Failing to moderate content such as fake news could incur fine of 6% of X revenues or EU blackout under new lawsThe EU has issued a warning to Elon Musk over the alleged disinformation about the Hamas attack on Israel, including fake news and repurposed old images", on X, which was formerly known as Twitter.The letter arrives less than two months after sweeping new laws regulating content on social media seen in the EU came into force under the Digital Services Act. Continue reading...
GMB union says online retailer's planned wage rise is little comfort to staff facing poverty pay'More than 1,000 Amazon workers at the online retailer's Coventry warehouse are to go on strike for four days next month, including on the busy Black Friday sales day.The action was announced as the GMB union said the company must urgently reconsider its priorities", denouncing a planned pay rise for UK workers announced this week as little comfort to the thousands of Amazon workers facing poverty pay, unsafe working conditions and workplace surveillance". Continue reading...
The music, screen and tech worlds will converge for the festival's first staging outside the US - but tickets are pricey for an event that's hard to get a handle on
Critics say decision by Elon Musk-owned company is extremely concerning' ahead of Australia's Indigenous voice to parliament referendumX, the company formerly known as Twitter, has removed the ability for people to report a tweet for containing misleading information just weeks before a referendum on an Indigenous voice to parliament in Australia.Since 2021, users on X in countries including the US, Australia and South Korea had been able to flag tweets that they believed contained misleading information for review by staff at the company - separate to other processes the company has in place to report abuse or hate speech. Continue reading...
Musk is told his platform, now known as X, must comply with new laws designed to combat fake news and Russian propagandaThe EU has issued a warning to Elon Musk to comply with sweeping new laws on fake news and Russian propaganda, after X - formerly known as Twitter - was found to have the highest ratio of disinformation posts of all large social media platforms.The report analysed the ratio of disinformation for a new report laying bare for the first time the scale of fake news on social media across the EU, with millions of fake accounts removed by TikTok and LinkedIn. Continue reading...
Legal firm had said Real World Portal encouraged misogyny and there was evidence to suggest it is an illegal pyramid schemeApple has withdrawn an app created by Andrew Tate after accusations that it encouraged misogyny and could be an illegal pyramid scheme.Tate created the app, Real World Portal, after the closure of his Hustler's University", which was an online academy for his fans, promising to assist them in making thousands of pounds while helping Tate's videos on social media, which have been described as misogynistic, to go viral. Continue reading...
by Kalyeena Makortoff Banking correspondent on (#6EWP9)
Charles Randell says some of the exchanges the FCA was pressed to allow to trade in the UK are now being investigated in the USThe UK's financial watchdog came under political pressure" to welcome crypto firms into the British market, its former chairman has said.Charles Randell, who stepped down as chairman of the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) in the spring, said it was an example of the kind of influence that elected politicians have tried to exert on independent regulators. Continue reading...
The photographer had given up on his quest to capture a poetic moment of city life when he came across a solitary figureBudapest has three train stations that, between them, can take you to Vienna, Warsaw, Zurich, Berlin and Bucharest (to name but a few). Nyugati Palyaudvar is Hungary's busiest station, with its peaked glass facade bookended by ornate domed buildings. Inside, cafes and commuters jostle for space, but nearby lies a closed-up line, almost derelict.Tamas Andok had been searching on foot with his camera for an entire day for peculiar, intimate, poetic moments of city life", and was on his way home. In fact, he'd put his camera away when he came across this man. It was an early October evening, and Andok remembers it being rather chilly. Continue reading...
Tech giant continued to collect and store a user's location data' even if users turned off their location history, according to suitGoogle will pay $93m to settle accusations of misleading consumers on how and when their location information was being tracked and stored, a considerable payout for the tech giant that following a years-long investigation into its data practices.The settlement stems from a lawsuit brought by the California attorney general, Rob Bonta, that concluded the company misled consumers into believing they had more control over their location information than they actually did. Continue reading...
Live shows should allow for self-expression, catharsis and abandon. It's the boorishness and selfishness that need to stopEarlier this week, Lucy May Walker, a singer-songwriter from Redditch, posted a series of modest proposals for behaviour at concerts under the title Gig Etiquette. The four subheadings for her guidelines were: 1. Don't Talk During the Show; 2. Be in the Moment; 3. The Audience Have Not Paid to See You; and 4. Have An Amazing Time. The former busker, who had hitherto received a relatively low level of attention despite being championed by Radio 2's Jeremy Vine, suddenly found herself at the centre of what would, until recently, have been called a Twitterstorm.Walker's post went viral, with more than 1.6m views. For some, the fault was the singer's own. You should just concentrate on your act," she was told. Her attitude, it was suggested, was condescending". Continue reading...
by Alexi Duggins, Hannah Verdier and Hollie Richardso on (#6ER64)
In this week's newsletter: The Guardian's own pop culture podcast is back again every Thursday to break down the latest in entertainment. Plus: five of the best surprise hit podcasts Don't get Hear Here delivered to your inbox? Sign up hereThe Happiness Lab x Sesame Street
The government is about to award a 480m contract to build a vast new database of patient data. But if people don't trust it, they'll opt out - I know, because I felt I had toLast December, I had an abortion. Most unwanted pregnancies set a panic-timer ticking, but I was almost counting down the seconds until I had to catch a flight from London, where I live, to Texas, where I grew up, and where the provision of abortion care was recently made a felony. You bleed for a while after most abortions, and I was still bleeding when I boarded the plane home for Christmas.Going to Texas so soon after the procedure made me consider where the record of my abortion - my health data - would end up. When I phoned an abortion clinic in late November to book an appointment, one of the first questions staff asked was: May we share a record of your treatment with your GP?" Continue reading...
Bill Gates, Sundar Pichai, Sam Altman and others gathered for one of the most important conversations of the year'A delegation of top tech leaders including Sundar Pichai, Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg and Sam Altman convened in Washington on Wednesday for a closed-door meeting with US senators to discuss the rise of artificial intelligence and how it should be regulated.The discussion, billed as an AI safety forum", is one of several meetings between Silicon Valley, researchers, labor leaders and government and is taking on fresh urgency with the US elections looming and the rapid pace of AI advancement already affecting people's lives and work. Continue reading...
by Stephanie Kirchgaessner and Andrew Roth on (#6EQDB)
Galina Timchenko, head of media outlet declared undesirable' by Moscow, targeted in February while living in BerlinAn award-winning Russian journalist living in exile in Europe was hacked using Israeli spyware made by NSO Group, according to a joint investigation by the Citizen Lab and Access Now.Galina Timchenko was hacked on or around 10 February, at a time when she was based in Berlin, Germany, marking the first time that an independent Russian journalist - whose media outlet has been targeted by Moscow and declared an undesirable organisation" - is known to have been hacked with spyware. Continue reading...
Walter Isaacson's insight-free doorstop makes at least one thing clear: the richest man in the world has a lot of growing up to doWho or what is to blame for Elon Musk? Famed biographer of intellectually muscular men Walter Isaacson's dull, insight-free doorstop of a book casts a wide but porous net in search of an answer. Throughout the tome, Musk's confidantes, co-workers, ex-wives and girlfriends present a DSM-5's worth of psychiatric and other theories for the demon moods" that darken the lives of his subordinates, and increasingly the rest of us, among them bipolar disorder, OCD, and the form of autism formerly known as Asperger's. But the idea that any of these conditions are what makes Musk an asshole" (another frequently used descriptor of him in the book), while also making him successful in his many pursuits, is an insult to all those affected by them who manage to change the world without leaving a trail of wounded people, failing social networks and general despair behind them. The answer, then, must lie elsewhere.There's a lot to work with here, but it doesn't make reading this book any easier. Isaacson comes from the his eyes lit up" school of cliched writing, the rest of his prose workmanlike bordering on AI. I drove my espresso machine hard into the night to survive both craft and subject matter. It feels as though, for instance, there are hundreds of pages from start to finish relaying the same scene: Musk trying to reduce the cost of various mundane objects so that he can make more money and fulfil his dream of moving himself (and possibly the lot of us) to Mars, where one or two examples would have been enough. To his credit, Isaacson is a master at chapter breaks, pausing the narrative when one of Musk's rockets explodes or he gets someone pregnant, and then rewarding the reader with a series of photographs that assuages the boredom until the next descent into his protagonist's wild but oddly predictable life. Again, it's not all the author's fault. To go from Einstein to Musk in only five volumes is surely an indication that humanity isn't sending Isaacson its best. Continue reading...
US Department of Justice questions compliance with FTC order on data security and privacy practicesElon Musk's takeover of Twitter created a chaotic environment" at the social media platform that may have violated a government order requiring an overhaul of its data security and privacy practices, according to a court filing.The US Department of Justice (DoJ) alleged in a legal filing on Tuesday that depositions from former employees at Twitter, now rebranded X, raised serious questions" about whether the company was complying with an order imposed by the consumer and competition watchdog, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Continue reading...
Characters' messages are often so tiny you're left squinting at the screen, or shown so fast it's like peering over a stranger's shoulder on the bus. Television has a major texting problemIt was when I was crouched on all fours in front of my television, squinting at the screen with my head tilted, that I realised TV might have a texting problem.My partner and I were bingeing the new season of Rose Matafeo's BBC romcom Starstruck - a solid four stars from us - but on-off lovers Jessie and Tom would insist on playing out their situationship via text. We kept having to rewind, freeze-frame and approach the screen to read them. OK, we are of a certain age", but I shudder to imagine how the properly elderly or vision-impaired coped. Continue reading...
US makes case Google leveraged power and wealth to strangle competition, spending billions on deals with Apple and SamsungThe watershed antitrust trial pitting the US government against Google began on Tuesday in a Washington district court, as the government started to argue its case that the tech giant illegally abused its power to monopolize internet search. The case is the biggest test of antitrust law in decades and the first such case against Google to go to trial in the US.Big tech companies and regulators are closely watching the trial, which could force a shift in how the industry is allowed to operate. Its outcome could reshape how the public accesses and interacts with the internet, or embolden Google to pursue an even tighter grip on the market. Continue reading...
Unity announces a Runtime Fee', which will charge developers each time a game using the engine is downloadedThe company behind the Unity Engine, one of the major game development tools used by independent studios, has announced a controversial new fee. Starting from 1 January, Unity will charge developers each time a game using the engine is downloaded.The charge will begin when sales reach a threshold of $200,000 in revenue over 12 months and 200,000 total installs. Charges will vary depending on the license the developer has with Unity, but will be as high as $0.20 per install. Continue reading...
Widespread access to world's richest man allowed biographer Walter Isaacson to detail a number of illuminating anecdotesA new biography of Elon Musk was published on Tuesday and contains colourful details of the life of the world's richest man.Musk afforded widespread access to his biographer, Walter Isaacson, the author of the bestselling biography of the Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, and the book contains a series of illuminating anecdotes about Musk. Here are eight things we learned from the book. Continue reading...
In their attempts to mimic the video-sharing site's success, Facebook, YouTube and others might have signed their own death warrants Don't get TechScape delivered to your inbox? Sign up for the free newsletter hereIn the mid-2010s, social media was simple. Instagram was for your pictures, Twitter for your feelings and Facebook to see who from your past was getting engaged, married, pregnant, or divorced. This period was also one of relative bliss for tech companies: Facebook's active users were drastically increasing quarter over quarter, and Instagram had doubled its active users in just two years. Even Twitter, which had gone through a rough patch, was regaining its footing. Like all good things, it couldn't last.A Pew Research Center study found that, by 2022, teenagers had all but abandoned Facebook, significantly denting its cultural cachet. Instagram had similarly disillusioned its users, and Twitter, recently bought by Elon Musk and rebranded as X, doesn't seem to even know what its name is any more. Many apps that comfortably dominated the 2010s are meeting their reputational downfalls because they tried to compete with a new social media app - and failed. Turns out, no one - not even the US Congress - is a match for TikTok. After almost four years of tech companies vying for dominance over the app, it's time to call it: TikTok has won. Continue reading...
As jobs screening US, UK and EU platforms are shifted to India, viewing gore' to clean up the web has traumatised moderatorsI had to watch every frame of a recent stabbing video ... It will never leave me," says Harun*, one of many moderators reviewing harmful online content in India, as social media companies increasingly move the challenging work offshore.Moderators working in Hyderabad, a major IT hub in south Asia, have spoken of the strain on their mental health of reviewing images and videos of sexual and violent content, sometimes including trafficked children. Continue reading...
by Helen Davidson, Hibaq Farah, and Dan Milmo on (#6EJQH)
Apple shares fall as local government and state-owned firms latest to face restrictions on devices at workChina's government has reportedly expanded its ban of iPhones to local government workers and state-owned companies, a day after it emerged central government employees were forbidden from bringing the devices to work.Several agencies had begun instructing employees not to bring iPhones to work and the ban was expected to be further extended, Bloomberg reported. Nikkei reported at least one state-owned company had told its employees that anyone working with trade secrets could not bring their iPhones, Apple Watches or AirPods into work from next month. Continue reading...
The popular MMO game has helped me deal with everything life brings. As I celebrate 10 years immersed in its world, I speak to other people who have found solace in this online communityIt's no secret that the art that moves us becomes associated with certain periods of our lives: the song that helped you navigate your first breakup, the movie that helped you take those first steps into adulthood, the book that persuaded you to try something new. Video games, however, are unique in that some are designed to be played for years. They can develop alongside you, grow up with you, or be a consistent refuge from the mundane.I've played Final Fantasy XIV for a full decade now, enraptured by its fantastical locations and a story that takes you from green adventurer to universe-saving hero. It's always been the game I turn to unwind at the end of a long day, and my life has completely changed alongside it. I've gone from the early stages of my career and a draughty flat, through a long-term relationship, and now I have a house and child - my character, Cel, was there for the whole journey. Continue reading...
The co-founder of DeepMind issues a terrifying warning about AI and synthetic biology - but how seriously should we take it?On 22 February1946, George Kennan, an American diplomat stationed in Moscow, dictated a 5,000-word cable to Washington. In this famous telegram, Kennan warned that the Soviet Union's commitment to communism meant that it was inherently expansionist, and urged the US government to resist any attempts by the Soviets to increase their influence. This strategy quickly became known as containment" - and defined American foreign policy for the next 40 years.The Coming Wave is Suleyman's book-length warning about technological expansionism: in close to 300 pages, he sets out to persuade readers that artificial intelligence (AI) and synthetic biology (SB) threaten our very existence and we only have a narrow window within which to contain them before it's too late. Unlike communism during the cold war, however, AI and SB are not being forced on us. We willingly adopt them because they not only promise unprecedented wealth, but solutions to our most intractable problems - climate change, cancer, possibly even mortality. Suleyman sees the appeal, of course, claiming that these technologies will usher in a new dawn for humanity". Continue reading...
by Samuel Gibbs Consumer technology editor on (#6EJGJ)
The most ethical, sustainable and repairable handset gets a big upgrade with even longer supportThe Dutch smartphone company Fairphone has achieved something remarkable - a handset that could last a decade.The ethical pioneer, which leads the way in repairable devices, has just released the Fairphone 5. It is a thinner, lighter and more refined device compared with its predecessors and one that makes leaps and bounds in terms of longevity, repairability and quality.Screen: 6.46in QHD+ OLED (460ppi)Processor: Qualcomm QCM6490RAM: 8GBStorage: 256GB + microSD card slotOperating system: Fairphone OS based on Android 13Camera: dual 50MP rear, 50MP selfie cameraConnectivity: 5G, esim + nanosim, wifi6E, NFC, Bluetooth 5.2 and GPSWater resistance: IP55 (spray/splash)Dimensions: 161.6 x 75.83 x 9.6mmWeight: 212g Continue reading...
The signature's days are now numbered in some official documents in Australia. But the signature as a personal brand has a long history and it's hard to see it going anywhere fast
by Hollie Richardson, Alexi Duggins, Hannah Verdier a on (#6EHDN)
In this week's newsletter: Alice Levine and Matt Forde remember seven chaotic weeks in Westminster in the new season of British Scandal. Plus: five of the best musicals podcasts Don't get Hear Here delivered to your inbox? Sign up hereStrike Force Five
The artist who makes little gay collages' about the internet shares what makes them laugh online, including Jordan Firstman, Patti Harrison and a Cars conspiracy theory
The studio is far from the first to restrict some critics from their games. But if only influencers and fans get early access, it's players who suffer most Don't get Pushing Buttons delivered to your inbox? Sign up hereThe Guardian's review of space exploration epic Starfield, Xbox's big game of the year, went live this morning - almost a week after other outlets published theirs. This is because Bethesda did not give our reviewer an advance copy, as publishers usually do. Along with several others, including the greatly respected games publications Eurogamer and Edge, we were left waiting until the game's early access release last Friday to play it.Bethesda's reasons for cherry-picking reviewers are known only to itself, but it's far from the only publisher to do this. Sometimes, controlling early reviews is a way to manipulate a game's Metacritic average in the crucial first week of release. This happened earlier in the year with Hogwarts Legacy, when Warner Bros distributed copies to certain outlets long before others; the result was an initial flurry of very positive reviews, with more measured takes appearing around or after the game's release, once critics had played for longer. When reviewers receive review codes close to a game's embargo or release date, they are often under pressure to rush, and that can skew their experience. Continue reading...
Technology secretary Michelle Donelan says online safety bill will enable Ofcom to fine firms up to 10% of their global turnoverSocial media firms could face humongous" fines if they fail to block the accounts of under-13s, the technology secretary has said.Michelle Donelan made the comments on the eve of the long-awaited online safety bill returning to parliament for its final stages on Wednesday after numerous delays. Continue reading...
For seven years I was a compulsive sharent', chronicling my daughter's life on social media. Then she told me how much she hated it ...In 2010, the year Mark Zuckerberg said privacy was no longer a social norm, my child was born. I had no intention of doing anything online that would compromise my daughter's privacy, but I had never been a parent before and lived 5,000 miles away from where I grew up. Social media was my lifeline, and a place to share her development with our widespread loving family. I transcribed funny and sweet verbatim dialogues between us and posted them for my inner circle. I had become a sharent" - a parent who publishes information about their child online. What harm could it do?While I was writing a book about digital afterlives, though, I began thinking about how our online identities are shaped from our first moments, often by other people. Unease descended, and I took my then nine-year-old daughter for lunch and asked if we could have a conversation. You're not posting it, are you?" she replied. Sometimes, I only had to take my phone from my bag to elicit this response. Her reflex reaction to my question was the reason I wanted to talk in the first place. Continue reading...
Scams and data thefts could be caused by individuals overriding chatbot scripts, NCSC saysThe UK's cybersecurity agency has warned that chatbots can be manipulated by hackers to cause scary real-world consequences.The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) has said there are growing cybersecurity risks of individuals manipulating the prompts through prompt injection" attacks. Continue reading...
Almost 30,000 workers signed petition against return-to-office mandate in MayAmazon's CEO has told workers it's probably not going to work out" for them at the tech company unless they are prepared to come into the office at least three days a week.Andy Jassy made the statement in an internal meeting this month where he expressed his frustration that some employees were not coming in three days a week, despite that now being Amazon's official policy. He said: It's past the time to disagree and commit. If you can't disagree and commit ... it's probably not going to work out for you at Amazon because we are going back to the office at least three days a week." Continue reading...
Company says users targeted in Australia, UK, US and elsewhere by political spam network across more than 50 platformsMeta shut down close to 9,000 Facebook and Instagram accounts, groups and pages associated with a Chinese political spam network that had targeted users in Australia and other parts of the world, the company has revealed.Meta began investigating in 2019 and its research aligned with several research groups who coined the term Spamouflage, including the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (Aspi). Continue reading...
The head of Recreate Games talks about the inspiration behind the studio's forthcoming cartoon brawler - which features many of the team's own petsI've said it before and I'll say it again: there's nothing quite like a kitten wielding a crossbow. Party Animals gives you an array of adorable pets to dress up and throw into an arena, where they slapstick-spar against each other with bats, shovels, nunchucks and more. Developer Recreate Games looked to the much-loved jelly-baby beat-'em-up Gang Beasts for inspiration for this upcoming party brawler. Playing as a puppy throwing your opponents to their doom off a moving train? Having your otter grab a crossbow to take your family out? It's pure cuddly chaos.Picture this: you transform into an adorable corgi, your best buddy turns into a goofy dinosaur, and your girlfriend becomes a cute kitten. You're all brawling on a submarine, in a bar, in the snow; in all sorts of extraordinary places," explains the head of Recreate Games, known only as PM. That's what Party Animals is all about." This is the first game from the studio, which previously developed VR software before pivoting to paw punch-ups.Party Animals is out 20 September, 2023 on Xbox and PC. Continue reading...
We've lived in more places than we can remember, but home is where the games areI have moved house. Again. There are now new, different rooms to fill with all the things and machines that keep a family functioning.Some of them, as ever, are games consoles. I wrote recently about the place that the ZX Spectrum occupied in our council house in Arbroath in the 80s. But we had a machine before that. A bizarre arcade box that came with a black and white TV and an assortment of Pong knockoffs. It bonded us, but once Sir Clive's chocolate bar came along it was consigned to the loft, where it grew bitter and revengeful and later auditioned for the role of one of Ultron's drones in that Avengers movie. Continue reading...
Artificial intelligence is on track to shake up work. So what should the next generation of workers be trying to pursue?Teenagers deciding their future this year have a lot to contend with. In England, those who sat their A-levels suffered the biggest results drop on record while the top grades in GCSEs also fell. And now they face the question: will the career I choose to pursue even exist by the time I enter the workforce?Artificial intelligence has hit the mainstream with the popularity of generative AI programmes driven by large language models such as ChatGPT. Businesses are increasingly adopting the technology. A study, which was published last week by the cybersecurity firm Kaspersky, suggests 57% of workers are using such tools to save time in the office, especially for summarising meeting notes and long documents. Continue reading...
Taiwanese microchip manufacturer TSMC blames struggle to build Phoenix plant on skilled labor shortage but workers cite disorganization and safety concernsPosed in front of an American flag and a large banner reading A Future Made in America Phoenix, AZ," Joe Biden told a crowd of assembled workers, supporters and media last December: American manufacturing is back, folks."Eight months on, the Phoenix microchip plant - the centerpiece of Biden's $52.7bn US hi-tech manufacturing agenda - is struggling to get online. Continue reading...
One marketplace firm says Amazon is only delaying the pain' of having to wait a week for their proceedsAmazon has partially relented following a row about new rules affecting thousands of marketplace sellers and is now releasing some of their sale proceeds.The online retailer had told many of its sellers in the UK and continental Europe that it would now hold on to the proceeds of sales for more than a week, rather than crediting their accounts immediately a sale was made. Some small firms said the move - first revealed by the Guardian - could force them out of business. Continue reading...
There were 9,000 breaches of personal information last year but experts say not enough is being done to stop themIt's brutal. People are wondering if they should resign, or move house, or get fortified gates. You can feel the anger."The comment from a former officer in the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) underlines the real-life consequences of an all-too frequent occurrence: a data breach. Continue reading...
Chief executive of platform rebranded as X seeking to reverse advertiser boycott since Elon Musk takeoverThe chief executive of X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, has moved to repair the company's relationship with advertisers by reinstating a client council" for marketing and ad agency executives.Linda Yaccarino wrote on the platform on Thursday that it was officially bringing back the client council in the fall", as the business seeks to reverse an advertiser boycott that has hit revenues since it was bought by Elon Musk for $44bn last year. Musk admitted last month that cashflow was still negative amid a 50% slump in advertising revenues. Continue reading...
For Microbird Games co-founders Philipp Seifried and Regina Reisinger, the social side of their RPG adventure game is just as important as exploring dungeons and slaying huge bossesDungeon slaying video games have severely lacked one essential element, until now: toasting an epic monster battle with a well-deserved schnitzel. At least, that's what the team at Vienna-based Microbird Games has decided, prompting the creation of forthcoming action role-playing game, Dungeons of Hinterberg.Looking like a Saturday morning cartoon come to life, with a visual style inspired by the clear lines and vivid colours of European comic artists, the indie adventure promises a mix of hack 'n' slash action RPG and social sim, against the backdrop of the Austrian Alps - which as video games go, is a setting as fresh as recently fallen snow. Players can explore dungeons, solve puzzles, slay huge bosses ... and then enjoy a schnitzel with the local people and other visiting slayers. Fighting monsters has never sounded so delicious. Continue reading...
AI's potential is huge and terrifying. But a new generation of artists is starting to find new uses for the technology, as well showing its many limitationsWhen I visited the Victoria and Albert Museum in London in early June, a fabulous drag cabaret was in full swing. Across seven small screens and a large wall projection, a rotating cast of performers in an array of bold looks danced and lip-synced their hearts out to banger after banger. Highlights included Freedom! 90 by George Michael, Five Years by David Bowie and Beyonce's Sweet Dreams.Then the whole thing started again. And again. But this wasn't just a video installation running on a loop: it was an elaborately engineered deepfake. Between each song, the performers underwent a kind of metamorphosis, melting down into amorphous masses of pixels and then re-forming with new faces and figures. For these AI-generated drag kings and queens, life really is a cabaret. Continue reading...
Data from Electoral Commission breach could allow rogue actors to create AI-generated messages in effort to manipulate electionsData accessed in the Electoral Commission hack could help state-backed actors target voters with AI-generated disinformation, experts have warned.The UK elections watchdog revealed on Tuesday that a hostile cyber-attack had been able to access the names and addresses of all voters registered between 2014 and 2022. Continue reading...
The $350 million Galactic Starcruiser will shut this year - but experiences that combine the real world with online gameplay could still fly Don't get Pushing Buttons delivered to your inbox? Sign up hereNext month, Disney's immersive Galactic Starcruiser Star Wars hotel" in Florida will shut down, less than two years after opening. Best known for being horrendously expensive - $4,809 for a couple for two nights, or a mere $1,500 a person if you fit four to a cabin - most have dismissed the Starcruiser as yet another of Disney's recent spendthrift follies.When I heard the news of its closure earlier this year, I rushed to book one of the remaining cabins. My path into the games industry was by playing alternate reality games (ARGs) that mixed real-world actors and events with online gameplay; I'd go on to make ARGs such as Perplex City and, more recently, augmented reality games like Zombies, Run! Even though I hadn't been impressed by the Starcruiser's marketing, I was desperate to see what an estimated $350m budget had produced. Continue reading...
Technology | The Guardian