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With the success of Spider-Man: Brand New Day, we have looked back at when the star was in Essex filming in 2018 for Spider-Man: Far From Home.

A wildlife rescue centre has been overwhelmed with emergency call-outs.

The school has made major changes but are still 'pushing to that next level'

Rochelle, who rose to fame as a singer in The Saturdays and is now in a presenting duo with her husband, told how their daughter Alaia-Mai wants to be a social media creator when she's older.

Yet despite everything they have experienced, one question continues to follow them: Why did it take Cristiano so long to propose?

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Scientists have made the first viruses designed by artificial intelligence in a milestone that raises hopes for new medicines but also concerns over how to ensure the technology remains safe. The viruses are specific kinds known as bacteriophages, which only infect bacteria and are used around the world to treat patients with persistent infections. In lab tests, a cocktail of the AI-designed viruses killed E coli bugs that were resistant to natural bacteriophages. Dr Brian Hie, a chemical engineer at Stanford University in California, used genome language models, the genetic equivalent of the large language models behind AI chatbots, to design functioning genomes for bacteriophages. The viruses were then made in the laboratory and pitted against E coli in a dish. The ability to "rapidly design" genomes and tune them for specific bugs while overcoming resistance could "transform phage therapy" and "expand biotechnological toolkits," the researchers wrote in the journal Science. But beyond the potential benefits, the scientists said the work raised "important biosafety, biocontainment and biosecurity considerations" and urged others who were designing whole genomes to "consult both safety and security professionals throughout the project." In an accompanying article, Prof Tom Inglesby and Dr Moritz Hanke at the Center for Health Security at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, reinforced the warning, writing: "Although this is promising for life sciences applications, it also raises urgent biosafety and biosecurity questions. The ability to compose viral genomes using generative AI now exists; the governance to safely steer it does not." Tom Ellis, a professor of synthetic genome engineering at Imperial College London, said the work was impressive, but revealed how hard it would be to make more complex genomes. "This is literally the smallest and easiest genome to make," he said. An AI trained on the genetic code of dangerous bugs could be used to design more harmful viruses, Ellis said, but controlling access to genetic data and having restrictions on making genomes that look dangerous would help. "Governments are working hard to do this already," he added. "But honestly," he said, "the threat from full AI design and writing of a genome of a virus or bacteria is very overblown when we consider that just taking existing pathogens and making gain-of-function changes to their genomes is so much easier and much more likely to be a real pathogenic threat." Dr Filippa Lentzos, a reader in science and international security at King's College London, said the most important point to intervene at the moment was when DNA was being manufactured. "It's important to see the bigger governance picture and not focus regulation solely on the AI model," she said. "A layered approach makes more sense: safeguards around model development and access, responsible research review, synthesis screening, and established laboratory biosafety and biosecurity."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Machine-generated traffic to surge 1000x in five years, while we meatbags keep clicking away slowly

The Tories have said they will slam the door on foreign nationals being given our social housing.

A survey by Ipsos in the UK asked Britons what they think are the main causes for a rise in the number of working age people receiving disability and health benefits.

Jason Arday's resignation from the University of Cambridge raises uncomfortable questions right across the board

Jason Arday resigned this week from the university, where he had become a poster boy for diversity as its youngest ever black professor, after an investigation was launched into his CV.

A New Mexico court ordered (PDF) Meta to create a $567 million fund to address harms linked to youth mental health and child sexual exploitation after finding its platforms constituted a public nuisance. "In sum, the Court finds that New Mexico is in the midst of a teen mental health crisis affecting public health and public safety in and throughout the state, and that Meta's platforms are a significant contributing cause to the crisis," wrote Chief Judge Bryan Biedscheid in the decision. The fund comes on top of $375 million in civil penalties, though the judge declined to mandate changes to features such as infinite scroll and autoplay, citing potential First Amendment and Section 230 concerns. Tech Policy Press reports: The decision follows the second phase of in the State of New Mexico v. Meta Platforms Inc., which consisted of a bench trial. Its central question was whether Meta's platforms amounted to a public nuisance in New Mexico, and, if the court found that they did, what remedy would be needed to address it. In March, a Santa Fe jury found Meta liable for violations of New Mexico's Unfair Practices Act, awarding $375 million in civil penalties. The jury deliberated less than a day following that nearly seven-week trial. The $567 million abatement fund would be in addition to the civil penalties, according to today's decision. New Mexico Attorney General Raul Torrez sued Meta in December 2023, alleging the company made false public statements about the safety of its platforms while knowing internally that its products facilitated child sexual exploitation. The court denied Meta's Section 230 defense in May 2024. In today's decision, the court again asserted that "Section 230 does not preclude the State's public nuisance claim," but the decision attempted to thread the needle on issues that the court determined might have run "afoul" of the statute, or of the First Amendment, such as issuing remedies around any particular product feature.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Mrs Badenoch had ruled out any pact with Nigel Farage and said: 'Reform are a woke party. It's all moaning and whinging and not proper solutions.'

Possession was channelling Daphne Du Maurier from the opening shot of a decaying mansion on the hill.

The drought afflicting our once green and pleasant land has spread into the multiplexes: this week's only major release (for grown-ups) is the woeful Super Troopers 3.

The BBC six-part series, Hercule, with Edward Bluemel in the title role, is soon to start filming, mostly in Liverpool.

Ariana now plans to take a break after her world tour finishes in London next month - and her disenchantment spills over into her latest album, Petal.

AI usage is evident but isn't yet a serious problem

Ben-Tzur and Ori, who were ripped from their mother shortly after birth and passed around owners as trophy pets.

The women say they were sexually abused or raped at the Army Foundation College within the past five years, when all were aged 17.