South America
Russian drone hits Turkish ships in Ukraine
A Russian drone strike hit a Turkish-owned commercial vessel at Ukraine's Chornomorsk port. Ukraine said Odessa port was also hit and a total of three Turkish ships were damaged. Kyiv said Russian attacks on Black Sea shipping showed it wasn't serious about ending the war. Were South Africans lured into fighting for Russia's Ukraine war?
I thought I'd struck lucky on a dating app but invited a monster into my life
I thought I'd struck lucky on a dating app but invited a monster into my life Handsome, charming, a gentle giant - Katie Yates believed Jason Smith was a real catch after meeting him on a dating app. But within months he had subjected her to relentless physical and mental abuse before raping her and attempting to drown her in the bath just before Christmas. Katie, 42 and from Cardiff, has waived her anonymity as a victim of sexual assault to warn women to be wary of strangers they meet on dating apps who may pose as nice guys in an attempt to lure them in. You scroll on all the profiles with smiling photos and slick words but there are some people who should be looking for a therapist, not a girlfriend, she said. Katie had been single for five years when she signed up to a dating app in February 2018.
Ukraine's health supplies hit in series of Russian strikes on medical warehouses
Ukraine's health supplies hit in series of Russian strikes on medical warehouses Warehouses supplying the vast majority of Ukraine's pharmacies have been destroyed in a series of Russian attacks over recent months. Medical supplies worth about $200m (ยฃ145m) were destroyed in just two strikes in December and October. A large warehouse storing medicines in the city of Dnipro was destroyed in a Russian air strike on 6 December. As a result, about $110m worth of medicines were destroyed - estimated at up to 30% of Ukraine's monthly supply. It was a missile and drone strike against our facility.
Online gaming escaped Australia's social media ban - but critics say it's just as addictive
Online gaming escaped Australia's social media ban - but critics say it's just as addictive Wednesday afternoons have become a ritual for 15-year-old Sadmir Perviz. It's a circuitous route from home in Perth to the Fiona Stanley Hospital - but it's worth it, he says, to sit down for a game of Dungeons & Dragons with people he may not know but with whom he shares a great deal in common. Sadmir and his board game companions are just some of the 300 patients at the gaming disorder clinic, Australia's only publicly-run institution of its type, helping patients wean themselves off excessive online gaming habits. The room where they meet is a simple space in a faceless hospital but in the corner, there's a pile of boardgames on a chair. Jenga, Uno and Sushi Go are also popular choices at the informal group which is attended by both patients and clinicians.
Amazon pulls AI recap from Fallout TV show after it made several mistakes
Amazon has pulled a video recap made with artificial intelligence (AI) from its hit TV show Fallout after users said it got several facts wrong about the series. The firm said in November it was testing the first-of-its-kind tool in the US to help viewers catch up on some of its shows on streaming service Prime Video - including Fallout, its adaptation of the popular video game franchise. But it has since disappeared from the site after users highlighted mistakes in its video summarising the events of Fallout season one - including claiming one scene was set more than 100 years earlier than it was. The BBC has approached Amazon for comment. The move to apparently press pause on its AI-powered recaps was first reported by tech publication The Verge .
When football fought colonial rule
Football, under French colonial rule, was built to exclude them. So Algerians built their own club. The Sports Association in Constantine may have laid the foundations in 1898, but it was MC Alger, founded in 1921 who was the first football club that sparked a statement of identity, resistance and belonging. Samantha Johnson looks at how a football club fought colonial rule. Why does Israel play in European Football?
You're Thinking About AI and Water All Wrong
Fears about AI data centers' water use have exploded. Experts say the reality is far more complicated than people think. Last month, journalist Karen Hao posted a Twitter thread in which she acknowledged that there was a substantial error in her blockbuster book Empire of AI. Hao had written that a proposed Google data center in a town near Santiago, Chile, could require "more than one thousand times the amount of water consumed by the entire population"--a figure which, thanks to a unit misunderstanding, appears to have been off by a magnitude of 1,000. In the thread, Hao thanked Andy Masley, the head of an effective altruism organization in Washington, DC, for bringing the correction to her attention. Masley has spent the past several months questioning some of the numbers and rhetoric common in popular media about water use and AI on his Substack.
Watch: Clair Obscur sweeps The Game Awards with nine wins
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 has been named game of the year in a record-breaking haul at this year's Game Awards. The French-developed role-playing game (RPG) cleaned up in nine of the 10 categories it was up for, with further wins in best narrative, best music and best performance. I think that's what I find really beautiful is that people really reacted strongly to all the passion we put into this game. Influencer Tallulah Metcalfe took part in the BBC Teen Summit in Bradford, and gave us her best tips. Dr Kaitlyn Regehr has this advice to help you stop looking at your phone and go on a digital detox.