News from Friday’s pre-match press conferences, including Arsenal, Newcastle, Bournemouth and Aston Villa
This article will be updated
Continue reading...News from Friday’s pre-match press conferences, including Arsenal, Newcastle, Bournemouth and Aston Villa
This article will be updated
Continue reading...As his new version of Lord of the Flies comes to the BBC, we count down the 20 boldest and most moving productions by the quintuple Bafta-winning scriptwriter
He has been hailed as the hardest-working writer in Britain. Looking at Jack Thorne’s astonishing list of credits, it’s hard to argue. The prolific playwright and screenwriter’s output includes many of the best homegrown TV dramas of the past two decades.
That’s without the many hit plays and films he has also written. There’s more to come, too. Next out of the Thorne pipeline is Channel 4’s forbidden romance Falling, with Keeley Hawes and Paapa Essiedu, and the film Enola Holmes 3, which will be followed by the small matter of Sam Mendes’ four Beatles biopics.
Continue reading...UK’s research funding body warned best scientists taking posts oversees due to lack of job stability at home
Hundreds of early career researchers have warned that the UK will lose a generation of scientists after the announcement of significant cuts to physics projects and cutting edge research facilities.
Scientists working in particle physics, astronomy and nuclear physics have been told their grants will be cut by nearly a third, with project leaders asked to report back on how their research would fare with cuts up to 60%.
Continue reading...Darlington Hippodrome
Perkins’ return to live comedy features some lurid stories of her personal and professional ineptitude, and jaunty tales about vacuum cleaners and a drug-addled trip to a shaman
Shame is what Sue Perkins promises us in this return to live comedy after years away: her public personae withdrawn like the layers of a Russian doll to reveal the true, humiliated person beneath. Who wouldn’t want to see the former Bake Off star, after “30 years in our living rooms”, put on such a show? But it’s not quite what Perkins delivers. Like Dawn French before her, in a touring set purporting to show what a “huge twat” she was, The Eternal Shame of Sue Perkins compiles a series of perky professional and personal anecdotes only loosely connected to that theme, and is judicious with its intimacies.
It is stronger in its second half, which cleaves more tightly to the theme and affords more glimpses behind our host’s brisk demeanour. Act one begins with Perkins alluding to her shame at being middle-aged and tired in an industry dedicated to youthful vigour. The ensuing anecdotes have nothing to do with that whatsoever, as she relates an inconclusive tale about local drug dealers cloning her car registration, and a literal shaggy dog story, more suggestive of pride than shame, about rescuing a wounded pup on a trip to Bolivia.
Continue reading...When the likeness of the populist leader as an angel was painted into a cheesy tribute to Italy’s last king, it caused outrage. But far better artists have been similarly profane for centuries
It must be the ugliest wall painting in Rome - and that’s even without the bizarre portrait of Giorgia Meloni as an angel. Artist Bruno Valentinetti painted his tribute to Umberto II, the last king of Italy, earlier this century in a side chapel of the ancient church of San Lorenzo in Lucina in its historic heart, the Centro Storico. It’s the kind of unsightly accretion you try to ignore when enjoying the city’s artistic glories which include, in this particular church, a staggering, stormy vision of the Crucifixion by the 17th-century painter Guido Reni, his most unforgettable masterpiece.
Valentinetti’s mural, by contrast, is a glib, tacky, photorealist effort that didn’t even last two decades before water damage demanded restoration. Valentinetti, now 83, carried out the repairs himself and had the genius idea of giving an angel the face –highly recognisable because obviously based on photos of her – of Italy’s populist prime minister. What was he thinking? Is he in love? Or was this an insidious piece of propaganda?
Continue reading...
An enterprising engineer has evoked the spirit of Acorn's BBC Micro with a custom paintjob for a Raspberry Pi 500+ computer-in-a-keyboard and a natty set of replacement keycaps.…
DEN HAAG (ANP) - Door een datalek zijn gegevens van medewerkers van de Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens (AP) en Raad voor de rechtspraak gelekt, melden de demissionaire staatssecretarissen Arno Rutte (Justitie en Veiligheid, VVD) en Eddie van Marum (Binnenlandse Zaken, BBB).
In een Kamerbrief schrijven zij dat "voor zover bekend" werkgerelateerde gegevens als naam, zakelijk e-mailadres en telefoonnummer zijn ingezien door onbevoegden. Hoeveel medewerkers zijn getroffen, wordt niet vermeld. Het lek is pikant, omdat juist de AP toeziet op de bescherming van persoonsgegevens.
Meer dan 700 miljoen mensen gebruiken ChatGPT wekelijks. Samen versturen ze dagelijks zo'n 2,5 miljard berichten. OpenAI publiceerde samen met Harvard-econoom David Deming het grootste onderzoek ooit naar hoe consumenten de AI-chatbot daadwerkelijk inzetten. De resultaten zijn verrassend.
Het snelst groeiende gebruik is niet professioneel, maar privé. In juni 2024 was 53 procent van alle gesprekken niet-werkgerelateerd; een jaar later was dat al 73 procent. Dat komt niet doordat er andere gebruikers bijkomen, maar doordat bestaande gebruikers ChatGPT steeds vaker voor persoonlijke doelen inzetten. OpenAI wil hierop inspelen met een eigen hardwareproduct.
Drie categorieën domineren bijna 80 procent van alle gesprekken:
Programmeren, waarvan velen denken dat het dé toepassing is, beslaat slechts 4,2 procent van alle berichten. Concurrent Claude van Anthropic scoort daar met 36 procent aanzienlijk hoger.
Gebruikers stellen vooral vragen (49%) in plaats van taken uit te laten voeren (40%) of zich te uiten (11%). In een werkcontext draait het juist wel om 'maken': 56 procent van de werkgerelateerde berichten vraagt om concrete output zoals e-mails, alinea's of tabellen. Interessant: wanneer mensen om advies en afwegingen vragen, is de tevredenheid hoger dan bij puur taakgericht gebruik.
De aanvankelijke mannendominantie is verdwenen; er is inmiddels een lichte meerderheid vrouwelijke gebruikers. Bijna de helft van alle berichten komt van gebruikers jonger dan 26 jaar. Geografisch groeit het gebruik het sterkst in landen met lagere en middeninkomens, wat duidt op een verbreding voorbij de westerse markten.