New electricity generating capacity would enable north-east to attract investment for large-scale AI infrastructureNational Grid has taken a step towards building Britain's biggest electricity substation on Teesside, which could supply power to a vast neighbouring datacentre as the UK races to expand its AI infrastructure.Last week, the company agreed to purchase 29.5 hectares (73 acres) of land at Dorman Point on a site owned by Teesworks, a local private-public partnership. The deal was first reported by Sky News. Continue reading...
Today's crop of smooth talkers tap directly into a specific evolutionary vulnerability. Here's how to defend yourselfRecently, I was alone in a bar waiting for a friend. To pass the time, Istarted chatting to a stranger. He had an easy, confident way of speaking, which I admired. We discussed topics I know little about: the instability of modern economies, the feasibility of commercial space travel, the likelihood of a coup in Russia. I found myself leaning in and asking questions: I felt as if I could learn a lot from this person. We eventually got to psychology, which is more my wheelhouse. I brooded about how easy it's become for people to accept strange ideas. Some people will believe anything," he observed. Some people even believe the Earth is round!"It's increasingly difficult to ignore how fragmented and bizarre our beliefs have become. We live in our own echo chambers, defined by the channels, feeds and influencers we follow. As a result we can arrive at very polarised conclusions about vaccines, the climate, gender, geopolitics, the shape of the Earth and everything else. Disagreements on topics like these frequently damage relationships, alienate friends and estrange loved ones. Continue reading...
Using a fake DOB or leaving the field blank when making an online account can offer protection from identity theftYou get a call from your bank saying there has been suspicious activity on your account. They read out your name, address and date of birth so you are happy it is a legitimate caller.But you are talking to criminals who have used your date of birth as part of a web of verifying information to convince you they are someone else. Continue reading...
Almost 40% of British singles have used AI for romantic advice, from writing messages to assessing potential partnersAfter Sam's ex joked that her sister found him ugly, he turned to AI. Google Gemini had a look at the photo and politely disagreed. AI has been his wingman ever since, aiding his dating life by giving pep talks and vetting his messages.The 27-year-old from Stoke-on-Trent is not the only AI-assisted romantic - a survey of 3,000 British singles published this month by Match Group, the owner of the Tinder and Hinge platforms, found 39% had used AI in their dating lives. Continue reading...
by Nick Robins-Early, Andrew Witherspoon, Will Craft, on (#79E44)
The tech mogul's midterm donations backing Republicans have made him the largest single-cycle political donor in modern US historyElon Musk has poured so much money into US politics this midterms election cycle that his donations could fund half a dozen SpaceX rocket launches or buy thousands of Tesla Cybertrucks. At the Tesla Diner in Los Angeles, Musk could order more than 31.9m cheeseburgers with the money he has spent on the midterms.Musk, the world's richest person, has funnelled at least $445.77m into Republican-aligned political action committees (Pacs) and groups since last year, according to US Federal Election Commission data as of 29 October. The contributions have made him the Republicans' most prominent financial backer and the largest single-cycle political donor in modern US history. Continue reading...
In a survey, just to be clear' came out as the most loathed phrase. But I think I can do betterA new contender for the most passive-aggressive email phrase has emerged. Just to be clear" was chosen by 52% of desk jockeys in a survey by email verification company ZeroBounce, closely followed by the perennial pass-ag fave, per my last email" (40%), which tied with the identical-in-intent as previously discussed". Further down the list came for future reference" and kindly note".If you ask me, these all verge on actual aggressive. Imagine saying just to be clear" out loud to another person: that's a conversational poke in the ribs, isn't it? It's the kind of thing you unleash 10 minutes into an ill-tempered wrangle with your home insurance company about inflated renewal premiums. Kindly note" is even worse - it's a phrase from an angry message on the office kitchen wall about microwave abuse. Continue reading...
by Johana Bhuiyan, Hazel Tang, Tiara Chiaramonte, Joh on (#79DRW)
Anthropic, the creator of Claude, filed to go public on the US stock market on 26 October. The company's filing statement contains a 92-page risk factor document in which it acknowledges the dangers that AI poses to society and human beings, and factors that could negatively affect Anthropic's business. Johana Bhuiyan, senior tech reporter for the Guardian, breaks down the document and explains why Anthropic's IPO could be a real test to the AI boom
Big tech stocks falter as investors question whether billions being poured into AI can generate returns quickly enoughA sell-off of tech stocks that began earlier this month and gained steam with disappointing earnings from leading tech companies drove US markets down by hundreds of billions of dollars Friday. In total, the decline has knocked nearly $1tn in value off the tech-heavy Nasdaq exchange in one week and erased about $2tn in a month.The S&P 500, the index of the 500 most valuable companies in the US, fell by more than 1% Friday, losing hundreds of billions of dollars in market value. It was on track to erase its gain for October, even though it set its all-time high during the same month. The weakness for technology stocks dragged the Nasdaq composite down even further, more than 3%, also erasing hundreds of billions in value. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell less. Continue reading...
It was an ambitious notion - now Californians will vote on a one-time 5% billionaire tax, and state's super rich have pulled out all the stops in oppositionOne year ago, the idea of a billionaire tax in California was still in its infancy.It wasn't yet one of the most contentious ballot measure fights in state history - pitting Democrats against Democrats, drawing national attention from political heavyweights, and netting hundreds of millions of Silicon Valley dollars to fight it. Back then, it was a bold and desperate answer to Donald Trump's healthcare cuts. Continue reading...
UK government guidance says we should be ready for the unexpected, but what's actually helpful to have at home? We ask the specialists The best power banks - testedHow prepared are you for an emergency? Do you have a few extra tins of beans in the cupboard, or a full-on preppers' kit in the cellar? While no one likes to think about worst-case scenarios, you can't have failed to notice the growing noise around being sensibly, practically ready for floods, power cuts, cyber-attacks and other events.The government launched its Be Ready campaign in October with guidance on how to prepare for emergencies, including a list of suggested items to have at home. Continue reading...
Ghost hunting has changed in recent years due to AI chatbots, and paranormal enthusiasts are concernedGhost hunting is a tech-heavy pursuit. When Amy Waine and Jarrad Cutting investigate haunted locations, they're loaded up with software of their own design, such as an app that assigns signals from a phone's sensors to different words in a database. In the age of ChatGPT, the ghost-hunting pair is probing the world of AI. They describe one of their latest inventions, an app called GhostTube Seer, as the world's first AI Ghost Hunting tool".
Voicing the main character in Black Tides Draga's Wake led to me making the kinds of noises I haven't made since my honeymoon but also one of my favourite moments as a fatherI listen to you on the radio and I keep hearing your voice in my head!"Not a typical opening to a creative partnership, but that is how Greg Strangis introduced himself to me 16 months ago, when he asked me to come to his garage in the middle of nowhere and have a look at a game he was making called Black Tides Draga's Wake. Continue reading...
As thousands of datacentres are constructed across Europe, the Guardian and Investigate Europe have uncovered disturbing evidence that some workers building them are exposed to dangerous conditions and living in fear of speaking outSandu* checked his watch. He was winding down the last 15 minutes of his shift at a vast Google datacentre site in Saint-Ghislain, Belgium, in March, when the call came in. The 34-year-old electrical tester had already worked almost 10 hours, but says such last-minute jobs were normal: I had no choice. People have been fired after saying no."The task was one Sandu had done many times before and involved a series of tests measuring the safety and integrity of the electrical wiring. A protective suit was locked away in an equipment room. The round trip would have added another 15 minutes to the job, he says, and people were waiting, so he decided not to retrieve the suit. Continue reading...
E-commerce company posts high cloud computing sales but gives a cautious sales forecast for the fourth quarterAmazon offered a mixed picture of its financial health on Thursday in its quarterly earnings report.The e-commerce company gave a cautious sales forecast for the current fourth quarter, which encompasses the critical holiday shopping period, after delivering fiscal third-quarter results that came in below Wall Street analysts' expectations. Continue reading...
Net profit slid 25% from a year earlier to $26.2bn, well short of expectations, though revenue rose to $127.6bnShares in the Google parent Alphabet fell double digits Wednesday evening into Thursday trading, erasing hundreds of billions of dollars in stock market value from the $4tn tech giant.The company had reported lower-than-expected profit and a slowdown in its advertising business while it maintained big spending on AI. Continue reading...
Using AI for roles from executive assistants to chiefs of staff, companies are boasting about doing more with less, creating tension with their human workersOn an average workday, Dhruv Amin chats with dozens of colleagues to get things done at his AI startup Anything. He might ask Gwen, his executive assistant, to schedule a meeting, then troubleshoot a technical problem with Cody, his coding partner. Then he might check in with Betsy for search engine optimization, or Juno for onboarding customers. If the office runs out of snacks, he sends a Slack message to Justin, the office manager charged with stocking the kitchen.But none of these co-workers are people. They're artificial intelligence agents, software that handles tasks without human intervention. Anything is one of several startups building them, and betting on a future where workplaces will increasingly turn over their sales, marketing, coding and other tasks to semi-autonomous AI. At Anything, there are 15 human employees and roughly 150 agents - a ratio that Amin believes will soon be the norm. Continue reading...
Wet weather dampening your plans? From screen-free stories and craft kits to waterproof gear, here's how to keep little ones - and grownups - entertained The best gifts for kids by ageBefore becoming a mum, I never appreciated quite how complicated getting out the front door would be with kids in tow. But in my four and a half years of parenting two small people, I can confidently say it's nothing compared with the challenge of a day spent inside when outside is off-limits. Whether because of endless rain or illnesses you don't want to pass on, I panic at the thought of filling the hours spent indoors.Being outside is profoundly helpful for my mental health, and it comes with its own built-in entertainment for small children: a bus ride becomes a sensory experience, a trip to the doctor's an opportunity to pick up role-play ideas. Continue reading...
Human practitioners warn computer-generated offerings lack the empathy and connection central to divinationThis journey isn't just about algorithms or data," an AI psychic named Urban Mystic recently told me. The chatbot, featuring an AI-generated profile photo of a smiling woman surrounded by palm trees, also said I will get married soon, that I have a pink aura and that I may have been an herbalist in a past life.It's about connecting on a soulful level," the chatbot said. Continue reading...
Replacing diesel-powered ferries with electric vessels could reduce emissions and improve air qualityCutting through New York Harbor in the shadow of the Statue of Liberty, the small white boat we were riding on caught the attention of passengers aboard a nearby sightseeing ferry.It's quite a curiosity at the moment," Eric Laakmann, the chief executive and co-founder of Vessev, said.Climate Central is an independent group of scientists and communicators who research and report the facts about our changing climate and how it affects people's lives. Continue reading...
Dyson's first electric toothbrush watches you brush and flosses for you, but there are far cheaper ways to get an effective clean The best electric toothbrushes for every budgetWhen Dyson announced it was entering the toothbrush market, the world responded almost as one: Four hundred and twenty pounds? For a toothbrush!?"No, it wasn't a stray decimal point - or if it was, Dyson is doubling down and leaning into the mistake. Unlike high-end brushes from Oral-B or Philips Sonicare, where the recommended" in recommended retail price" is doing a heroic amount of heavy lifting given the frequent discounts, the Dyson CameraJet will actually set you back 419.99. Continue reading...
Software giant reports $36.6bn in profit, beating Wall Street expectations, as Azure cloud computing division grows 48%Microsoft gained billions of dollars in stock market value on Wednesday afternoon after it reported better than expected revenue and profit, just days after it offered voluntary buyouts to about 60,000 employees.The office software giant's growth was fueled by its Azure cloud computing division, which grew by 48% in the September quarter. Continue reading...
by Oliver Milman with data visuals by Daniel Wolfe on (#79C7W)
Several Mississippi homes have been purchased near datacenters and one resident said realtor outlined target to buy more than 400People in a Mississippi neighborhood, many of whom dislike a nearby power plant central to Elon Musk's artificial intelligence ambitions, have received a stark offer - to sell their houses to his company and make way.Real estate agents have been going door to door in Southaven, Mississippi, on behalf of xAI, touting a deal to purchase houses as long as the owners agree to not join a lawsuit against the company over the power plant's noise. (Musk's AI company officially became SpaceXAI in July and has lately been rebranded as SpaceXSI but to neighbors of the datacenter in Mississippi, it remains xAI.) Continue reading...
They claim to reduce fine lines, blemishes and redness - but which stand up to scrutiny? After consulting dermatologists and putting them to the test, we have crowned a brand new number one The best anti-ageing creams, serums and treatmentsLED face masks are booming in popularity - despite being one of the most expensive at-home beauty products to hit the market. They claim to reduce the appearance of fine lines, stop spots and calm redness, with some even combining different types of light to enhance the benefits.However, it's wise to be sceptical about new treatments that are costly and non-invasive, and to do your research before you buy. With this in mind, I interviewed doctors and dermatologists to find out whether these light therapy devices work. Continue reading...
AI tools are making it easier to modify and recreate games, raising questions about piracy, copyright and how far the technology could disrupt the industry Don't get Pushing Buttons delivered to your inbox? Sign up hereIf your social media algorithms have clocked that you're into video games, something strange will have happened in the past few weeks. Your feed, like mine, will have been full of clips of streamers playing bizarre mashups of popular video games. Skyrim in Minecraft. Halo, except the main character is Mario. Skate 2 in Call of Duty maps. A flood of professional-looking fan-coded game mods that are mildly interesting to look at for 30 seconds, but ultimately inconsequential. Would I download a mod that lets me play Wii Bowling inside a zombie shooter? No, but I am very interested in where they came from.Of course, the answer - or at least, most of the answer - is AI. After a week of researching this (thanks especially to Replay Mode on YouTube for this informative video, which set me down this track) I now understand that these mashup mods are not just AI-generated videos, but AI-assisted coding. Basically, as of a few weeks ago, Anthropic's Claude has become extremely good at decompiling video game code. Games are written by humans in readable code and then compiled into binary 1s and 0s that the PC or console running it can read; decompiling is the reversal of that process, revealing a game's source code, which humans can then edit and mess around with for fun. This used to be an extremely laborious process. But now it is not, because humans aren't doing much of it any more. Continue reading...
Billed as the first end-to-end AI-created series on a major streaming service, this Turkish show looks like the result of the prompt make it cinematic'Just as the world reels from Elon Musk's AI-powered The Odyssey remake - though remake" feels rather generous for a seven-minute splat of synthetic sludge - another bucket of AI gunk is dropped on to our faces. For Prime Video's AI-generated TV series Castle Walls, produced by Turkish production studio Ay Yapm using a melange of generative video tools, has arrived, billed as the first end-to-end AI-created series to premiere on a major streaming platform.It's certainly more epic than Musk's production, consisting of two 17-minute episodes. Set in the 11th century, the show revolves around the historic Alamut Castle, although it's entirely absent of any real sense of time or place. I was briefly intrigued by the opening images, with their bold palette of blues and mustard browns and yellows - but as soon as the people" appeared, looking like Vaseline-smeared Madame Tussauds creations slowly melting in the sun, everything came crashing down. Continue reading...
by Denis Campbell Health policy editor on (#79C63)
Three-quarters of all responses were machine-generated in failed attempt to stop bill from passing into law, research findsAI bots flooded a government consultation with tens of thousands of fake responses in a failed attempt to stop the UK's ban on disposable vapes.Three-quarters of all the responses to the 2023 consultation on the tobacco and vapes bill were machine-generated, in what is thought to be the first coordinated attempt to use AI to derail health policymaking in the UK. Continue reading...
Tesla tycoon launched Grok project after criticising Christoper Nolan's diverse casting for his Homeric blockbusterElon Musk has released an AI-generated rival to Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey after pledging to make a version true to the art of Homer".Having criticised the hit movie in the summer, the tycoon said he would use Grok Imagine to make a historically accurate" adaptation. Continue reading...
It is hardly a shock that Grok AI's interpretation of Homer is as meaningless as a laptop screensaver. The only surprise would be if Musk accepted defeat graciously. Which he won'tThink back. Do you remember when Elon Musk, in a weird online tantrum, and without having seen the film, condemned the supposed wokery in Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey, for getting Elliot Page to play Sinon and Lupita Nyong'o to play Helen of Troy? As the plaudits and the box-office receipts for Nolan's Odyssey piled stratospherically up, Musk showed that being a good loser is not among his qualities. He petulantly exclaimed that he could do his own better and more authentic Odyssey on Grok AI. And now he has released the first online seven-minute episode" to a world that has long since forgotten about this claim and didn't care in the first place.In Musk's version, as the tale begins Odysseus is - off screen - pretending to be mad to avoid fighting in the Trojan war. Grim-faced Palamedes and Agamemnon are shown testing this ruse by taking his baby boy Telemachus and placing him in the harm's way of a plough in a field; Odysseus instantly rushes to save his child, showing that he isn't mad, and agrees to fight. We see him join the armada, with Penelope and Telemachus (soon to grow to a little boy) left behind. This, effectively, is a prologue sequence that is not in Nolan. The expeditionary force arrives at Troy, and an intertitle tells us we have cut to a 10-years-later flashforward; the siege is about to escalate into the fake-horse attack. Continue reading...
Both private and public schools in tech regions are limiting the use of tech in classrooms. But will low-income districts be able to follow suit?German Gil spends most of his waking hours looking at screens. Since moving to the San Francisco Bay Area in 2015, the software engineer has bounced between startups and giants including Netflix, Facebook and GitHub.But when it came to the education of his daughter, Victoria, he wanted her to have a different experience, one in which his kid could be a kid". Continue reading...
Social media companies including Meta have pulled back on efforts to protect voters from election-meddling liesSocial media feeds are awash with an unprecedented flood of AI-driven disinformation ahead of November's US midterm elections, according to experts, who warn many posts are probably slipping through the cracks".As tens of millions of Americans prepare to cast their vote, social media companies have scaled back their efforts to protect voters from lies meant to manipulate elections. Continue reading...
Whether you favour spooky fairtales, satanic card games or infernal hijinks at the chip shop there are all manner of fresh top scarers at large this witching seasonTis almost All Hallows' Eve and naturally, the thoughts of all good video game players are turning to horror. 2026 has already been a bloody good year for the genre with Resident Evil Requiem and Silent Hill: Townfall leading the rabble. But this autumn sees a festering surge of indie horror releases, featuring everything from cursed card games to Nazi-hunting penguins. Here are eight terrifying titles we think you should sample while jack-o-lanterns burn and spirits walk the moonlit streets.Allogloom (PC) Continue reading...
by Aisha Down Global technology reporter on (#79B9H)
Investigation finds dozens of ministers and civil servants moved into AI roles as government developed datacentre expansion plansThe UK's policy on datacentres and AI was developed without any meetings with environmental groups, an investigation has found.The nonprofit organisation Spotlight on Corruption said a considerable revolving door" shaped the government's development of AI growth zones", a central plank of the former prime minister Keir Starmer's AI and economic policy, with 38 ministers, senior civil servants and special advisers hired to positions in AI companies between July 2024 and September 2026. Continue reading...
Lack of profits and the threat posed by western countries are raising concern about the sustainability of Beijing's AI boomTrillions of dollars have been wiped from China's stock markets in recent months amid increasing anxiety about the future of artificial intelligence, as Beijing races against the United States for dominance in the sector.The STAR 50 Index, which tracks technology and innovation companies on the Shanghai stock exchange, has plunged 40% since June. Other indexes of major companies dropped by about 20% over the same time period. Continue reading...
Tasks from determining asylum seekers' ages to border surveillance now involve AI, says Open Rights GroupAI has been embedded across the Home Office in near-total secrecy, reinforcing the so-called hostile environment for immigration, according to research.Tasks from the detection of potential sham marriages to determining the age of asylum seekers and checking through the contents of phones of new arrivals now involve use of the technology, according to a report by Open Rights Group (ORG). Continue reading...
Tech firm announces two-part fundraising after Elon Musk warns hundreds of AI startups face collapseMark Zuckerberg's Meta has announced plans for $95bn (71bn) of fundraising to cover its AI expenditure, even as Elon Musk warned that funding for smaller players in the sector was drying up.The owner of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp is a leading investor in AI and is ploughing multibillion-dollar sums into datacentres, the central nervous systems of the technology. Continue reading...
Company says small number of devices affected by display glitch after posts appear on Reddit and social mediaOwners of the new foldable iPhone are reporting cracks in the device's screen, as Apple confirmed an issue with a small number" of units.Reports of cracks have emerged on Reddit and social media platforms since the handset went on general sale globally on Friday. Experts said there had been too few examples to determine whether there was a more serious problem with Apple's first foldable device, which retails from $1,999 (1,499). Continue reading...
Tech company offers buyouts in an effort to reduce costs amid the rising use of AI, according to reportsMicrosoft announced that it would offer buyouts to 60,000 employees in an effort to reduce costs amid the rising use of artificial intelligence, according to reports, the latest example of how AI is reshaping tech companies and the greater workforce.This is the latest of several trimmings Microsoft has made to its workforce this year. The company announced in April that it was offering voluntary retirement to about 7% of its US workforce, which consisted of about 125,000 employees at the time. Its global workforce is made up of about 223,000 workers globally. Continue reading...
by Blake Montgomery and Johana Bhuiyan on (#79AR9)
Market debut of firm behind Claude chatbot will be one of largest in US history, a test of AI boom's financial viabilityAnthropic has publicly filed for a stock market listing in what is slated to be one of the largest debuts in history. The company's float on the US market will serve as a test of the financial viability of the multitrillion-dollar AI boom.Analysts and investors have valued the San Francisco-based company, founded in 2021, at more than $1.5tn. The company, which will will list under the symbol ANT, confidentially filed with US financial regulators for an initial public offering in June. Continue reading...
Company imitates reflection of sun from mirrors, prompting pushback from some scientists, environmentalists and California localsLocals in a rural area of California were recently startled to see dazzlingly bright light shining down from nearby mountains at night, illuminating a swathe of the desert below.Unbeknown to them, the strange nocturnal illumination was the latest step in a company's plan to erect thousands of giant mirrors in space to reflect sunlight on to the Earth during night-time. Continue reading...
Technology | The Guardian