Goto

Collaborating Authors

 content accessibility help


Would you choose 50,000 over the chance of 1m?

BBC News

Would you choose £50,000 over the chance of £1m? You have the choice of instantly receiving £50,000 or flipping a coin for a 50/50 chance of £1m. The vast majority decide on taking the £50k, according to a survey of thousands of people by YouGov. Women voted 82% in favour of the guaranteed cash. The poll has sparked a debate about why Brits appear more risk-averse than people in the US.


Losing my leg has elevated my life, says world champion surfer

BBC News

Four-time world champion adaptive surfer Llywelyn Williams says losing his leg as a teenager elevated his life. Surfing played a pivotal role in his recovery and in the years since losing a leg after being hit by a car in 2011. It had been a passion of the then 16-year-old prior to the accident - and it was not going to stop him despite being severely injured while out skateboarding. In fact, he recalled coming around from a coma in hospital amid a dream that a surfboard came between him and a bright light like you see in the movies. It wasn't my time, said Williams, from Abersoch, Gwynedd.


Primark's new 'supermarket tactic' to woo customers in online price war

BBC News

Primark's new'supermarket tactic' to woo customers in online price war It is something I keep hearing shoppers say when I ask them whether they shop at the fast-fashion giant. It's definitely got more expensive, says 19-year-old student Eshal Malik as she browses the jewellery at Primark with a friend. But that might be about to change. Primark said on Monday that it was lowering prices on hundreds of clothing items, including jeans, jumpers and socks. It's the kind of headline you'd expect from M&S or Next, says retail analyst Natalie Berg, explaining that price cuts like this from such a low-cost retailer are surprising.


Rental searches for pet friendly properties drop after law change

BBC News

Rightmove searches for rental properties that allow pets have plummeted since law changes gave renters more rights. Following the introduction of the new rules, pet searches dropped by more than 50% in May and June compared with a year earlier. Landlords in England cannot unreasonably refuse pets in their properties under changes made in May in the Renters' Rights Act. But agents say some renters wrongly believe permission to have a pet is guaranteed, and landlords say some homes remain unsuitable for multiple pets or large dogs. Landlords must consider requests fairly and cannot unreasonably refuse them, but they can still decline where there is a valid reason, said Megan Eighteen, immediate past president of lettings agents trade body ARLA Propertymark. She said there was plenty of potential for misunderstanding, among tenants about pet-friendly properties.


Students tell us how to keep graduation outfit costs down

BBC News

From the beginning of my course, I've been thinking about what my graduation dress was going to be, says Keerthana Krishnadas. I had to make sure I looked 10 out of 10, I couldn't compromise on that. She is one of hundreds of thousands of university students graduating this summer and, like many, has been figuring out what to wear for a photo marking one of life's milestones - without breaking the bank. You can save some bucks if you thrift your outfit because you're only going to wear it once, says Keerthana. She bought hers second hand.


Warning shot or publicity stunt - how worried should we be about the OpenAI hack?

BBC News

Warning shot or publicity stunt - how worried should we be about the OpenAI hack? This week the tech world was gripped by a story that has it all - and which started like a sci-fi thriller. Hugging Face - a kind of app store for artificial intelligence tools - announced on 16 July it had been hacked by a cyber criminal wielding enormously powerful AI. The bombshell announcement was full of scary, highly technical terms: a swarm of sandboxes, agentic attacker, and self-migrating command and control. Hugging Face said the hack was different from anything it had handled before because it was done at superhuman speed by an AI with little or no human guidance. The AI performed 17,000 actions in less than two days, successfully breaching the large wealthy tech company to steal secrets.


Zelensky tries to fix crisis over removal of defence minister and counts the cost

BBC News

With an acting defence minister in place and a new commander-in-chief in charge of the military, Ukraine's recent political crisis is over, right? The political fallout from President Volodymyr Zelensky's 15 July decision not to re-appoint Mykhailo Fedorov as defence minister, as part of a cabinet reshuffle, continues to reverberate about Kyiv and beyond, even as air raid sirens wail and Russian drones and missiles are intercepted overhead. Fedorov's mostly young supporters are still mounting daily street protests, demanding that Zelensky reinstate the popular young innovator widely credited with driving much of Ukraine's recent technological innovation. On Thursday, Fedorov said he had rejected Zelensky's offers of alternative posts in government, saying there were only three positions worth having to influence the course of the war: minister of defence, commander-in-chief of the military or president of Ukraine. If you don't have a ministry under you, you don't have a budget, ex-deputy defence minister Alina Frolova said, and you don't actually have the authority to do something. Fedorov's reference to the presidency did not go unnoticed.


Paramount and Warner Bros pause 110bn merger amid legal challenge

BBC News

Paramount Skydance and rival Warner Bros Discovery have agreed to pause their $110bn (£82.8bn) The pause follows lawsuits from 12 US states and the Writers Guild of America (WGA), who argue the deal would harm competition and lead to higher prices for consumers. The decision comes just days after European regulators approved the deal, on the condition Paramount would end a major film distribution partnership with Universal Pictures in the region. With the deal on hold in the US, emergency court hearings have now been cancelled. Despite the court freeze, Paramount and Warner Bros insist that combining their operations is essential to compete with digital streaming giants and tech conglomerates.


Ten killed in Russian attack near Kyiv

BBC News

At least 15 people have been killed in Russian attacks on Ukraine, with 10 dead in ballistic missile strikes just outside Kyiv, according to a national official. Writing on social media, Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed about 100 people had been injured in Kyiv, where emergency services are still at the scene, with five other people killed in the eastern city of Sloviansk. Meanwhile, an overnight Ukrainian strike killed six people and wounded 26 near the Russian city of Kirov, more than 1,000 km (600 miles) behind the front line. Ukraine also attacked the warehouses of Wildberries - Russia's biggest online retailer - in St Petersburg and the surrounding area, setting off huge fires. In the attacks near Kyiv, Russia also appeared to have targeted Defence Ministry adviser Serhiy Beskrestnov, aka Flash, and Lyuba Shypovych, who has been involved in developing technology for the Ukrainian army.


EA's bestselling football video game gets 16 age rating due to loot boxes

BBC News

EA FC is one of the most popular video game series in the world, and reliably tops the UK charts each year. And as the trailer for the latest instalment of the annual football simulator dropped this week, one new addition drew a lot of attention. Previously, the game had been marked as 3+, meaning its content was considered suitable for most players. But last month the scope of those age ratings expanded to cover elements of the online experience including in-game purchases and mechanisms designed to encourage repeat play. In the case of EA FC, one of its most popular features has come under the new rules.