The largest ever semiconductor chip merger has been hit by regulatory hurdles and industry oppositionNvidia is becoming increasingly resigned to giving up on its $40bn takeover of Cambridge-based chip designer Arm, as regulatory hurdles and industry opposition mounts, making it almost certain that the two-year time frame the companies aimed to complete the deal in will expire.The contentious deal, the largest ever in the semiconductor industry, has become mired in seemingly insurmountable regulatory red tape on both sides of the Atlantic as well as in China since being announced in September 2020. Continue reading...
The tech world has been overtaken by the seductive idea of a virtual utopia, but what’s on offer looks more like a late-capitalist technocratic nightmareI have spent large portions of my life in virtual worlds. I’ve played video games since I was six; as a millennial, I’ve lived online since adolescence; and I’ve been reporting on games and gaming culture for 16 years. I have been to Iceland for an annual gathering of the players of EVE Online, an online spaceship game whose virtual politics, friendships and rivalries are as real as anything that exists outside its digital universe. I’ve seen companies make millions, then billions from selling virtual clothes and items to players eager to decorate their virtual selves. I’ve encountered people who met in digital worlds and got married in the real one, who have formed some of their most significant relationships and had meaningful life experiences in, well … people used to call it cyberspace, but the current buzzword is “the metaverse”.Ask 50 people what the metaverse means, right now, and you’ll get 50 different answers. If a metaverse is where the real and virtual worlds collide, then Instagram is a metaverse: you create an avatar, curate your image, and use it to interact with other people. What everyone seems to agree on, however, is that it’s worth money. Epic Games and the recently rebranded Facebook are investing billions a year in this idea. When Microsoft bought video game publisher Activision for $70bn last week, it was described as “a bet on the metaverse”. Continue reading...
by Mark Sweney Media business correspondent on (#5VCN8)
Change will force hundreds of thousands of older people and those in rural areas to upgrade mobilesHundreds of thousands of predominantly older people and those living in rural areas will be forced to upgrade their mobile phones by the end of 2023, as Vodafone sets a deadline for switching off its ageing 3G network next year with a promise that “no one will be left behind”.Vodafone, which has about 18 million UK mobile customers, is to turn off the almost two-decade-old network as usage dwindles to focus on using the freed up spectrum to expand its 4G and 5G networks. Continue reading...
The UK cybersecurity outfit has been on a rollercoaster ride from a meteoric share price rise to a plunge in market valueDarktrace is a well-oiled sales and marketing machine, as slick and turbocharged as the multimillion-pound McLaren Formula One sponsorship deal it uses to entice prospective clients, and yet the cybersecurity company continues to be overshadowed by questions about its technology and founding investor.On the face of it, Darktrace is a great British tech success story. It was founded in Cambridge nine years ago by an alliance of mathematicians, former spies from GCHQ and artificial intelligence (AI) experts. Its market value hit almost £7bn within months of its stock market float last April as investors clamoured for a stake in the promise of a rare European superpower in the US-dominated cybersecurity space. Continue reading...
When I moved house the provider didn’t process the switch, and now it says the local fibre cabinet is fullWe have just moved into a house in Woodford Green on the edge of London but BT is unable to offer us broadband. The previous occupant had it, and as soon as I had a moving date I asked BT to switch us. However, it seems that this was not processed properly and the connection has been given to someone else in the road.Incredibly, BT has told me that the local fibre cabinet is full, and there is no longer an old-style copper line connection. We need wifi to work at home and can’t believe this is happening in 2022. Continue reading...
by Samuel Gibbs Consumer technology editor on (#5VCJ0)
Third-gen of popular earbuds have improved design, shorter stalks and virtual surround soundApple’s AirPods need no introduction due to their ubiquity on the street, but is the third generation of the most popular wireless earbud actually an improvement?The new earbuds have been redesigned to resemble the Pro models with shorter stalks and a better fit. They don’t block your ear canal, like the Pros though, just rest in place with all the benefits and disadvantages of an open fit, including an airy feel and complete lack of isolation from the outside world.Connectivity: Bluetooth 5.0, SBC, AAC, H1 chipBattery life: six hours playback (30 hours with case)Water resistance: IPX4 (splash resistant)Earbud dimensions: 30.8 x 18.3 x 19.2mmEarbud weight: 4.28g eachCharging case dimensions: 46.4 x 54.4 x 21.4mmCharging case weight: 37.9gCase charging: Lightning, Qi wireless (MagSafe) Continue reading...
Texas, Indiana, Washington state and DC condemn what they call invasions of users’ privacyTexas, Indiana, Washington state and the District of Columbia sued Alphabet’s Google on Monday over what they called deceptive location tracking practices that invade users’ privacy.“Google falsely led consumers to believe that changing their account and device settings would allow customers to protect their privacy and control what personal data the company could access,” the office of the Washington DC attorney general, Karl Racine, said in a statement. Continue reading...
Facebook founder’s planned metaverse, blending reality with digital experiences, will require enormous computing powerMark Zuckerberg has announced his social media empire is building what he claims is the world’s fastest artificial intelligence supercomputer as part of plans to build a virtual metaverse.The Facebook founder said in a blogpost that the metaverse, a concept that blends the physical and digital world via virtual and augmented reality, will require “enormous” computing power. The AI supercomputer, dubbed AI Research SuperCluster (RSC) by Zuckerberg’s Meta business, is already the fifth fastest in the world, the company said. Continue reading...
A hotel discovered its smart floor cleaner had escaped – and offered a reward for its return. But where had it gone?Name: Robot vacuum cleaners.Age: 20. Continue reading...
The focus seems to be on upgrading internet speeds in urban areas, while rural locations struggle, says Richard HarrisI live in a small village about two miles from a large town that has high-speed broadband. My experience mirrors your report (19 January) that local governments focus extensively on easy-to-reach urban areas. Money was spent to improve areas that already had high speeds, just from a rival provider.The local project was wound up. Our village was left stuck in the slow lane of 2Mbps speeds. Luckily, a conversation with our local councillor helped resolve this and the village now has a high-speed fibre network. Continue reading...
by Samuel Gibbs Consumer technology editor on (#5VB8F)
A slow connection affects not only your entertainment but also your ability to work from homeFind out the speed you are getting using a computer connected to your router via an ethernet network cable. Many routers and other devices come with one, or they cost about £5 separately. Continue reading...
Committee report says draft bill is neither clear nor robust enough to tackle some harmful contentThe sharing of some of the most insidious images of child abuse will not be prevented by a new government bill that aims to the make the internet a safer place, MPs have said.The draft online safety bill is not clear or robust enough to tackle some forms of illegal and harmful content, according to a report by the digital, culture, media and sport (DCMS) committee. The landmark bill places a duty of care on tech firms to protect users from harmful content or face substantial fines imposed by the communications regulator Ofcom. Continue reading...
Technology stocks have been tumbling in the new year; now all eyes are on the sector’s giants as they report resultsTech stocks have been nursing a new year hangover, pushing the Nasdaq into correction territory. Momentum is building against companies with exciting promises to reshape the world, as investors turn to “value” alternatives such as oil and banking.The tech sector now faces a crunch fortnight as its biggest names report results, including Microsoft on Tuesday, Tesla on Wednesday and Apple on Thursday. They must prove they can thrive in a post-lockdown world where the cost-of-living squeeze is leaving people with less money for tech products and services. Continue reading...
Two-thirds of all new cars bought by Norwegians last year were electric. Turns out you just need a government with a clueI’ve just been standing for 10 minutes at a moderately quiet junction near where I work in Cambridge. During that time I’ve seen six electric vehicles (EVs) – three VW ID.3s, a Nissan Leaf, a Nissan white van and a Renault Zoe. Three years ago, if I’d been standing at the same spot, I’d have seen precisely zero such vehicles. And what that brought to mind was Ernest Hemingway’s celebrated reply to the question: how does one go bankrupt? “Two ways,” he said. “Gradually, then suddenly.”Something similar is going on in relation to adoption of EVs in Britain. The hockey-stick graph is common in consumer technologies. We saw it in the early years of mobile phones, when text messaging was ignored by adults as an inferior form of email. But when pay-as-you-go tariffs arrived and teenagers could have phones, SMS use suddenly shot skywards. The arrival of kids represented a tipping point – a point in time when a group rapidly changes its behaviour by widely adopting a previously rare practice. Continue reading...
French luxury brand says Mason Rothschild’s furry MetaBirkins digital tokens ‘rip off’ its trademarkFrench luxury group Hermès has started legal proceedings against an American artist over virtual versions inspired by its famous Birkin bags.Mason Rothschild creates digital art that he sells as non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, which can be traded online but ownership cannot be forged. Continue reading...
The announcement, in an industry where unions are rare, came on the heels of Microsoft’s acquisition of the companyEmployees at Raven Software, a video game studio owned by Activision Blizzard, announced Friday they have formed a union – a milestone in a largely unorganized industry recently marred by labor complaints.Several dozen employees of the Wisconsin studio, which is behind the massively popular Call of Duty series, voted in favor of the union. The news comes just days after Microsoft announced it would acquire Activision Blizzard for $70bn. Continue reading...
by Alexi Duggins, Hannah Verdier, Hollie Richardson on (#5V8ER)
Smuggled cheetahs, counter-terror cops and Grace Kelly feature in the Wild Things podcast which profiles the outrageous career of the world-famous illusionists. Plus: Stephen Fry looks at brainsWild Things: Siegfried & Roy
Western users may be logging off, but across the continent of Africa, the social media company is indispensable for everything from running a business to sourcing vaccines. How has it become so inescapable?Badri Ibrahim is a Sudanese comic artist and the founder of the Abbas Comics empire. His strips are quirky and irreverent, poking fun at the Sudanese military and encouraging civic activism. One recurrent character is a hapless but wise cat called Ghadanfar, a sort of Garfield meets Snoopy protagonist, who finds himself on the wrong end of misunderstandings with neighbourhood felines and humans. It is all rendered in colloquial dialect and is dry, funny and often poignant. So popular has the comic become that Ibrahim is regularly commissioned to do private work, rendering Ghadanfar in different guises – as a bashful groom on a wedding invitation card, for example.The majority of this work comes through Facebook, where his comics have about 19,000 followers. “I ran the page for about a year,” Ibrahim says. By then, it had become its own community, and now he does not need to spend much time maintaining it. During the launch period, Ibrahim spent a lot of time “posting regularly and engaging with comments” and also “sending the page to everyone I know”. Freelance work came through those comments. “People and businesses would send me a message through the page, looking for an artist. Sometimes they ask for one of my comic characters to use for a product.” He can’t imagine how he would have launched his artistic career without Facebook. Continue reading...
Investors react to possibility that Playstation and subscription service will lose Activision Blizzard games$20bn (£14.7bn) has been wiped off the value of Sony after its rival Microsoft announced a record-breaking deal to buy the Call of Duty publisher Activision Blizzard and take the console wars into the metaverse.Shares in the Japanese conglomerate closed down 13% on Wednesday, their biggest fall since the global financial crisis in 2008, as investors reacted to the possibility that the $70bn bid for Activision Blizzard could result in hit games being pulled from the Sony PlayStation console and subscription service and offered exclusively on the rival Microsoft Xbox. Continue reading...
The company’s bottomless appetite for buying new studios means the art of the deal is threatening the art – and heart – of the gameIn 2014, Microsoft bought Minecraft’s developer Mojang for what seemed, at the time, an eye-popping figure: $2.5bn (£1.8bn). It was the first in a series of bullish video-game studio acquisitions by the tech giant, whose games division has been led by executive Phil Spencer, a long-time advocate for video games within Microsoft and the wider business world, for the past eight years. More studios followed, for undisclosed amounts: beloved Californian comedy-game artists Double Fine, UK studio Ninja Theory, RPG specialists Obsidian Entertainment. It seemed that under Spencer’s leadership, Microsoft was cementing its commitment to the Xbox console and the video-games business by investing in what makes games great: the people who make them.Then came 2020’s deal to acquire Zenimax (and with it Bethesda), for a properly astonishing $7.5bn. This was different. This wasn’t the Xbox division acquiring studios to make games for its consoles. This was an entire publisher, with several different studios and a whole portfolio of popular game series. At this point Microsoft’s spending started to look like a monopoly move – a bid to sew up the market by closing off hugely popular games behind Microsoft’s own consoles and services. When it was confirmed that Bethesda’s forthcoming games, including this year’s space role-playing epic Starfield and the next fantasy Elder Scrolls game, would be exclusive to Xbox and Microsoft Game Pass, I started to wonder whether Microsoft’s stated aim to make video games more widely available to everyone was lining up with its actions in the market. Continue reading...
Investigation alleges Israeli police carried out phone intercepts without court supervision or monitoring of how data was usedThe Israeli police allegedly conducted warrantless phone intercepts of Israeli citizens, including politicians and activists, using the NSO group’s controversial Pegasus spyware, according to an investigation by the Israeli business media site Calcalist.Among those described as having been targets in the report were local mayors, leaders of political protests against the former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and former government employees. Continue reading...
Tech giant acquires publisher of games including World of Warcraft and Candy CrushMicrosoft is to pay almost $70bn to buy Activision Blizzard, the publisher of mega franchises including Call of Duty, World of Warcraft and Candy Crush, in the biggest ever takeover in the tech and gaming sectors.Microsoft said that the $68.7bn (£50.6bn) all-cash deal – which dwarfs its previous biggest, the $26bn takeover of LinkedIn in 2016 – will “provide the building blocks for the metaverse”. It is the biggest deal in tech history, eclipsing the $67bn paid by Dell to buy the digital storage giant EMC in 2015. Continue reading...
In this week’s newsletter: when every game tries to collect our data and monetise our attention, it’s no wonder the world responded positively to one that’s simple, fun and free
The New Yorker has made a virtual art show to take place within the smash-hit game – and a real-life one at London’s Serpentine with a touch of augmented reality. Can it get young gamers into galleries?For Brian Donnelly – known as Kaws since his graffiti beginnings in 1990s New York – art has always been a communication tool. From street art to vast public commissions, he says, “it’s a chance to create a dialogue”. His desire to bring art to the masses is partly why his work spans collectable toys and streetwear collaborations, as well as paintings and sculptures that sell for millions. His new exhibition will allow him to connect with a large number of eyeballs in, he says, “a new and massive way”. The show, New Fiction, is at London’s Serpentine Gallery, and simultaneously on two free online platforms: the gaming behemoth Fortnite and the augmented-reality (AR) app Acute Art.With more than 400m player accounts, Fortnite is massive, especially when compared with the estimated footfall of an average Serpentine show (around 35,000). While the uninitiated might dismiss Fortnite as just another shooting extravaganza, players are increasingly spending time in its more peaceful zones, such as creative mode, where they can mooch about the Fortnite metaverse without fear of elimination. “You can hang out with your friends and explore new features,” says Fortnite’s partnerships director, Kevin Durkin. This could mean honing your dance moves but also watching a film or an Ariana Grande concert (as players did in August 2021), or, as of today, visiting an art gallery. Continue reading...
No Place to Hide drive funded by Home Office to warn social media firms over dangers of end-to-end encryptionA government-backed campaign has stepped up the pressure on plans by Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook Messenger and Instagram apps to introduce end-to-end encryption, warning that millions of cases of child sex abuse could go undetected.The new campaign warns that social media companies are “willingly blindfolding” themselves to abuse if they implement end-to-end encryption for private messaging. Continue reading...
by Daniel Boffey in Brussels and Jack Butcher in Pris on (#5V2JZ)
Speculators rush to sell off their kit as Balkan state announces a crypto clampdown to ease electricity crisisFor bitcoin enthusiasts in Kosovo with a breezy attitude to risk, it has been a good week to strike a deal on computer equipment that can create, or “mine”, the cryptocurrency.From Facebook to Telegram, new posts in the region’s online crypto groups became dominated by dismayed Kosovans attempting to sell off their mining equipment – often at knockdown prices. Continue reading...
Plans by crypto-evangelists for the lavish hideaway have courted mockery and controversy, and now the island is back on the marketWidely mocked plans to establish a tropical haven for cryptocurrency enthusiasts have run into trouble after a contract to buy an island in Fiji for US$12m fell through.A group of crypto-evangelists, led by Max Olivier and Helena Lopez, outlined plans for the island, Nananu-i-cake, in a lavishly animated YouTube video, featuring a wide-eyed crypto bro named Christopher landing by helicopter and being given a guided tour by a talking coin called Connie. Continue reading...
Overwhelmed by messages, notifications and distractions? You can reclaim your focus without a full digital detoxAre you in control of your smartphone or is it in control of you? Sometimes it is difficult to tell. One minute you might be using FaceTime to chat with loved ones or talking about your favourite TV show on Twitter. Next, you’re stuck in a TikTok “scroll hole” or tapping your 29th email notification of the day and no longer able to focus on anything else.We often feel like we can’t pull ourselves away from our devices. As various psychologists and Silicon Valley whistleblowers have stated, that is by design.Becca Caddy is the author of Screen Time: How to Make Peace With Your Devices and Find Your Techquilibrium (Blink, £14.99). To support the Guardian and Observer order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply Continue reading...
The Nigerian photographer on an unusual encounter on the roadside in MoroccoAs a professional photographer, Stephen Tayo’s usual reason to travel is for work. Since visiting Marrakech solo in 2019, however, he had been raving to friends about how much they all needed to go. Bored after a year under Covid restrictions, he eventually rallied five friends from his home town of Lagos, Nigeria, to join him on a mini road trip. The group began in Tayo’s beloved Marrakech, then decided to head to the beach to slow the pace a little.“We hired a bus and headed for Essaouira on the coast, but stopped any time we saw something interesting. Shortly after a roadside coffee break, we saw this tree filled with goats taking shelter and resting,” Tayo says. Continue reading...
Car-sharing is both liberating and a big hassle if you want to avoid the cost and carbon emissions of a personal vehicleBefore moving overseas six years ago, I sold my car and have been living without one ever since. Life in New York for the first two years was a breeze, but being car-free in Sydney? Not so much.Private cars have always been integral to getting from A to B in Australia. While I caught the bus to school, afternoon and weekend activities usually required a lift from my parents or those of a friend. I got my own licence as soon as I was eligible and a few years later bought my first car, which I used most days. Continue reading...
Meta says human rights diligence projects can be ‘highly time intensive’ and run for year or moreThe owner of Facebook and Instagram has said it will “assess the feasibility” of conducting an independent human rights study related to its work in Ethiopia, after the company’s oversight board urged it to investigate how its platforms have been used to spread hate speech and unverified rumours in the country.Meta was asked by its oversight board, which reviews the company’s content moderation decisions and policies, to conduct the study after it upheld the removal of a Facebook post alleging the involvement of ethnic Tigrayan civilians in atrocities in Ethiopia’s Amhara region. Because the platform had subsequently reinstated the post after an appeal by the user who posted it, Facebook was required to take it down again. Continue reading...
Cryptocurrency with shiba inu dog meme rises 15% after billionaire’s tweet about merchandiseDogecoin, the cryptocurrency with a shiba inu dog meme, soared in value by 15% on Friday after the billionaire Elon Musk said it could be used to buy Tesla merchandise.Dogecoin rose to $0.20 after Musk’s tweet early on Friday, and has soared by 5,859% over the past 12 months, according to data from the Coinbase website. Continue reading...
An open letter expresses concern about Covid misinformation and specifically addresses an episode with virologist Robert MaloneA total of 270 US doctors, scientists, healthcare professionals and professors have written an open letter to streaming company Spotify, expressing concern about medical misinformation on The Joe Rogan Experience podcast, listed as the platform’s most popular program.The letter asks the platform to “establish a clear and public policy to moderate misinformation on its platform”. Continue reading...
Federal Trade Commission wants to force sale of Instagram and WhatsAppThe US competition watchdog can proceed with a breakup lawsuit against Facebook’s owner, a federal judge has ruled.Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta, the parent of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, had asked a court to dismiss an antitrust complaint brought by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) for the second time. However, Judge James Boasberg said on Tuesday that the FTC’s revised lawsuit should be allowed to proceed. Continue reading...
Modern video games boast longer and longer playtimes – but does the idea of spending hundreds of hours on a game make you feel excited, or exhausted?In the winter of 1996, I almost lost my job because of the acclaimed management sim Civilization II. I was supposed to be reviewing it for the video game magazine Edge, where I was a fledgling staff writer. But I got so hooked, playing it was all I did for three weeks. During that period I ate, slept and drank Civilization II. At the end, I handed in my extremely thorough two-page review: the only thing I had submitted for the entire issue. I was supposed to be writing 25 pages a month. My editor was … displeased.On Saturday evening, video game publisher Techland proudly tweeted that if players hoped to fully complete its forthcoming apocalyptic adventure Dying Light 2, they would need around 500 hours – “almost as long as it would take you to walk from Warsaw to Madrid”. The message immediately provoked a storm of controversy. Many respondents were critical, complaining that there wasn’t a chance they’d be able to find enough time for such a challenge. Writer Andy Kelly summed up it up by tweeting: “How not to market a game to anyone over 30 years old.” Continue reading...
by Mark Sweney Media business correspondent on (#5TW36)
The maker of Grand Theft Auto adds popular farming game and Harry Potter to roster to create gaming giantThe maker of hit video games including the Grand Theft Auto franchise is to acquire Zynga, best known for its FarmVille and Harry Potter titles, in a $12.7bn (£9.4bn) deal that will create a global console and mobile gaming giant.US-listed Take-Two Interactive said the cash and shares deal will create one of the largest publicly traded interactive entertainment companies in the world. Continue reading...
Starlink’s satellite internet performance has fallen victim to felines attracted to the warmth its dish gives off on cold daysElon Musk’s satellite internet company, Starlink, has ambitious plans to bring internet access to people anywhere in the world. But it turns out the venture is providing another service: warming up cats.A customer tweeted a photo of five cats huddled on his Starlink dish, which links homes to more than a thousand satellites, and noted that the presence of the furtive felines had slowed his internet performance. Continue reading...
by Apostolis Fotiadis, Ludek Stavinoha, Giacomo Zando on (#5TVDW)
EU police body accused of unlawfully holding information and aspiring to become an NSA-style mass surveillance agencyThe EU’s police agency, Europol, will be forced to delete much of a vast store of personal data that it has been found to have amassed unlawfully by the bloc’s data protection watchdog. The unprecedented finding from the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) targets what privacy experts are calling a “big data ark” containing billions of points of information. Sensitive data in the ark has been drawn from crime reports, hacked from encrypted phone services and sampled from asylum seekers never involved in any crime.According to internal documents seen by the Guardian, Europol’s cache contains at least 4 petabytes – equivalent to 3m CD-Roms or a fifth of the entire contents of the US Library of Congress. Data protection advocates say the volume of information held on Europol’s systems amounts to mass surveillance and is a step on its road to becoming a European counterpart to the US National Security Agency (NSA), the organisation whose clandestine online spying was revealed by whistleblower Edward Snowden. Continue reading...
We take in 3D crosswords and wordplay in other forms in our pick of the best of the broadsheets’ crypticsIn the sample clues below, the links take you to explainers from our beginners series. The setter’s name often links to an interview with him or her, in case you feel like getting to know these people better.10a Adult gets into origins of Peppa Pig with hesitation in front of function needing sheets of A4? (9)
From low-cost to do-it-all systems, here are the best wireless, wifi and smartphone-connected optionsWhether you have a newborn or know someone who does, a good baby monitor can be both freeing and reassuring, helping keep an eye on the little ones as they rest.But with so many to choose from with varying brands, capabilities and prices, it can be hard to know which work best in practice. So we put nine of the best baby cameras to the test across three different categories for travel or home. Here are the ones that delivered. Continue reading...
Four storage solutions to help Britain keep the lights on deep into the futureSoaring energy bills rooted in a global gas supply crunch have focused minds on the age-old problem: how can we better store power?Attention has turned to the closure of the Rough gas storage facility in the North Sea in 2017, which left the UK with only enough storage to meet the demand of four to five winter days. Continue reading...
Campaigners say lack of parental controls on Oculus Quest 2 virtual reality headset could breach children’s safety codeThe UK’s data watchdog is seeking clarification from Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta about parental controls on its popular virtual reality headset, as campaigners warned that it could breach an online children’s safety code.The Information Commissioner’s Office said it was planning “further discussions” with the Facebook and Instagram owner about its £300 Oculus Quest 2 device, which was a sought-after gift over Christmas. However, child safety experts have warned that the headset’s lack of parental controls – which would allow parents to block content that could be harmful to children – expose young users to the threat of abuse on the platform. Continue reading...
Young developers on the platform used by many millions of children claim they have been financially exploited, threatened with dismissal and sexually harassedAnna* was 10 when she built her first video game on Roblox, a digital platform where young people can make, share and play games together. She used Roblox much like a child from a previous generation might have used cardboard boxes, marker pens and stuffed toys to build a castle or a spaceship and fill it with characters and story. There was one alluring difference: Roblox hosted Anna’s tiny world online, enabling children she had never met and who maybe lived thousands of miles away from her home in Utah to visit and play. Using Roblox’s in-built tools – child-friendly versions of professional software – Anna began to learn the rudiments of music composition, computer programming and 3D modelling. Game-making became an obsession. When she wasn’t at school Anna was rarely off her computer.As she became more proficient, Anna’s work caught the attention of some experienced users on Roblox, game-makers in their 20s who messaged her with a proposition to collaborate on a more ambitious project. Flattered by their interest, Anna became the fifth member of the nascent team, contributing art, design and programming to the game. She did not sign up to make money, but during a Skype call the game-makers offered the teenager 10% of any profits the game made in the future. It turned out to be a generous offer. Within a few months, the game had become one of the most played on Roblox. For Anna, success had an unfathomable, life-changing impact. At 16 her monthly income somehow exceeded her parents’ combined salaries. She calculated that she was on course to earn $300,000 in a year, a salary equivalent to that of a highly experienced Google programmer. Anna cancelled her plans to go to college. Continue reading...
Critics attacked Don’t Look Up for being over the top. But the mania for NFTs shows how on-the-money the movie isOn 24 December, the movie Don’t Look Up began streaming on Netflix following a limited release in cinemas. It’s a satirical story, directed by Adam McKay, about what happens when a lowly PhD student (played by Jennifer Lawrence) and her supervisor (Leonardo DiCaprio) discover that an Everest-size asteroid is heading for Earth. What happens is that they try to warn their fellow Earthlings about this existential threat only to find that their intended audience isn’t interested in hearing such bad news.The movie has been widely watched but has had a pasting from critics. It was, said the Observer’s Simran Hans, a “shrill, desperately unfunny climate-change satire”. The Guardian’s Peter Bradshaw found it a “laboured, self-conscious and unrelaxed satire… like a 145-minute Saturday Night Live sketch with neither the brilliant comedy of Succession… nor the seriousness that the subject might otherwise require”. Continue reading...
Record sales and now news of a battery that lasts hundreds of miles. It’s getting better, but going green was tough, admits a reluctant pioneerThis time last year my partner John and I celebrated purchasing an electric car by driving through London to see the Christmas lights without having to pay congestion or Ulez – ultra-low emission zone – charges. I gleefully tweeted that Regent Street, deserted in lockdown, seemed a London from a different era: empty roads and glittering shop windows.This was my first moment of enjoyment of the electric vehicle (EV), whose purchase had been the source of considerable domestic tension. An eternal optimist, John was convinced we should dispense with a diesel car. The arrival of a grandchild, living at the opposite diagonal corner of London, tipped the balance. It would cut 30 minutes off a hellish journey. Continue reading...
The mathematician and Countdown presenter on Caribbean comfort food, a podcast for millennials and her owl-shaped bestieBorn and raised in east London, the mathematician Anne-Marie Imafidon MBE, 31, was announced last month as a new presenter on Countdown, covering Rachel Riley’s maternity leave. A child prodigy, Imafidon passed two GCSEs at primary school and two A-levels aged 11. She graduated from the University of Oxford with a master of mathematics and computer science degree in 2010 and in 2013 co-founded and became the CEO of Stemettes, a social enterprise encouraging young women to pursue careers in Stem (science, technology, engineering and maths). In 2020 she was named the most influential woman in tech in the UK. Continue reading...
Technology | The Guardian