Technology | The Guardian

The AI researcher on how natural resources and human labour drive machine learning and the regressive stereotypes that are baked into its algorithmsKate Crawford studies the social and political implications of artificial intelligence. She is a research professor of communication and science and technology studies at the University of Southern California and a senior principal researcher at Microsoft Research. Her new book, Atlas of AI, looks at what it takes to make AI and what’s at stake as it reshapes our world.You’ve written a book critical of AI but you work for a company that is among the leaders in its deployment. How do you square that circle?

The fashion resale app and its young users represents the likely future of retail: more online, more sustainable, and more socialDepop, the fashion resale app, has joined fellow British tech companies such as Arm Holdings and DeepMind in heading to a deep pool of investment outside its homeland.London-based Depop’s acquisition by Brooklyn-based Etsy for $1.6bn (£1.1bn) last week came just days after Oxford-based WaveOptics, a maker of displays used in augmented-reality glasses, was bought up by the Santa Monica-headquartered owner of Snapchat for $500m. Continue reading...

Brad Stone’s second book on the world’s richest person is another portrait of great power – and the great damage it does

Wise Bank of England heads are pondering the case for a state-run digital currency this week. But do we really need one?When Google announced that bitcoin traders would be allowed to buy advertising space on its pages from August, central banks were alerted to the next likely surge in publicity for cryptocurrencies.The increasing activity around digital currencies has not gone unnoticed at the Bank of England, and on 7 June Threadneedle Street’s brightest will publish a consultation document, setting out how a publicly operated electronic coinage system – one that would rival bitcoin – might work. Continue reading...

Whether single, curious or just plain horny, many people are planning to make the most of life after lockdowns. Are we ready to get up close and personal?

Christopher Wray also revealed that the agency is investigating about 100 kinds of ransomware cyber-attacksThe FBI has compared a recent string of cyber-attacks on US government and corporate entities to defense difficulties presented by the 9/11 terrorist attacks.Christopher Wray, the FBI director, also revealed that the agency is investigating about 100 kinds of ransomware, with many tracing back to criminal operators in Russia. Continue reading...

Twitter Blue, launched in Australia and Canada, also allows users to manage bookmarks and tweak coloursTwitter has launched its first paid subscription service, offering users the ability to undo tweets, manage their bookmarks and change the colour of their app icon for a monthly fee.The service, Twitter Blue, launched on Thursday in Canada and Australia for CA$3.49 and AU$4.49 a month respectively, offering a smattering of new features for those willing to pay for the premium tier. It is the first consumer-focused subscription product from a leading social network and comes amid growing pressure on app-based advertising. Continue reading...

Over lockdown, comedian, mother of two and former games journalist Ellie Gibson took up livestreaming, loved the community – and learned to love playing againLike so many things in my life, it began as a daft experiment. I love learning new stuff, and over the course of my 43 years I’ve tried all sorts. Some things have stuck, like comedy, running, and having kids. Some haven’t, like kung fu, olives and holidays in Germany. To be honest, I thought that livestreaming games on Twitch would fall into the latter category.For those who aren’t familiar (I wasn’t until this year), Twitch involves playing video games live on the internet while providing a running commentary. People watch you, and chat to you via a message window, and sometimes give you money. It’s sort of like exotic dancing, but with fewer breasts. Continue reading...

Firm says it will help users more safely put computers to work making money – though gains may be negligibleMillions of people will soon be able to mine cryptocurrencies without installing any extra programs after the antivirus company Norton announced plans to add the feature to its LifeLock security software.The company says the new feature, Norton Crypto, is intended to allow users to put their computers to work mining cryptocurrency – and eventually earning real money – without needing to risk using unvetted software. Continue reading...

Up to 50 companies dealing in digital assets such as bitcoin could be forced to stop trading immediatelyUp to 50 companies dealing in cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin may be forced to close after failing to meet the UK’s anti-money laundering rules.The Financial Conduct Authority, the City regulator, announced on Thursday that an “unprecedented number” of companies had withdrawn applications from a temporary permit scheme that allowed firms to continue trading until the regulator could green-light or formally reject their operations. Continue reading...

Tesla CEO and the Securities and Exchange Commission’s 2019 deal stipulated that Musk would vet any public communicationsThe US securities watchdog told Tesla last year that Elon Musk had twice violated a settlement requiring his tweets to be pre-approved by company lawyers, the Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday.Musk and the US Securities and Exchange Commission agreed in 2019 that the electric car maker would vet any material public communications Musk made regarding Tesla. Continue reading...

PC, Xbox Series S/X; Strange Scaffold

Structural engineer who had a big hand in the creation of the Severn, Forth and Humber road bridgesMichael Parsons, who has died aged 92, played a key role in the design of Britain’s three major suspension bridges, over the Forth, Severn and Humber estuaries – and was closely involved in the design of the first two suspension bridges over the Bosphorus in Turkey.Working for the consultants Freeman Fox and Partners throughout his career, he was the originator of the streamlined box girder concept first adopted for the suspended deck of the Severn Bridge and taken up on most suspension bridges thereafter. Continue reading...

Working for the app, which feeds users local crime information, ‘is very traumatic’ and the managers ‘don’t appear to care’Susan, a former employee for the crime app Citizen, applied for a job curating the platform’s content and notifications in 2019 “in a pinch”. She had a writing background, was having trouble finding work in New York City, and thought she could make some money while looking for a better fit.By the time she left less than a year later, Susan said, she was drinking to excess because of work stress, had trouble sleeping, and had, at one point, cracked her tooth clenching her jaw while listening to hours of talking on the police scanner. As her mental health declined, her bosses at Citizen were not supportive, Susan said. Continue reading...

After a pandemic-hit slowdown on new content, the PS5 finally has a family game to match its capabilitiesIt’s been six months since the PlayStation 5 launched, and they still fly out of stock minutes after appearing in stores. But anyone still waiting to pick one up can be comforted by the knowledge that as yet, there haven’t been many games to show off what it can do. The only one that has felt strikingly next-generation is the superb horror-sci-fi-shooter Returnal, which is like Groundhog Day on an alien planet where everything is trying to kill you.Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart, out 11 June, is also science-fiction, but unlike Returnal, it is more cuddly and approachable. Part of a long-running series about a furry big-eared alien and his unflappable robot companion having adventures in space with a wacky arsenal of weapons, it’s made by Insomniac Games in California, the developer behind PS5 launch game Spider-Man: Miles Morales. And like Miles Morales, it is a bit of a technical showcase. Continue reading...

Its repair policy seems to fly in the face of Bill Gates’s work to combat climate change

The ransomware attack on JBS, probably by a Russia-based group, has disrupted meat production in North America and AustraliaA ransomware attack against the world’s largest meatpacking company that has disrupted meat production in North America and Australia originated from a criminal organization probably based in Russia, the White House was informed on Tuesday.The attack on Brazil’s JBS caused its Australian operations to shut down on Monday and has stopped livestock slaughter at its plants in several US states. Continue reading...

Guardian Australia picture editor Carly Earl explains the dos and don’ts of photographing the moonWhen a full moon rises, many people will pull out their mobile phones to try and get an Instagram-worthy photograph, but unfortunately the moon is really challenging to get a great photo of.Two reasons: it is very far away and unless you have a telephoto lens (which makes the moon appear closer than it is) it will always appear as a very small glowing dot in the frame. Continue reading...

Device prices may rise, as Acer’s chief operating officer says that on any given day the firm can only fill half of worldwide demandOne of the biggest laptop makers in the world, Acer, has said the worldwide global chip shortage will continue to have a “severe” impact on its production capabilities until at least the first or second quarter of next year.The shortage of semi-conductors across the globe has resulted in supply issues for everything from computers, phones and gaming consoles to new cars. Continue reading...

From live streams of new plays to classics from the archive, here are some of the top shows online now or coming soonThe stage on screen: our guide to films about theatrePaul Miller, artistic director of Richmond’s Orange Tree theatre, continues his fine run of George Bernard Shaw productions with this pair of one-act plays about desire, How He Lied to Her Husband (1904) and Overruled (1912). The 70-minute double bill runs at the Orange Tree until 26 June but will be livestreamed on 3 and 4 June. Read the full review. Continue reading...

Study claims firms paid $96bn less in tax between 2011 and 2020 than the notional figures cited in their annual reportsThe giant US tech firms known as the “Silicon Six” have been accused of inflating their stated tax payments by almost $100bn (£70bn) over the past decade.As Chancellor Rishi Sunak called on world leaders to back a new tech tax ahead of next week’s G7 summit in the UK, a report by the campaign group Fair Tax Foundation singled out Amazon, Facebook, Google’s owner, Alphabet, Netflix, Apple and Microsoft. Continue reading...

Gaming is task-driven, repetitive and often frustrating – just like having a job. Childhood isn’t supposed to be so seriousThere are currently three computer games occupying the house: the 13-year-old (M), sometimes in conjunction with the 11-year-old (F), plays Fortnite, a game mainly about shooting people; the 13-year-old (F), also sometimes with the collaboration of the 11-year-old, plays Genshin Impact, a whimsical, open-world environment game, whatever the hell that means. Avatars dressed as pirates or fairies wander about the place, doing chores, occasionally fighting giant warthogs. Mr Z plays Hitman, another shooting game with very densely layered storylines, though he always skips them so never knows what’s going on beyond that; the aim is to leave everyone else dead in a laundry hamper.Observing all this, I feel like the manager of a hi-tech sweat shop. Everyone is locked in concentration, shouting over headphones at other people who may or may not be in the same house, a cross between high-intensity data inputting and horribly frazzled air traffic control. I know what I should be worrying about – are they getting enough fresh air? Will they become addicted? Is this a useful life lesson, to find meaning through shooting others? Continue reading...

Doctors say NHS Digital’s proposals could erode the relationship between them and their patientsDoctors have warned that plans to pool medical records on to a database and share them with third parties could erode the relationship between them and patients.The warning came as the Royal College of GPs wrote to NHS Digital urging it to better communicate with the public about the plans and their options for opting out. Continue reading...

Instead of paying musicians properly, the likes of Spotify have set up ‘donation’ buttons – thus passing the buck to fans

Our reliance on technology means ever more devices and apps and ever less interoperability – and the ubiquity of Apple hasn’t helpedIn 2001, if you listened to digital music, you did it with a large folder of MP3 files. How you acquired them is probably best left between you and a priest, but you may have ripped them from a CD, downloaded them from a file sharing service, or bought them from one of a few nascent download sites.Whichever option you picked, you’d play them on your computer with a program built for the task. And if you were lucky enough to have an early standalone MP3 player, it was probably made by another company again. Continue reading...

The pay-TV giant has the chance to turn popular films into ‘universes’ of stories – and steal a march in the content-hungry streaming warsAmazon’s $8.5bn deal to buy MGM, the Hollywood studio behind James Bond, The Handmaid’s Tale and Gone With the Wind, has secured it the rights to a century’s worth of TV and film titles that the streaming giant intends to exploit with a wave of remakes, reimaginings and spin-offs.The deal to buy the 97-year-old Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, which has an immense library of 4,000 film titles and 17,000 hours of TV programming, is designed to supercharge Amazon’s content pipeline, which is the lifeblood of any competitor in the global battle for streaming supremacy. Continue reading...

Attempt to tackle racial bias long overdue say practitioners, but it’s not just about the equipment

AmaZen, a small box for employees’ ‘mental wellbeing’, came under fire as critics called out the company’s problematic working conditionsAmazon was lampooned on social media Thursday after sharing a video highlighting “AmaZen”, a small enclosed booth installed in an Amazon warehouse where employees can go to “focus on their mental wellbeing”.Related: Amazon must ‘do a better job’ for its workers, says Jeff Bezos Continue reading...

Button-bashing arcade sports vied with the thrill of urban planning, Pac-Man ate up everything, and Super Mario Bros smashed gaming into the mainstreamThe 1980s were crammed with wonderful adventure games – The Hobbit, King’s Quest, Leather Goddesses of Phobos – but the first point-and-click title to be designed by comic genius Ron Gilbert using the SCUMM scripting language is the classic that busted out of the genre ghetto. Filled with great jokes and B-movie cliches, the game made brilliant use of its accessible and intuitive interface, as well as seamlessly integrating cutscenes and non-sequential puzzles. The start of a weird and special era. Continue reading...

We asked our favourite funny people for their favourite links. For the Kates, it’s sketches, news fails and a silly amount of raccoonsKates McLennan and McCartney – of Get Krack!n and The Katering Show – have a new comedy podcast out, titled Slushy: eight episodes of a workplace sitcom, set on an Antarctic research station.To celebrate, they supplied this list of other funny online things. Continue reading...

Labor is set to question executives in an estimates hearing after data reveals employees were paid $77.5m in cash bonuses in 2020Hundreds of NBN Co staff on $200,000 and above a year were paid an average bonus of almost $50,000 last year, according to new data.Earlier this year – while everyone was talking about the $20,000 worth of Cartier watches purchased for Australia Post executives as bonuses – it was revealed staff and executives at the government-owned business enterprise NBN Co were paid $77.5m in cash bonuses in 2020. Continue reading...

Cumberbatch and McKellen among big names to appears in live-recorded stage shows to feature on PrimeAmazon has partnered with the National Theatre to stream four high-profile live-recorded stage shows, including Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s Fleabag.The shows, which include Benedict Cumberbatch and Jonny Lee Miller in 2011’s Frankenstein, will be made available to Amazon’s Prime Video customers in the UK and Ireland from 11 June. Continue reading...

Ofgem to build infrastructure for 3,550 new ultra-rapid charging points on motorways and in townsBritain’s energy regulator has approved a £300m investment spree to help triple the number of ultra-rapid electric car charge points across the country, as part of efforts to accelerate the UK’s shift to clean energy.Ofgem has given the green light for energy network companies to invest in more than 200 low-carbon projects across the country over the next two years, including the installation of 1,800 new ultra-rapid car charge points for motorway service stations and a further 1,750 charge points in towns and cities. Continue reading...

Investors are betting the big chains won’t be able to compete with startups that bring your shopping within minutesOver the past year, you may have noticed the rapid growth in all kinds of app-based delivery services. For a while, supermarkets weren’t involved: traditionally, the industry does not grow very much. The margins are small, but predictable.But something strange has happened: interest and investment in app-based delivery has exploded, with various fast-track services offering to have groceries at your door within a specified number of minutes. Weezy is the market leader in the UK, but you may also have heard of Fresh Direct or Sainsbury’s 60-minute delivery option, Chop Chop. Grocery is a multibillion-pound industry that appears to be in the midst of a massive disruption. Continue reading...

Historians are aghast that the National Archives have had to resort to crowdfunding to protect irreplaceable historical recordsHistorians are calling it an international embarrassment for Australia and saying it is “inconceivable that it has come to this”, as they preemptively mourn the loss of “irreplaceable national history”.The National Archives of Australia doesn’t often make headlines, but when it does, it’s rarely good news. Continue reading...

The scientist on why studying elementary particles is only one way of explaining phenomena, how the 3D printer could change the world, and her optimism about women in scienceChiara Marletto is a research fellow at Wolfson College, University of Oxford. Her research is in theoretical physics – especially quantum computation, thermodynamics and information theory. Her broader interests include theoretical biology, epistemology and Italian literature. The Science of Can and Can’t: A Physicist’s Journey Through the Land of Counterfactuals attempts to forward a new foundational basis for physics. It is her first non-academic book.You argue for a radically different approach to physics, which you call the science of can and can’t. What does that mean?

The company has revealed 47,700 faulty boxes had to be replaced in just four months to March 2021 in NSW homesNBN Co has revealed it has been forced to replace close to 50,000 faulty broadband devices in homes across New South Wales in just four months due to lightning damage.Last week Guardian Australia reported NBN Co had been forced to replace 10,000 modems in the Blue Mountains after they had been fried after being struck by lightning. One resident reporting seeing blue sparks shooting out of the modem during a severe lightning storm this month. Continue reading...

Players such as Weezy or Getir aim to make ordering milk, wine or crisps as easy as turning to Spotify or NetflixCheap groceries, free delivery, on your the doorstep in 10 to 20 minutes. Fast-track grocery services have sprung up like weeds during the pandemic with players pulling out all the stops to tempt in shoppers.At least seven key players are vying for dominance in the UK. Most are currently focused on London, with only Weezy, Fancy and Gorillas venturing outside the capital so far. But all the major players, who also include Getir, Dija, Zapp and Jiffy, are planning to expand into new cities this year with Manchester, Birmingham, Bristol and beyond in their sights. Continue reading...

False Covid claims, including that Scott Morrison faked getting his vaccine, among the content removed from the popular platformFalse claims about Covid vaccines – including that the Australian prime minister faked getting his jab – were among some of the hundreds of Australian videos TikTok removed from its platform as part of a misinformation crackdown.In February, Facebook, Twitter, Google, Microsoft, Redbubble, Apple, Adobe and TikTok signed on to a new voluntary industry code aimed at combating misinformation and disinformation online. Continue reading...

The Fortnite maker, the most popular game in the world, claims the way Apple runs its App Store amounts to a monopolyTim Cook, the chief executive of Apple, took the stand on Friday as the star witness in a high-stakes case brought by Epic Games that could upend the company’s business model.The trial stems from an antitrust lawsuit filed last year by Epic Games, the maker of the wildly popular video game Fortnite. The game became the most popular in the world in recent years, generating more than $9bn total for Epic in 2018 and 2019. Continue reading...

Barn theatre, Cirencester

Retail giant offering $100,000 reward for more information on nooses, the first of which appeared on 27 April in ConnecticutAmazon has closed a construction site in Windsor, Connecticut, after seven nooses were discovered there in the past month.The retail giant is offering a $100,000 reward for more information on the nooses, the first of which appeared on 27 April, hanging from a steel beam of the building. Continue reading...

Analysis: political undercurrents cannot be ignored as Zhang Yiming stands down to ‘daydream’

As co-founder stands down, we look at the lip-syncing, sea shanties and recipe sharing that went viral

Justin McLeod, boss of the dating app, talks about its massive rise in users, his difficult romantic past – and why people are now ditching their partners and looking for someone newThe whiteboard on the living room wall behind Justin McLeod’s sofa frames his head like a halo. But it is also symbolic of the chasm between good intentions and reality that many of us may have experienced recently. This high-achieving CEO says that, while working from home, he was “going to write a lot on that”, but didn’t. He turns to look at its blank expanse. It’s comforting for those of us who also haven’t used this change of pace for vast plans and self-improvement. Which is not to say that McLeod has had a quiet year – far from it. Isolating at home, without the usual options of meeting people, he saw a 63% rise in the number of people downloading Hinge, his dating app. And revenues tripled.McLeod seems grounded and realistic – a romantic who doesn’t believe in “the one”, a tech founder with a concern about what tech is doing to us and a husband with a romcom-worthy story about how he met his wife, but who also admits to weekly couples’ counselling. The pandemic has had a big impact on the dating landscape, he says. People switched to video dating, for a start. It was moving that way anyway, he says, but the “pandemic accelerated it”. Continue reading...

Apps tracking hormones and a gadget combatting hot flushes are some of the latest innovations in the femtech market, which is predicted to be worth $60bn by 2027When lifelong worrier Louise Stevenson asked her husband whether her anxiety was damaging, his answer stopped her in her tracks. “He said it had a negative impact on absolutely everything.” It was the prompt she needed to seek help.Diagnosed with generalised anxiety disorder, she searched for tech-based tools to complement her therapy. “But I couldn’t find an app that offered what I wanted,” she says. “I was literally scribbling down my worries on backs of envelopes.” So the 41-year-old mum from Herefordshire ditched her job in financial services, created Worry Tree – one of 15 approved mental health tools in the NHS app library – and entered the flourishing femtech sector. Continue reading...

The tech giant says it has taken down posts on fake preventative measures and exaggerated cures as part of a new voluntary industry codeFacebook has removed more than 110,000 pieces of Covid-related misinformation generated by Australian accounts in the first year of the pandemic, the company has revealed.In February, Facebook, along with Twitter, Google, Microsoft, Redbubble and TikTok, signed on to a new voluntary industry code aimed at combating misinformation and disinformation online. Continue reading...

There are nearly 10bn Google searches for skin, nail and hair issues each year, prompting the tech giant to create a ‘dermatology assist tool’Google’s entry into health diagnostics has alarmed health experts who fear a new artificial intelligence tool to identify skin conditions could lead to overdiagnosis, or rare and complex skin conditions being missed.At a technology conference in the US on Tuesday, Google revealed there are almost 10bn Google searches related to skin, nail and hair issues every year. In response, Google has developed an artificial intelligence “dermatology assist tool” for people with concerns about their skin. Users of the app can use their phone to take three images of their skin, hair or nails from different angles. Continue reading...

Digital currency under pressure from payment crackdown and tweets from Elon MuskThe price of bitcoin fell by almost 30% on Wednesday, after a Chinese government crackdown on banks’ use of cryptocurrencies accelerated a long-predicted sell-off, in a day of chaotic trading.The world’s largest digital currency tumbled to about $30,000 (£21,000) amid frenzied trading, a drop of more than 50% since it hit record highs of more than $64,000 in mid-April. However, by 10pm UK time, the bitcoin price had risen back to about $38,500, still down 11% on the day, according to Refinitiv data. Continue reading...

Zhang Yiming will change role after saying he lacks the right skills to manage and prefers ‘reading and daydreaming’The Chinese boss of TikTok’s parent company has said he is leaving the role because he lacks managerial skills and preferred “reading and daydreaming” to running the tech giant.Zhang Yiming, the co-founder of Bytedance – which created the popular short video TikTok app – said on Thursday that he will step down as chief executive and trainsition to a new role by the end of the year focusing on “long-term strategy”. Continue reading...