Technology | The Guardian

The hugely popular app is reinventing the way that technology can transform images by recreating a photo from scratch, rather than overlaying a filterPeople across the world are turning amateur photos into elaborate works of art with a new viral app that relies on AI technology to let users instantly transform mundane images into Picasso paintings.Related: Watch out, Instagram: new Polaroid app brings a nostalgic classic to your phone Continue reading...

The magazine says the carmaker should disable the automatic steering function – and change its name to avoid promoting ‘dangerous assumptions’Consumer Reports magazine on Thursday urged Tesla to disable the automatic steering function on its electric vehicles and change the name of its autopilot driving-assist system, which is under investigation after a driver was killed while using it.

Apps such as Pokémon Go turn physical space into a game – and as technology has done since the telegraph, we are subtly distributed via these connected toolsIn his 1963 book God and Golem, the founder of the cybernetics movement Norbert Wiener suggested a compelling thought experiment. Imagine cutting off someone’s hand, he wrote, but leaving intact the key muscles and nerves. Theoretically, a prosthesis could connect directly both to nerves and muscles, giving the subject control of the replacement organ as if it were real (I’m indebted to Thomas Rid for highlighting Wiener’s thought experiment in his new book, Rise of the Machines).So far so sensible: this scenario was a reasonable extrapolation at the time, and is close to becoming a reality today. Wiener, however, went further. Having imagined an artificial hand able to replace its original, he wondered why we should not now imagine the addition of an entirely new kind of limb or sensory organ? “There is,” he wrote, “a prosthesis of parts which we do not have and which we never have had.” There was no need to stop at nature. Human-machine integration could in theory blur its boundaries well beyond replacement. Continue reading...

One-third third of its workers are female, while black employees accounted for just 3% of senior US leadership, its latest diversity figures showFacebook has said about one-third of its workers are female, while black employees accounted for 3% of its US senior leadership, both numbers only slightly higher than a year earlier.The data released by the world’s largest social network on Thursday reflects the scant progress made by Silicon Valley heavyweights in making their workplaces more diverse in the face of criticism for having mostly white, male workers. Continue reading...

A federal appeals court has ruled Microsoft Corp and other companies cannot be forced to turn over customer emails stored on servers outside the USA federal appeals court has ruled Microsoft and other companies cannot be forced to turn over customer emails stored on servers outside the United States, handing a victory to privacy advocates.Related: Microsoft sues for right to tell customers when US government requests emails Continue reading...

The video game company is rereleasing the console that started it all, with a new version of the Nintendo Entertainment System set to hit shops in NovemberHot on the heels of Nintendo’s biggest success in years – that would be Pokémon Go, which you may have read about – the company is releasing a new version of its 1983 Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) on 11 November. Stock in the company, already on the rise from the Pokémon Go phenomenon, was up 15% on Thursday morning.The new NES, called the Nintendo Classic Mini, will be smaller, lighter and composed of fewer parts than its 33-year-old thrice-great-grandfather. The company has released five subsequent home video game consoles since the NES broke out and, unlike other systems made by Nintendo, the new version will be a dedicated machine with a preset selection of 30 games from the company’s vast library. It will retail for $59.99.

The Guardian hit the streets to speak to restaurateurs who have transformed their establishments into money-making Pokéspots, but not everyone is happy with invasions of Pokémon catchers.Bars and restaurants across the country have been scrambling to cash in on the Pokémon Go phenomenon and lure budding trainers into their establishments, but the company behind the game is hoping to monetize it even further by introducing sponsored locations.Related: Pokémon Go: US holocaust museum asks players to stay away Continue reading...

Video game addicts and experts unravel the Pokémon Go phenomenonLeigh Alexander talks to cultural critic Clem Bastow, the Guardian’s Alex Hern and the CEO of the United Kingdom Interactive Entertainment Association, Jo Twist, about Pokémon Go, its social implications and the what the future holds for augmented reality in video games. Continue reading...

NearSt, a new platform to order titles from local bookshops – and get them to customers within an hour – begins in LondonAt Ink@84, an independent bookshop in Highbury, north London, an order pinged in on Thursday morning for Jared Diamond’s Guns, Germs and Steel. The Pulitzer prize-winning bestseller was then to be delivered to a nearby customer within 60 minutes – by NearSt, a new platform that is offering one-hour delivery for books across London, as well as the facility to browse your local shops with your phone.Almost 40 bookshops are now on NearSt’s newly-launched platform, which allows customers in London to enter their postcode and the name of the book they’re looking for on the site or app. They can then order the book for instant collection from a local store, or have it speedily delivered. Entering Joe Hill’s post-apocalyptic thriller The Fireman for my home address in Kilburn, I’m told I can either walk nine minutes to a local shop, Queen’s Park Books, where it will be reserved for me, or have it delivered within the hour. Continue reading...

The world has been turned into a Pokémon menagerie, but the game is not without problems. The real fun comes from going outside to exploreAs those in the know will doubtless already be aware, there’s a Squirtle at Senate House Library, a Bulbasaur at Buckingham Palace, and maybe even an Evee at your local bus stop waiting, not for the 147, but for an intrepid player to snap it up. Pokémon Go has turned the world into a Pokémon menagerie, and now everyone with a smartphone has the potential to become a master of cute little monsters.Pokémon Go is the first smartphone release from The Pokémon Company, which has been looking after this multimillion-selling video game franchise since 1998. Created by augmented reality specialist Niantic Inc, the developer behind Google’s experimental AR game Ingress, it’s a massive-multiplayer, location-based spin-off from the role-playing fantasy series. Continue reading...

Charge against firm’s advertising arm follows reinforced filing against shopping service and probe into alleged abuse of AndroidThe European commission has filed a third antitrust charge against Google, this time against its AdSense advertising business.The EU regulator accuses Alphabet’s Google of abusing its dominance in search to benefit its own advertising business, which has historically been the company’s main revenue stream. The EC also reinforced its existing charge against Google’s shopping service, which the regulator says receives preferential treatment in search results. Continue reading...

People often search for their symptoms, but the right diagnosis can be hard to find. Google and Microsoft are working on ways to improve thingsWhen Liz Jurcik of Seattle felt a sharp pain in her side and back in January of 2013, she didn’t think much about it.Jurcik, a 31-year-old human resources professional at Boeing, ran regularly and was in good shape. She thought it was probably a strained muscle from a workout. But the pain got worse, and by early February she could barely stand up. “I had the absolutely worst pain in my life,” she said. “I couldn’t stand up straight.” Continue reading...

Location-based smartphone game available in the UK Google Play Store and Apple App Store for iPhoneThe smash-hit location-based game that has led people all over the world take to the streets with smartphone in hand, Pokémon Go, has finally launched in the UK for both Android phones and iPhones.

Niamh would like to start drawing on a tablet instead of paper, and would like to be an animator. Where could she start? Continue reading...

Sydney police say the teenagers, who were each fined $325, put themselves and others at great riskPolice have caught two teenagers playing Pokémon Go while driving near a busy pedestrian crossing in western Sydney, which they said put themselves and others at great risk.Two 17-year-olds were busted while driving on John Street in Cabramatta – a location described by Pokémon fans on Facebook as “lit”. Continue reading...

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

Su Bin, 51, admitted conspiring with China-based hackers who targeted projects including F-22 and F-35 fighter jets on behalf of People’s Liberation ArmyA Chinese businessman who admitted taking part in the hacking of US defence secrets has been given nearly four years’ jail.

All vehicles using the ‘autopilot’ technology that featured in the accident that killed Joshua Brown in May to be reviewed, Nhtsa letter tells companyA letter from the National Highway and Transportation Safety Administration says that it is investigating all Tesla vehicles equipped with any version of its “Autopilot Technology Package” in the wake of a crash in May that killed a 40-year-old man.The accident that killed Joshua Brown appears to have happened because autopilot – a self-driving mode still in its testing phase – could not distinguish between a white truck and a bright sky in this case, according to Tesla. Continue reading...

Senator wants the federal government to investigate the extent to which the short-term lodging market actually consists of commercial rental firmsSenator Elizabeth Warren has urged the federal government to investigate Airbnb and other short-term rental companies in a move that experts say marks an unprecedented step in US lawmakers’ formal scrutiny of the “sharing economy”.The progressive senator from Massachusetts, who has taken on a high-profile role in the presidential race, co-signed a letter to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) on Wednesday, requesting that the agency “study and quantify” the extent to which the short-term lodging market consists of “persons or firms acting in a commercial manner by renting out entire residences or multiple residences simultaneously”. Continue reading...

Engrossing and high-grossing, this game is a further sign of the commercialisation of our imaginationsThe streets are suddenly full of people ignoring obvious obstacles and dangers because they are playing a collective game on their smartphones. Pokémon Go requires players to walk around looking through their smartphone cameras, waiting for them to show an image of a Pokémon superimposed onto the real-world scene. The aim is to capture them with a phone gesture: there are 150 different varieties, some more common than others. The game has been a sensation in a sensational world (the games market worldwide grossed $6bn in May), putting 25% on the value of Nintendo, the company that owns Pokémon, and downloaded so often in its first week that it is now on more smartphones than the dating app Tinder and has as many active users as Twitter. Yet, technically, it is unremarkable: what’s interesting is what it tells us about ourselves, and about the economy that we work and play within.To overlay reality with an imagined meaning, to blur the boundary between real and virtual worlds, is something we have always done. The technology has changed, but in London, for example, there is usually a queue at King’s Cross station for the sign marking “Platform 9¾”, from where the Hogwarts Express is supposed to leave – a collective fantasy almost entirely driven by print. Augmented reality has long been imagined in science fiction, written about and filmed. The smartphone gives it another technological expression but it can hardly be said to give it a new reality. What is novel about Pokémon Go is that it has taken an existing game framework and plugged into a story, or a game, that many of the players have been familiar with since their childhood: the young adults playing on their smartphones now are those who played Pokémon with cards and game consoles in their schooldays. Continue reading...

Developer Niantic rolls out improved version of app to first non-English language country, as rest of Europe waits with bated breathSmash-hit augmented reality game Pokémon Go has launched in Germany, making its first move into Europe and outside of the US, Australia and New Zealand.

I can’t put a billboard on your house without your permission, but I can put a Pokéstop there. As real and virtual worlds collide, that is causing problemsWhen a virtual space overlaps a real-world space, then whose space is it, and who controls what is created as a result? The success of augmented-reality game Pokémon Go has forced this question into focus. Since its launch less than a week ago, groups worldwide have struggled with the game’s unforeseen ramifications. Continue reading...

Body launches public consultation on laws that need updating including online abuse legislation, which predates digital ageLegislation criminalising indecent or grossly offensive communications should be clarified to help tackle abuse and “trolling” on the internet, the Law Commission has suggested.Launching a public consultation on laws that may need reform, the body that identifies legal flaws also proposed reviewing ineffective or outdated parliamentary acts governing weddings, surrogacy, the “Maxwellisation” process – in which individuals facing criticism are given an opportunity to respond during public inquiries – codification of the law in Wales and confiscation of the proceeds of crime. Continue reading...

Fans of hit smartphone game trek to ‘only Pokémon Go holy land on peninsula’ following restrictions on Google Maps, leaving behind jobs and familiesSouth Korean Pokémon Go players have been forced to leave their home towns and flock to a remote city close to the North Korean border in order to play because of the country’s mapping restrictions.

Tech giant’s first original production will feature developers trying to create ‘the next great app’Apple is seeking participants for its new reality TV show Planet of the Apps.The casting call issued on Tuesday by co-producers Propagate seeks app developers aged over 18 who are planning on making apps for Apple devices. Continue reading...

Burning airships, rocket guns, fighting on horseback – what did playing the closed alpha version of EA’s eagerly anticipated epic tell us about the future of a battered genre?“Preparing all-out war,” says the starting screen as Battlefield 1 loads up. It’s not kidding. When Electronic Arts launched the trailer for its first world war shooter, fans were delighted to see the series, not only returning to its historical roots, but heading even further back than the original start point: 1942. This heavily viewed slab of cacophonous action promised an epic war story of destruction and gritty combat; and judging by the closed alpha test – an early version of the St Quentin’s Scar map available only to a select few players – the game will deliver.After several days on the mostly stable 64-player servers, here’s what we’ve learned about the Battlefield 1 experience so far. Continue reading...

Dominant smartphone operating system maker given extra time to respond to European commission charges over market abuse of Android and Google Search and Chrome appsGoogle has been given a six-week extension until early September to respond to EU antitrust charges filed against its mobile operating system Android.In April the European commission said Google’s requirement that mobile phone manufacturers pre-install Google Search and the Google’s Chrome browser in order to get access to other Google apps including the Google Play Store, the largest source of Android apps with more than 2m available, may harm consumers and competition. Continue reading...

Britain’s biggest carmaker plans to deploy self-driving vehicles on motorways and roads near its Coventry HQ later this yearJaguar Land Rover has said it will create a fleet of more than 100 research vehicles over the next four years to test autonomous and connected technology, with the first hitting the streets later this year.

Phenomenal success of Nintendo’s mobile game has led to renewed interest in the Japanese franchise with Legendary Pictures reported to be close to a dealThe worldwide success of Nintendo’s mobile game Pokémon Go has led to renewed talks over a live-action movie.Related: The joys of Pokémon Go: exercise, the outdoors and 'full-on escapism' Continue reading...

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

Memorial to victims of Nazis is designated as a ‘Pokéstop’ but officials point out that playing game on the grounds is ‘extremely inappropriate’The US Holocaust Memorial Museum and Arlington National Cemetery have requested that smartphone users refrain from “catching” Pokémon when they visit.Like many other landmarks, the museum and the military cemetery are featured in the popular new Pokémon Go game. Continue reading...

Architects and planners brought up on SimCity are using the principles of gaming to encourage sustainabilityMany children of the 1990s would have fond memories of the smash-hit computer game SimCity. The open-ended simulation that allowed players to plan entire cities while balancing public service, environmental and budgetary pressures smashed preconceptions of what a video game could be.At the time of SimCity’s emergence in 1989, a video game with no end and no set target was considered absurd. But the sheer detail (down to crime and traffic levels on each street), the ease of learning, constant feedback to player decisions (citizens moving into suburbs or buildings becoming derelict) and the ability to “play god” lifted this title from mere simulation to a global sensation. Continue reading...

Did you hear the one about the Wyoming girl who stumbled across a dead body while catching Pokémon by a river?Catching cheating boyfriends, stumbling across dead bodies and advertising one’s services as a professional Pokémon Go trainer – less than a week since the launch of the virtual-meets-real-world app Pokémon Go and the stories it has sparked are kookier than the names of the critters its fans are trying to catch. Continue reading...

Tesla said data suggested the driver’s hands were not on the wheel in a recent accident in Montana in which a Model X veered off the road and hit a postAnother accident involving Tesla’s autopilot system has been reported, this time in Montana when a Model X veered off the road and hit a post.Early on Sunday morning on a highway near Whitehall, a Tesla veered off to the right into a wooden guardrail, according to the Detroit Free Press, stopping the car before it left the road. The driver told a highway patrol officer that the car’s driver assist feature had been engaged. Continue reading...

Currency behind social media website Steemit, in which users are rewarded or paid based number of ‘thumbs up’, has rocketed to more than $150m in valueSteem, the digital currency behind the new social media website Steemit, soared more than 1,000% in value on Tuesday to more than $150m, two weeks after it first paid people who posted on its website, according to coinmarketcap.com.

By signing up to the retail giant’s affiliate network, Amazon Associates, publishers can earn commissions from linking to products on Amazon.comIn July 2015, Amazon declared its own annual holiday: Amazon Prime Day. The retail giant promised deals on a wide range of products for customers signed up to its membership program, Amazon Prime.This is the second Amazon Prime Day, and it’s pretty hard to miss. At the time of writing, the #PrimeDay hashtag was one of Twitter’s top 10 worldwide trends. Media outlets including the Daily Mail, USA Today, the Telegraph, PC World and CNet are publishing numerous stories about the discounts on offer, and urging readers to sign up for an Amazon Prime trial. Continue reading...

Brogan BamBrogan brings harassment and nepotism lawsuit against the supersonic transport company, claiming he feared for his physical safetySenior executives at Hyperloop One, the much-hyped technology company developing a high-speed transportation system, are being accused of nepotism and physically threatening and harassing employees in a lawsuit filed by the startup’s co-founder and three former employees.Brogan BamBrogan, a co-founder who recently resigned as chief technology officer, alleges that one executive left a “hangman’s noose” on his chair in one of the most explosive claims, which is bolstered by photos included in the complaint. Continue reading...

Internapalooza provides an inside look at the peculiar cultural initiation to the tech industry: coding, entrepreneurship and a certain amount of privilegeThere were piles of free stuff at Internapalooza, the annual gathering of thousands of tech industry summer interns. In the club level at the San Francisco Giants’ stadium on Monday evening, name-tag-sporting millennials travelled in packs of three and four as they scooped up branded T-shirts, tote bags, water bottles, Moleskin notebooks, sunglasses, argyle socks from Zillow, mobile device charge pads from eBay, winter caps from Google, flip flops from Andreessen Horowitz, and – the overall favorite – selfie sticks and throw pillows from YouTube.Almost everything was free. Everything except the popcorn. Continue reading...

Nintendo’s share price soars but there have been safety fears over players visiting secluded locations late at nightAn app that began as an April Fools joke has become a worldwide phenomenon, taking gamers out of the living room and on to the streets as they compete to capture, train and battle Pokémon characters using their mobile phones.In just seven days since the game was released in the US, Australia and New Zealand, Pokémon Go has now almost certainly exceeded Twitter’s 65 million American users, and the game’s servers have repeatedly crashed under the strain of its popularity. Continue reading...

US Fish and Wildlife Service to target diseased prairie dogs, food for the ferrets, via specially designed drones that shoot the candies in three directions at onceThe US government is set to unleash drones that fire vaccine-covered M&Ms in a bid to save the endangered black-footed ferret, a species that is facing a plague epidemic across America’s great plains.

Investigatory powers bill could lead to video shot by reporters being accessed remotely by police or their phone microphones used as a bug, peers sayPeers have issued a serious warning that the government’s proposed “snooper’s charter” law could endanger journalists and their sources.The House of Lords heard a strong cross-party plea that greater protection for journalists’ sources was needed in Theresa May’s investigatory powers bill, which seeks to extend the powers of state surveillance. Continue reading...

Fans from San Francisco to New York extol the benefits of the monster-catching craze – while trying to avoid walking into poles“There’s a really rare Pokémon really close by,” confides Deann Rossi.

The augmented-reality game Pokémon Go has become hugely popular. It might be fun, but is it also benefiting players’ mental and physical health? Many fans of the game in the US and Australia – the only locations where the game has been officially released – seem to think so

Reverence for the original brand inspired two San Francisco-based Brits to bring back the magic with a modern twist: 3D moving imagesBefore everyone had a digital camera tucked inside their mobile phone, before the duck-faced selfies and sepia-toned filters of Instagram, before Flickr and Periscope and Snapchat, there was Polaroid.From 1948 to the early 2000s, that name was synonymous with “instant visual gratification”. Wait 60 seconds, and the photo you just snapped would appear magically before your eyes. Continue reading...

Gears of War 4 developer will be owned by a company which, until 2015, exclusively dealt in chicken meatLondon-based games developer Splash Damage has been bought by Chinese chicken supplier Leyou.Best known for its involvement in the Wolfenstein, Quake and Gears of War franchises, as well as its own multiplayer shooter Brink, Splash Damage will be the second games developer owned by Leyou, whose Reuters profile describes the company as “engaged in supplying chicken meat products in the Fujian province”. Continue reading...

The latest video-game-to-movie adaptation will update an obscure Sega Mega Drive title from 1992 about a young superhero for hireAn obscure Sega Mega Drive title about a slacker who becomes a superhero for hire is the latest video game to become a candidate for a big-screen adaptation, according to Deadline.Rent-a-Hero, first released in 1992, has a backstory in which a small-town Japanese kid orders a pizza and instead receives a suit of power armour. Hot Tub Time Machine director Steve Pink (who also co-wrote Grosse Pointe Blank and High Fidelity) is on board to direct, and will write the script with Jeff Morris (The True Memoirs of an International Assassin). Continue reading...

In 2015, the story of a stolen iPhone went viral and led to a friendship forged on China’s Twitter. Now, the Finding Dory star is working on a film about itEllen DeGeneres and BuzzFeed are working together on a film inspired by a series of articles about a stolen mobile phone, according to the Hollywood Reporter. Continue reading...

From calendar to email, here’s what to replace the iOS defaults with to work better, harder and hopefully lessFace it: the best thing about iOS is the App Store. The iPhone has come a long way since version one, but the ability to add to the fifteen built-in apps has been the biggest improvement.These days, Apple’s default apps are showing their age. What’s more, they suffer from being too simple for power users and too complex for new users. Ask anyone who needs to get serious work done with their iPhone and they’ll tell you that the first step to a more productive life is to ditch the defaults and replace them with apps built from the ground-up for power. Continue reading...

Where can I find rare Pokémon? How can I make it easier to capture them, what should I do with stardust and candy, and how do I make my battery last?Pokémon Go has caught the world by storm, sent Nintendo’s stock price rocketing, atheists into churches and Australians into police stations.But it can be confusing and a lot of legwork, literally, if you screw something up – so here are a few tips to get you started. Continue reading...