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Tech
Industry, products, and the wires that hold it all together.
744 stories archived
Fairphone's latest repairable phone is finally available in the US for $650
Fairphone sells components like the USB port and screen, all swappable with a single torx driver.
Anthropic’s Text Watermarking Proves AI Companies Do Not Care at All About Writing
AI companies see words as interchangeable and have zero clue how to judge the “quality” of writing.
Ford hopes this Hypercar will be its next Le Mans winner
The American automaker returns to the top category of endurance racing next year.
Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma takes pains to deliver a slasher fan’s dream
Matte paintings—not CGI—warp a world designed to hit a nerve for slasher fans.
OpenAI launches ChatGPT for Teens with stronger safeguards
Teen version is intended for children aged 13 to 17 and includes content protections on self-harm and sexual chats OpenAI is launching a version of ChatGPT designed for teenagers – the first generation to grow up with artificial intelligence – who are already using it for schoolwork, questions about daily life and even companionship. The San Francisco-based company says ChatGPT for Teens, which launches on Tuesday, is tailored for children aged 13 to 17 with stronger protections including content restrictions around things such as suicide, self-harm and romantic or sexual chats. It also provides homework and study support designed to help students learn rather than spit out answers and school essays. Continue reading...
X-rays add new twist to narwhal's spiral tusk
New study finds that the tusks have not one but two spirals, twisting in opposite directions.
X's Algorithm Feeds Off Ragebait and Impacts Democrats More, Study Finds
X is driving engagement by making users fight in the replies.
The National Park Service Is Using Flock. Rangers Are Pissed
“I fear for the day when a visitor's National Park experience is interrupted by being pulled over and held at gunpoint because a license plate reader misread their plate.”
Reel-ing it in: Meta is paying influencers to promote teen accounts
Tech Transparency Project’s report shows whenever governments mull platform regulations, company recruits influencers to promote its safety features In July 2025, Meta gathered parenting influencers from all over Australia at a waterfront venue overlooking the Sydney Opera House. It was a camping-themed event and in many ways was like any other influencer affair. There were Instagram-branded tents to take pictures in, an Instagram-branded step-and-repeat, a custom-tote making station and Instagram-branded snacks and coffee cups. But this “screen smart” event wasn’t about the photo op. Continue reading...
Microsoft Copilot reveals secret input that allowed it to be hacked
Secret parameter allowed hackers to steal passwords when a target clicked on a link.
‘The ultimate gamers’ mascot’: Sonic the Hedgehog at 35 – from 2D to 3D to a billion-dollar film franchise
Sonic’s creators explain how the speedy scamp has kept on running through generations as an enduring avatar of ‘attitude in the face of adversity’ One day in the early 1990s, I came home from university for the weekend and discovered that my dad had bought himself a Sega Mega Drive, bundled with a copy of Sonic the Hedgehog 2. I knew about Sega’s mascot of course. The launch of the original Sonic the Hedgehog game in 1991 was a landmark moment for the company, massively boosting the sales of its 16bit console in the west, ripping market share from the dominant Super Nintendo. While Mario was the family favourite, Sonic with his speed, attitude and brash visual energy encapsulated the edgy spirit of the early 1990s MTV culture. That weekend, Dad and I did little else but team up for daylong Sonic sessions, the game’s two-player mode letting us play cooperatively as we zoomed through those dense, beautiful play zones. Thirty-five years later, I am still a Sonic fan. There have been plenty of rough times (Sonic 06, Sonic and the Secret Rings, Sonic Free Riders – sorry, I can’t go on), but there have been plenty of good ones too. (Rush, Mania and Colors, and I have a soft spot for Sonic R, a racer developed by Traveller’s Tales, which went on to make the Lego games). Few people know this rollercoaster better than Takashi Iizuka, who worked on Sonic 3 as a designer and has been series producer for almost 20 years. When he joined Sega in 1992 he wanted to work for the company’s arcade division, but after playing the original Sonic – especially Sonic 2 – he was seduced. Continue reading...
As temperatures get hotter, pesticides are more dangerous to farmworkers
Research shows heat amplifies the dangers of pesticides.
The best vacuum cleaners in the UK for hard floors, carpet and pet hair – tested
From handheld to corded, self-emptying to stick models, these are our resident cleaner’s favourite vacuums for a spotless home • The best cordless vacuum cleaners, tested • How to make your vacuum cleaner last longer Buying a vacuum cleaner isn’t as easy as you might think. With so many brands and models to choose from, it can be bewildering. Sticking with established brands isn’t necessarily a safe bet, with past performance being no guarantee that the latest models will be as good. Meanwhile, prices can be deceptive, with some affordable models now closing the gap on top-of-the-range brands when it comes to cleaning performance. You can’t know all this by browsing through a department store or online. The ideal thing to do would be to take a few models home to try them out – but good luck persuading anyone to let you do that. Thankfully, you won’t have to try because I’ve tested an array of models for you. I’ve measured each one’s ability to perform a range of real-world cleaning jobs, so you can discover the best vacuum cleaner for you. Continue reading...
Dickovers, baggravation and botiquette: 18 new words to describe our tech hellscape
There are many tech irritants that are a scourge of modern life, yet we have lacked the vocabulary to describe them ... until now The “dickover” is the scourge of the modern age. Coined in May by John Gruber, a tech writer, it is defined as “a modal panel, popover, or curtain presented by a website or app, deliberately obscuring its own content to frustrate the user”. Essentially, it is the thing (or more often, things) you have to click away in order to read the thing you wanted to read. It is the “accept cookies” box, the “allow notifications?” box, the “sign in with Google” box, the pop-up video box, etc. We shouldn’t fool ourselves into thinking that dickovers are the only terrible thing about technology in 2026. Until now, though, we have lacked the vocabulary to describe them, so here are some suggestions. Continue reading...
Dressmaker – a canvas for the creativity of dream dress design
Co-created by a developer and his sewing-obsessed partner, this design game is ‘the most technically challenging’ its lead programmer has ever made When Jonathan Hau-Yoon wanted to make something as meaningful as the environmental strategy game Terra Nil , he turned for inspiration to his longtime partner. Sabrina Becker had worn a dress she made herself to their very first date, and would have studied costume design abroad had hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (a connective tissue disorder I also have) not put those plans on hold. The pair developed a concept around the creative decisions involved in dressmaking, like trying to fit pattern pieces on to available fabric while observing the grain line (the direction of the thread in woven fabric). Other decisions followed: a 3D model on which to place garment pieces, buttons and trims with which to decorate them, clients with commissions as creative prompts. Continue reading...
US states take on Meta in pivotal trial over child social media addiction claims
State attorneys general allege that tech company intentionally designed addictive products that harm young people More than half of the states in the US have joined together in an unprecedented lawsuit against Meta that goes to trial on Tuesday, accusing the parent company of Instagram and Facebook of deliberately designing addictive products that lured in young people and caused them harm. The jury trial is taking place in federal court in Oakland, California , and is expected to last between six and eight weeks. The jury is expected to hear from Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg , Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri and employee turned whistleblower Arturo Béjar . Continue reading...
Theban tomb reveals how Egyptian burial trends evolved in time
Practices shifted from individuals buried in coffins to reusing sites for later mummy interments.
Democracy v the machine: the birth of the digital age and the warnings that were ignored
Many hoped that the march of technology would usher in an egalitarian utopia – but some foresaw the threat it would pose to liberal society. Why did nobody listen? One of the stranger things about this dizzying, headlong moment in time is that it doesn’t have much of a past. Everything is about the future of this, the future of that: the future of work, the future of humanity, the future of the planet. It’s as if everyone is screaming (some ecstatically, most terror-stricken): robots are taking over the world! Meanwhile, you can’t put down your phone, unplug, delete your AI apps, tell Zoom to piss off; it feels as if you are racing toward something, and can’t stop, or look back, or think straight. But of course this weird moment in history does have a past. It comes from somewhere. It wasn’t inevitable. Things could have turned out differently. They still can. And if you look back, one thing you’ll see is that a lot of people saw this all coming. They foresaw our present when it was still the future. They thought it might turn out fabulously, a computer utopia. And they worried it might turn out disastrously. Above all, they issued warning after warning about the rise of what I call the artificial state, the replacement of the liberal democratic nation-state, the consent of the governed, with the rule of people by machines. They warned of a future in which democratic deliberation would be replaced by prediction by calculation, the public sphere would be supplanted by data-driven commerce, and drones would take the place of the demos. Why didn’t anyone listen? The new underworld is made up of innocent and well-intentioned people who work with slide rules and calculating machines and computers which can retain an almost infinite number of bits of information as well as sort, categorise, and reproduce this information at the press of a button. Most of these people are highly educated, many of them are PhDs, and none that I have met have malignant political designs on the American public. They may, however, radically reconstruct the American political system, build a new politics, and even modify revered and venerable American institutions – facts of which they are blissfully innocent. Continue reading...
US vaccination rates fall again as exemptions continue to rise, CDC data shows
Again, the CDC did not publish a full report and instead simply put the data online.
Former SpaceX engineers are building a robotic factory for making steel parts
“We're not necessarily building in a dogmatic fashion towards full autonomy.”
Pornhub's Parent Company to Pay $120 Million to Settle Child Sexual Abuse Lawsuits
The deal settles class action lawsuits claiming Mindgeek's sites hosted and profited from abuse videos of minors.
The Moon's shadow raced across the heart of Spain, and I was there to see it
Here's what it was like watching a total solar eclipse 90 minutes north of Madrid.
As Wisconsin cities flee Flock, its shared camera network loses value
"Network effect" can run in reverse.
Supreme Court rejects Verizon bid for $47 million refund of FCC fine
Despite loss, carriers still claim selling device-location data isn't illegal.