attack, which shows a man bound, gagged and cut with a knife, was viewed live by 16,000 people and eventually removed by Facebook for violating its community standards. Facebook prohibits the celebration or glorification of crimes on its platform. Continue reading...

CEO sees payout reduced by 15% as sales and revenue targets slip, although he still netted $135m in shares in 2016Apple’s chief executive, Tim Cook, had his annual payout reduced last year after the company failed to reach its 2016 targets.

Sleep technology is one of the biggest trends at CES, the world’s top electronics show, from beds that stop snoring to a pillow that monitors sleep cyclesA bed that adjusts itself in the night to stop people from snoring. A princess and the pea-style gadget that fits under a mattress and monitors sleep. A “water-based, app-controlled mattress topper”, which will encourage deep slumber.Related: LG unveils Hub Robot to compete with Amazon Echo and Google Home Continue reading...

Former employee filed lawsuit saying tech company misrepresented internal numbers about users and growth ahead of possible $25bn initial public offeringA former Snapchat employee has accused the tech company of lying about its user numbers to deceive investors ahead of a possible $25bn initial public offering and has filed a lawsuit alleging wrongful termination over his refusal to cooperate.Anthony Pompliano filed a lawsuit against the social media company on Wednesday in Los Angeles. In the suit, Pompliano alleges that Snapchat misrepresented its internal numbers about users and growth, “out of the avarice of the small group of executives” who hope for a huge valuation. Continue reading...

Users can now broadcast their lives to the world. But the real-time nature of events may prove to be beyond Facebook’s scopeIn August 2015, Facebook rolled out a new feature: the ability to broadcast live video streams from the company’s app for power users, Facebook Mentions. Six months later, the feature, now branded Facebook Live, began a slow rollout for normal users, initially in the United States.In classic Facebook style, the feature was late arriving, slow to roll out, and steadily demolished the competition. Meerkat, the company which ignited the live streaming craze, launched its mobile app in February 2015 and went meteoric at the South by Southwest Festival in March that year. But its time in the sun was limited: shortly after SXSW ended, Twitter subsidiary Periscope launched its own, technically superior, live-streaming service, eclipsing Meerkat almost instantly. Continue reading...

James Clapper tells Congress he will release more evidence of Russian interference in US election and describes ‘multifaceted’ cyber assaultThe departing head of US intelligence has publicly defended his analysts against attacks by Donald Trump following their conclusion that Russia interfered in the November election, as the unprecedented dispute between the president-elect and the intelligence services he will soon control broke into the open.“There’s a difference between skepticism and disparagement,” James Clapper told a hearing into foreign cyber-threats to the US held by the Senate armed services committee, adding that US intelligence analysts “stand more resolutely” than ever behind their conclusion of “Russian interference in our electoral process”. Continue reading...

The president-elect’s tweets approvingly repeated WikiLeaks founder’s claim that the Russian state was not the source of the hacked emails from the DNCLeading Republicans broke with Donald Trump on Wednesday after the president-elect appeared to put more faith in WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange than in US intelligence agencies.

Often seen as the pastime of friendless teenagers or a guilty pleasure, there are many huge benefits to playing video gamesEven now, well into the second decade of the 21st century, we tend to view video games as a guilty pleasure. For anyone over the age of 25, they’re often something you sneak off to do when no one is at home. They’re a furtive treat, filled with the cultural equivalent of empty calories.Partly this is to do with how video games have been marketed for the last 30 years – predominantly at teenage boys. The games industry has taught us to see games as loud, brash and arcane. On top of this, the most visible titles tend to conform to familiar stereotypes: Call of Duty is about killing enemies; Candy Crush Saga is about killing time. When you’re not entrenched in games, these highly marketed titles become representative – you don’t see the other things going on behind these entertainment monoliths. It’s just like, if you only go to the cinema in the summer, you’re in danger of thinking that all movies involve indestructible people wearing capes. Continue reading...

The president-elect’s musings are reported as news almost every day, but will the attention help make Twitter great again?“It’s like owning your own newspaper – without the losses.” That’s how Donald Trump described the San Francisco-headquartered social media tool in November 2012.In a little over four years, the celebrity businessman turned president-elect has grown his Twitter audience from about 2 million followers to almost 19 million, using it as his personal Pravda to post propaganda and stream-of-consciousness musings . Continue reading...

Manufactured by TCT with BlackBerry’s version of Android, new BlackBerry Press gets teaser before Las Vegas reveal at CESBlackBerry may have stopped making smartphones, but that hasn’t stopped BlackBerry smartphones from being made, with one expected to be called the BlackBerry Press to be announced at CES in Las Vegas on Wednesday.

The place to talk about games and other things that matterIt’s Wednesday. Continue reading...

The place to talk about games and other things that matterIt’s Tuesday! Continue reading...

As a Peter Thiel-funded group moves to build a colony in a local lagoon, residents fear wealthy Americans just want to use their home to avoid taxesA futuristic plan to build a floating techno-libertarian city in a French Polynesian lagoon has left some local residents worried they could be the next unsuspecting inhabitants of a peaceful planet in a science-fiction movie.“It reminds me of the innocent Ewoks of the moon of Endor who saw in the Galactic Empire a providential manna,” said Tahitian TV host Alexandre Taliercio. “They let them build what they wanted on earth and in orbit, but that’s not to say that the Empire shared the blueprints of the Death Star with them.” Continue reading...

Do you want to see more gigs, get more sleep, keep a diary, or learn a language this year? Here’s a roundup of the best goal-oriented appsBookout (iOS – free)

Audi’s super competent A6 Allroad may look like an estate, but it has a dirty secret. It’s actually an SUV in disguisePrice: £46,505

The president-elect has repeatedly proven that an understanding of the complex problems presented by technology eludes him, but that hasn’t stopped him tweeting about it. The consequences could be direTechnology? Bah humbug: “I think we ought to get on with our lives,” said Donald Trump on Wednesday, summing up his take on the complex problem of apparently Russian phishing attacks on multiple Democratic party groups during the 2016 election.As the White House’s current resident prepared to impose sanctions on Russia for hacking, Trump said: “I think that computers have complicated lives very greatly. The whole age of computer has made it where nobody knows exactly what’s going on.” Continue reading...

Alexa v Siri | Why so prudish? | Snow shame | Monster Raving classroom sizes | Floundering over FlanderSamuel Gibbs’ piece about the internet of things (How I turned my home into a sci-fi dream, theguardian.com, 24 December) omits an important warning: Alexa and Siri must never be left alone in the same room. The Bluetooth/Wi-Fi version of scratching each other’s eyes out is not pretty, but only Siri has that blood-curdling scream.

The International Drone Robot Contest is taking place in Incheon in South Korea. Humanoid bots battle it out in a martial arts contest while drones and rolling robots complete physical tasks. Six hundred pupils are taking part in the competition, which began on Tuesday Continue reading...

From the high-end Oculus Rift to Google and Samsung’s cheaper offerings, VR is aiming for the mainstream. What next?Virtual Reality is ... well, real. The last year has seen the launch of every major VR platform, from high-quality tethered systems like HTC’s Vive and Facebook’s Oculus Rift, through to cheap-and-cheerful smartphone-based platforms like Google’s Daydream and Samsung’s Gear VR.The early adopters have bought in, the launch games have been launched, and now that the initial flurry of excitement has died down, the more pressing questions are left: how will the platforms evolve? What will you actually be able to do with them? And is VR just a stepping stone anyway, to the even more science-fiction future of augmented reality tech? Continue reading...

The social network says it must encourage better behaviour otherwise users will stop using itIt is widely held that people are meaner on the internet than in person. Now Facebook is attempting to teach its users how to play nice.Its newly updated safety centre, including its “bullying prevention hub” are central to its strategy to improve the quality of discourse on the platform – for the sake of its future as much as for its users’ experience. Continue reading...

An open letter is urging the online retailer to follow Walmart and drop the sale of the T-shirt, which carries the words ‘Bulletproof: Black Lives Matter’The biggest US police union is pressing Amazon to follow Walmart and remove from third-party sale a shirt that seeks profit in relation to the Black Lives Matter protest movement.

For decades, sci-fi has told us voice operation is the way forward. Now AI butlers are here – and you don’t have to be Mark Zuckerberg do build your ownThe Internet of Things is here, they cried. Great, but do I really have to pull out my smartphone to do everything? Pushing a button was so much easier. Can’t I just talk to my house now? Can I scream “red alert” and have my lights flash red? The Star Trek dream.For decades we’ve been shown that voice is the future. From Star Trek’s computer to Iron Man’s Jarvis, science fiction has put voice control at the forefront of man-machine interaction. But until recently the best we could do was shout at a smartphone and hope for the best. Continue reading...

Company is taking its fleet of self-driving cars to Phoenix at the governor’s invitation, after California regulators struck down the unauthorized trialOne week after launching its self-driving pilot program in its home town of San Francisco, Uber is packing up its failed trial and taking its fleet of autonomous vehicles to Phoenix, Arizona.“Our cars departed for Arizona this morning by truck,” an Uber spokesperson said in a statement. “We’ll be expanding our self-driving pilot there in the next few weeks, and we’re excited to have the support of Governor Ducey.” Continue reading...