Sam Altman said if there is doubt the system will default to the under-18 experience putting ‘safety ahead of privacy and freedom for teens’

OpenAI will restrict how ChatGPT responds to a user it suspects is under 18, unless that user passes the company’s age estimation technology or provides ID, after legal action from the family of a 16-year-old who killed himself in April after months of conversations with the chatbot.

OpenAI was prioritising “safety ahead of privacy and freedom for teens�, chief executive Sam Altman said in a blog post on Tuesday, stating “minors need significant protection�.

Super-budget Chinese retailer reports revenues of $63.3m last year, almost double its $32m in 2023

• Business live – latest updates

The UK operation of the Chinese online marketplace Temu doubled revenues and pre-tax profits last year, as British consumers snapped up products offered by the super-budget retailer.

Temu UK reported revenues of $63.3m (£46.4m) last year, almost double the $32m in 2023, while pre-tax profits similarly surged from $2m to $3.9m, accounts show.

Kirk’s rise to fame was largely bolstered by being extremely online – and it seems the suspect has that in common

Hello, and welcome to TechScape. Dara Kerr here, filling in for Blake Montgomery, who promises he’ll come back from vacation. Meanwhile, I’m looking at the memes, gaming and internet culture behind the shooting of Charlie Kirk.

The bullet that killed conservative activist was inscribed with a message: “Notices bulge OwO whats this?� The online world quickly recognized the reference. It’s a phrase used in internet culture to troll people in online role-play communities, specifically furries (a subculture that cosplays as anthropomorphic animal characters).

How thousands of ‘overworked, underpaid’ humans train Google’s AI to seem smart

Larry Ellison: Oracle co-founder who overtook Musk as world’s richest person

Apple debuts thinner, $999 iPhone Air at ‘awe-dropping’ annual product event

How to Save the Internet by Nick Clegg review – spinning Silicon Valley

The women in love with AI companions: ‘I vowed to my chatbot that I wouldn’t leave him’

Comments from Chinese official in Madrid have raised questions over who could control the algorithm that powers Tik Tok’s video feed

Donald Trump has claimed his administration has reached a deal with China to keep TikTok operating in the US, amid uncertainty over what shape the final agreement will take, with suggestions from the Chinese side that Beijing would retain control of the algorithm that powers the site’s video feed.

“We have a deal on TikTok ... We have a group of very big companies that want to buy it,� Trump said on Tuesday, without providing further details.

Rachel Reeves says move is a ‘vote of confidence’ in British economy as she prepares to open firm’s first UK datacentre

• Business live – latest updates

Google has said it will invest £5bn in the UK in the next two years to help meet growing demand for artificial intelligence services, in a boost for the government.

The investment, which comes as Google opens its new datacentre in Waltham Cross in Hertfordshire, is expected to contribute to the creation of thousands of jobs, the US tech company said.

In 2020, after spending half his life in the US, Song-Chun Zhu took a one-way ticket to China. Now he might hold the key to who wins the global AI race

By the time Song-Chun Zhu was six years old, he had encountered death more times than he could count. Or so it felt. This was the early 1970s, the waning years of the Cultural Revolution, and his father ran a village supply store in rural China. There was little to do beyond till the fields and study Mao Zedong at home, and so the shop became a refuge where people could rest, recharge and share tales. Zhu grew up in that shop, absorbing a lifetime’s worth of tragedies: a family friend lost in a car crash, a relative from an untreated illness, stories of suicide or starvation. “That was really tough,� Zhu recalled recently. “People were so poor.�

The young Zhu became obsessed with what people left behind after they died. One day, he came across a book that contained his family genealogy. When he asked the bookkeeper why it included his ancestors’ dates of birth and death but nothing about their lives, the man told him matter of factly that they were peasants, so there was nothing worth recording. The answer terrified Zhu. He resolved that his fate would be different.

The ‘knowledge economy’ promised cultural and social growth. Instead, we got worsening inequality and division. Artificial intelligence will supercharge it

Recently, Palantir – a tech corporation that boasts no fewer than five billionaire executives – announced its Q2 earnings: over a billion dollars generated in a single quarter. Forty-eight per cent growth in its business compared with the same quarter last year, including 93% growth in its US commercial business. These elephantine numbers are maddening – and, in large part, a result of the company fully embracing artificial intelligence (AI).

The AI revolution is here and as its proponents remind us daily, it will remake our world, making every company and government agency more efficient and less error-prone while helping us unlock hitherto unheard of advances in science and technology. Not only this, but if we play our cards right, big tech’s latest explosion could yield unprecedented economic growth.

Dustin Guastella is the director of operations for Teamsters Local 623 in Philadelphia, and a research associate at the Center for Working-Class Politics

The clown duo share what makes them laugh, including pop divas, unhinged mobile game ads and Kermit unmasked

• Get our weekend culture and lifestyle email

We are Rae and Will AKA raeandwill, a clown duo who specialise in mime – so asking us to write about the 10 funniest things we’ve seen on the internet is technically considered a hate crime. But if the endless scroll of other people plugging their clown shows has taught us anything, it’s that we have to maintain our digital facade or risk being unbooked and unblessed. And if there’s one thing the world desperately needs more of, it’s clown shows. (We aren’t joking.) So here we are.

Will thinks the internet is a demonic, vacuous hole that is slowly stripping him of his humanity :( And Rae is convinced that the internet has made her stronger, hotter, funnier, and in no way damaged her brain :)

Sign up for the fun stuff with our rundown of must-reads, pop culture and tips for the weekend, every Saturday morning

More women are entering the US ranching and agriculture field. Their struggles – and aspirations – defy the traditional Marlboro cowboy stereotype

Savanah McCarty was not riding across the wide-open prairie when a horse accident nearly killed her.

She was in the driveway of her leased farm outside Bozeman, Montana, waiting for a student’s mother to arrive, when her horse seized and flipped over backwards, landing on top of her.

Preteens are parroting influencer speak and demanding anti-ageing products as the pressure to fit in intensifies

Jessica, 25, was working a shift at Sephora when a little girl who looked about 10 ran up to one of her colleagues, crying. “Her skin was burning,� Jessica said, “it was tomato red. She had been running around, putting every acid you can think of on the palm of her hand, then all over her face. One of our estheticians had to tend to her skin. Her parents were nowhere to be seen.�

Former Sephora employee KM, 25, has her war stories too. Like the day a woman was caught shoplifting and told the security guard “she was trying to steal because her kid was getting bullied because she didn’t have a Dior lip gloss. [The mom] couldn’t afford it but her daughter told her she is going to get made fun of at school.�

A growing number of shooters are in conversation with their digital communities, which are becoming extreme

On the day that 22-year-old Tyler Robinson shot and killed rightwing activist Charlie Kirk, prosecutors say, he texted his roommate to confess what he’d done. While appearing to admit to the murder and describe how he was planning to retrieve his gun, he pivoted to mention why he had carved messages into the ammunition.

“Remember how I was engraving bullets? The fuckin messages are mostly a big meme,� Robinson texted, according to authorities.

Top-spec cameras, cutting edge AI, great software and stunning screen squeezed into a more manageable frame

The Pixel 10 Pro is Google’s best phone that is still a pocketable, easy-to-handle size, taking the excellent Pixel 10 and beefing it up in the camera department.

That makes it a contender for the top smaller phone with Apple’s iPhone 17 Pro, offering the best of Google’s hardware without an enormous screen. It is also the cheapest of three Pixel 10 Pro phones starting at £999 (€1,099/$999/A$1,699) sitting below the bigger 10 Pro XL and the tablet-phone hybrid the 10 Pro Fold.

Super-svelte body, fast chip, high capacity battery and big camera make it some of the best phone-tablet hardware

Honor’s latest foldable phone-tablet attempts to usurp Samsung as the leader of the pack with a super-thin body, massive battery and a ginormous camera lump on the back.

The Magic V5 is an impressively thin piece of engineering, slimmed down to about 8.9mm thick when shut, with each half about the same thickness as a USB-C port. It feels very similar to a standard slab phone in the hand, but one you can open up like a book for a mini-tablet on the go.

Main screen: 7.95in (403ppi) 120Hz OLED flexible display

Cover screen: 6.43in (405ppi) 120Hz OLED

Processor: Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite

RAM: 16GB

Storage: 512GB

Operating system: MagicOS 9.0.1 (Android 15)

Camera: 50MP + 50MP ultrawide + 64MP 3x tele; 2x 20MP selfie

Connectivity: 5G, dual sim + esim, USB-C, wifi 7, NFC, Bluetooth 6, GNSS

Water resistance: IP58 and IP59 (immersion and high pressure jets)

Dimensions folded: 156.8 x 74.3 x 8.88-9mm

Dimensions unfolded: 156.8 x 145.9 x 4.1-4.2mm

Weight: 217-222g

Additional 5x telephoto camera, actually useful AI tools, Qi2 support and slick software make for a quality Android

Google’s new cheapest Pixel 10 has been upgraded with more cameras, a faster chip and some quality software that has brought it out of the shadow of its pricier Pro siblings to set a new standard of what you should expect from a base-model flagship phone.

The regular Pixel 10 costs £799 (€899/$799/A$1,349) – the same as last year’s Pixel 9 – undercutting the 10 Pro by £200 and matching rivals from Samsung and Apple while offering more for your money.

Screen: 6.3in 120Hz FHD+ OLED (422ppi)

Processor: Google Tensor G5

RAM: 12GB

Storage: 128 or 256GB

Operating system: Android 16

Camera: 48MP+ 13MP UW + 10.8MP 5x tele; 10.5MP selfie

Connectivity: 5G, eSim, wifi 6E, NFC, Bluetooth 6 and GNSS

Water resistance: IP68 (1.5m for 30 minutes)

Dimensions: 152.8 x 72.0 x 8.6mm

Weight: 204g

Super-slim frame, improved display, enhanced camera and plenty of power give the pricey phone-tablet hybrid a major upgrade

Samsung’s latest flagship folding phone looks like it has been put on a diet. The result is a transformation into one of the thinnest and lightest devices available and radically changes how it handles, for the better.

The Galaxy Z Fold 7 measures 8.9mm thick when shut – well within the realms of a standard smartphone if you ignore the camera bump on the back. It easily fits in a pocket but opens up to turn into a folding tablet just 4.2mm thick.

Slim, lightweight and with a bright 4K picture, Sky’s low-cost TV shines because of its software and service

Sky’s latest streaming TV aims to be a good, all-in-one budget option for your sitting room – and it achieves all those aims, leaving it standing strong in a field of mediocre, similarly priced appliances.

The Glass Air is a lighter, slimmer and cheaper version of the Glass gen 2 and is arguably the low-cost TV Sky should have launched first, coming in three sizes starting at £309 or just £6 a month on 48-month interest-free credit with £20 upfront.

Bluetooth noise cancellers have good sound, physical buttons and buck trend of boring black cans with distinctive transparent aesthetic

London-based Nothing’s latest gadget is a set of over-ear headphones that throws out the dull design norms of noise-cancelling cans for an attention-attracting look that is a cross between a 1980s Walkman and Doctor Who’s Cybermen.

The large, semi-transparent cans are certainly a statement piece on your head, with an outer design covered in details, dot-matrix print and physical buttons, but sadly stopping short of the flashing LEDs of the company’s phones.

Super bright OLED screen, top tracking accuracy, voice control and calls on your wrist are held back by high price

Garmin’s latest mid-range running and multisport watch has smartened up with a very bright OLED screen, voice assistant and upgraded sensors.

The Forerunner 570 continues the revamp of the company’s running watches, which have all gained more accurate GPS chips and improved heart rate monitors. The new model replaces the popular 265 and sits under the 970. It offers a similar look and feel to the top watch but with a few key features removed for a lower price.

Upgraded Bluetooth cans fold up, fit well, have long battery life, sound great and reduce more noise than rivals

Sony’s latest top-of-the-range Bluetooth headphones seek to reclaim the throne for the best noise cancellers money can buy with changes inside and out.

The Sony 1000X series has long featured some of the best noise cancelling you can buy and has been locked in a battle with rival Bose for the top spot.

PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox, Nintendo Switch 2; Gearbox Software/2K Games
Familiar and predictable, but also well-honed and significantly less juvenile, the fourth Borderlands game is a blast

Once a games franchise hits its fourth outing, it is certainly mature – yet maturity is not a word generally associated with Borderlands, the colourful and performatively edgy looter-shooter from Texas. This series is characterised by a pervasive and polarising streak of distinctly adolescent humour. But in Borderlands 4, developer Gearbox has addressed that issue: it features plenty of returning characters in its storyline, but this time around they are more world-weary and less annoyingly manic. Borderlands has finally matured, to an extent. And not before time.

Borderlands 4 still flings jokes at you thick and fast, and they are still hit-or-miss, but at least its general humour is a bit more sophisticated than before. It retains the distinctive cel-shaded graphical style and gun and ordnance-heavy gameplay that people have always loved. Indeed, it throws even more guns at you than any of its predecessors, and with a little work at filtering out the best ones, you will find plenty of absolute gems with which to take on hordes of straightforward enemies and more interesting bosses. A decent storyline emerges after the formulaic first few hours, eventually sending you off on some unexpected, fun and sometimes gratifyingly surreal tangents.

From famous Street Fighter lines to quips from 90s classics, these are the quotes we hear again and again – and even incorporate into our own lives

Some snippets of video game dialogue, like classic movie quotes, are immediately recognisable to a swathe of fans. From Street Fighter’s “hadouken!� to Call of Duty’s “remember, no Russian� to BioShock’s “would you kindly?�, there are phrases so creepy, clever or cool they have slipped imperceptibly into the gaming lexicon, ensuring that whenever they’re memed on social media, almost everyone gets the reference.

But there are also odd little phrases, sometimes from obscure games, that stick with us for seemingly no reason. I recall most of the vocal barks from the second world war strategy game Commandos: Behind Enemy Lines, even though I haven’t played it for 20 years. Why is it that I’ll lose my headphones, wallet and phone on a daily basis, but I have absolute recall when it comes to the utterances of burly soldier Samuel Brooklyn? Why am I doomed to “Finally, some action�, “Consider it done, boss� and the immortal “okey dokey� echoing through my head? What is wrong with me?

After a lacklustre response to the 2025 edition, the game has gone all out to engage players and respond to user feedback

In an open office space somewhere inside the vast Electronic Arts campus in Vancouver, dozens of people are gathered around multiple monitors playing EA Sports FC 26. Around them, as well as rows of football shirts from leagues all over the world, are PCs and monitors with staff watching feeds of the matches. The people playing are from EA’s Design Council, a group of pro players, influencers and fans who regularly come in to play new builds, ask questions and make suggestions. These councils have been running for years, but for this third addition to the EA Sports FC series, the successor to EA’s Fifa games, their input is apparently being treated more seriously than ever.

The message to journalists, invited here to get a sneak look at the game, is that a lacklustre response to EA Sports FC 25 has meant that addressing user feedback is the main focus. EA has set up a new Player Feedback Portal, as well as a dedicated Discord channel, for fans to put forward their concerns. The developer has also introduced AI-powered social listening tools to monitor EA Sports FC chatter across various platforms including X, Instagram and YouTube.

PC, PS5, Xbox, Switch 2; Bloober Team
An intriguing setup sees an unnamed protagonist time-travel to discover the origins of a devastating outbreak, but a stingy inventory and one-sided battles lead to frustration

Bloober Team, the Polish developer behind 2021’s hugely underrated psycho-thriller The Medium and last year’s excellent Silent Hill 2 remake, clearly understands that there is an established, almost comforting rhythm to survival horror games. It’s baffling, then, to see this latest game excel in so many areas while failing spectacularly on several of the genre’s most basic tenets.

You play an unnamed traveller, the latest of many, sent to gather information about a devastating outbreak that transformed the citizens of a town called New Dawn into the sort of misshapen monsters that have become the staple of sci-fi-adjacent survival horror: contorted of limb, long of fang, and ample of slobber. As you explore the stark, often beautifully devastated aftermath of the outbreak, you search for places where you can travel back through time to when all hell was breaking loose, extracting persons of interest who may shed light on the disaster. A slow-burn story is revealed through the usual assortment of voice notes, missives and grim environmental clues (often, as is de rigueur, daubed in blood on walls).

In this week’s newsletter: the long-awaited release from the three-person Team Cherry studio has crashed gaming storefronts and put indie developers back in the spotlight

Just one game has been dominating the gaming conversation over the past week: Hollow Knight Silksong, an eerie, atmospheric action game from a small developer in Australia called Team Cherry. It was finally released last Thursday after many years in development, and everybody is loving it. Hollow Knight was so popular that it crashed multiple gaming storefronts. With continual game cancellations, expensive failures and layoffs at bigger studios, this is the kind of indie triumph the industry loves to celebrate at the moment. But Silksong hasn’t come out of nowhere, and its success would not be easily reproducible for any other game, indie or not.

If you’re wondering what this game actually is, then imagine a dark, mostly underground labyrinth of bug nests and abandoned caverns that gradually yields its secrets to a determined player. The art style and sound are minimalist and creepy (though not scary) in a Tim Burton kind of way, the enemy bugs are fierce and hard to defeat, your player character is another bug with a small, sharp needle-like blade. It blends elements of Metroid, Dark Souls and older challenging platform games, and the unique aesthetic and perfect precision of the controls are what make it stand out from a swarm of similar games. I rinsed the first Hollow Knight and I’m captivated by Silksong. I’ve spent 15 hours on it in three days, and it has made my thumbs hurt.