And hey, maybe the overseas remote operators senators fret about won't be needed quite so often

Waymo is rolling out its sixth-generation autonomous driving system, saying it's designed to avoid a repeat of past weather-related snafus. It's also causing controversy by putting the new kit on vehicles built by a Chinese automaker. …

In what is considered one of the most serious estimates since the outbreak of war in October 2023, the Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights has suggested that Palestinian deaths in Gaza may have exceeded 200,000. The estimate is based on data indicating a population decline of more than 10% in recent months.

If confirmed, the figure would call into question current casualty estimates. It would also raise serious concerns about the gap between published statistics and the reality on the ground.

Gaza's population decline opens the door to shocking possibilities

Stuart Casey-Maslen, head of the Academy's International Humanitarian Law Focus Project, told Anadolu Agency that the recorded population decline could indicate the loss of around 200,000 people. He stressed that the figures announced so far "do not reflect the full extent of human losses."

He explained that the officially documented toll includes only bodies that have been found or registered. An unknown number of victims may remain under rubble or in inaccessible areas. He said

We will need time to know the exact number. But it is clear that we are facing a huge human loss, and it is necessary to know how these people were killed.

According to Gaza's Ministry of Health, documented deaths have reached 72,037, with more than 171,000 injured. The ministry notes that thousands of victims have not yet been recovered due to ongoing destruction and limited rescue access.

International report monitors Gaza among 23 armed conflicts

Maslen's comments were included in the Academy's War Watch report, which assessed Gaza and the West Bank alongside 23 other global conflicts over the past 18 months.

The report states that conditions in Gaza remain extremely dangerous. This is despite a decline in large-scale clashes compared to the most intense periods of fighting.

Maslen said the absence of widespread hostilities seen before last year's ceasefire "does not mean that the suffering of the population has ended." He stressed that people "are still dying in Gaza."

He added that wounded civilians in need of urgent evacuation face severe shortages of food, water, shelter, and healthcare. He called for a significant increase in humanitarian aid and guaranteed, unhindered access.

Exceptional destruction and years of reconstruction

Turning to reconstruction, Maslen described the scale of destruction as "exceptional." He said returning life to pre-October 2023 levels will take years, not months, and require billions of dollars in investment.

He emphasised that rebuilding critical infrastructure demands long-term international commitment. This must go beyond emergency relief to comprehensive development planning.

Legal characterisation and pending accountability

In legal terms, Maslen noted that the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry previously concluded that genocide had taken place in Gaza, though it did not specify a timeframe.

He also pointed out that in November 2024, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former defence minister Yoav Gallant. The charges relate to alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Maslen criticised sanctions imposed on several ICC judges in connection with those warrants. He argued that such measures undermine international justice rather than support it.

He concluded that the attacks carried out by Hamas on 7 October 2023 cannot justify the scale of human losses that followed. He called for genuine legal accountability for events over the past two years.

Between limited official figures and alarming population estimates, the situation in Gaza remains unresolved. The true scale of human loss may be far greater than current records suggest.

Featured image via Wafa News Agency

By Alaa Shamali

The Regulator of Social Housing (RSH) has issued the lowest, most serious rating for social housing landlords, after its inspection uncovered "very serious failings".

The RSH inspects all social housing providers as part of its regulatory inspection programme. It takes into account all four consumer standards. These are: Neighbourhood and Community Standard, Safety and Quality Standard, Tenancy Standard, and the Transparency, Influence and Accountability Standard.

The judgment on Northumberland County Council ruled:

Our judgement is that there are very serious failings in the landlord delivering the outcomes of the consumer standards. The landlord must make fundamental changes so that improved outcomes are delivered.

Social housing — 'Significant inconsistencies'

The RSH also based the judgment on the "scale of the issues" and the "significant impact" on tenants.

Social housing providers are required to have accurate, up-to-date, and evidence-based information about the condition of their homes. This should:

reliably inform their provision of quality, well maintained and safe homes for tenants and to ensure that their tenants' homes meet the requirements of the Decent Homes Standard.

Shockingly, Northumberland CC only had up-to-date information on the condition of around 3% of its homes. The council last conducted its stock condition survey in 2012. However, it only completed it for 10% of its houses. This means the RSH does not have assurance that homes meet the decent homes standard.

Additionally, the RSH requires Northumberland CC to meet all legal requirements related to the safety of tenants in its homes.

The judgment states:

Through our inspection we found very serious failings in Northumberland CC delivering this required outcome. We identified significant inconsistencies in reported information relating to health and safety obligations, and limited evidence that Northumberland CC is assured that it identifies and meets all legal requirements that relate to the health and safety of tenants in its homes and communal areas. We found no evidence to support that health and safety assessments are accurately recorded, are routinely monitored or that actions are being addressed within appropriate timescales.

The RSH also found weaknesses in Northumberland CC's ability to undertake repairs and maintenance effectively and in a timely manner. It states:

We found no evidence that it has considered the needs of tenants in the delivery of its repairs service or that Northumberland CC keep its tenants informed with clear and timely communication.

Transparency, Influence and Accountability

The Transparency, Influence and Accountability Standard sets out how landlords must be open with tenants and treat them with fairness and respect, so that tenants can access services, raise complaints, influence decision-making, and hold their landlord to account.

The RSH found that Northumberland CC was also massively failing on this standard, too.

It was discovered that it does not provide meaningful opportunities for tenants to scrutinise or influence services. Additionally, it did not respond to complaints on time.

On the subject of tenancy agreements, the RSH found:

Northumberland CC could not provide evidence that it was offering tenancies or terms of occupation that were compatible with the purpose of its accommodation, the needs of individual households, the sustainability of the community, and the efficient use of its housing stock.

Furthermore, it did not provide any evidence that it was taking appropriate action in response to anti-social behaviour and hate crimes.

Ultimately, the RSH ruled that:

Although Northumberland CC has indicated a willingness to address these very serious failings, and has started the work in some areas, we do not yet have assurance that it understands the potential risks to tenants, and that it has the ability to put matters right.

Based on our assessment of the seriousness of the failings, the risks tenants are exposed to as a result of these failings, and the fundamental changes needed to improve outcomes for tenants, we have concluded a C4 grade for Northumberland CC.

Feature image via NorthumberlandTV

By HG

Writing in the Guardian, renowned economists Jason Hickel and Yanis Varoufakis make the case that tackling the climate crisis first requires dismantling capitalism and its interests.

Hickel and Varoufakis astutely point to the 'extraordinary paradox' we find ourselves. One where we have the technology and resources to produce more than we could ever possibly need. At the same, time inequality is increasing rapidly, leaving millions of people suffering through severe deprivation.

Supporting their argument, they state:

Capitalism cares about our species' prospects as much as a wolf cares about a lamb's. But democratise our economy and a better world is within our grasp

"Our existing economic system, capitalism, is incapable of addressing the social and ecological crises we face in the 21st century." https://t.co/nbKPcpnaVr

— Jason Hickel (@jasonhickel) February 12, 2026

Capitalism: the cause of this paradox

Hickel and Varoufakis are sounding the alarm over our continued adherence to capitalist structures and principles. In this piece, they argue that we "have an urgent responsibility" to chart a different course. As they state, we've all learned it makes no difference who we vote for if we don't have systemic change.

Additionally, they point out it's ludicrous to tinker around the edges of a system that works against the interests of the 99%.

Quite aptly, they describe capitalism as:

an economic system that boils down to a dictatorship run by the tiny minority who control capital - the big banks, the major corporations and the 1% who own the majority of investible assets. Even if we live in a democracy and have a choice in our political system, our choices never seem to change the economic system. Capitalists are the ones who determine what to produce, how to use our labour and who gets to benefit. The rest of us - the people who are actually doing the production - do not get a say.

The latest situation in Argentina under far-right Trump-ally Milei only reinforces their claim that ordinary people's quality of life is consistently sacrificed for billionaire profits:

This is what the far right calls 'freedom': turning workers into slaves—12-hour workdays, no severance pay, punished for striking. A country pushed back centuries in just a few years while working people lose their rights.
Milei is a monster. pic.twitter.com/7SzlWyukzh

— Alejandro

Belligerent bot bullies maintainer in blog post to get its way

Today, it's back talk. Tomorrow, could it be the world? On Tuesday, Scott Shambaugh, a volunteer maintainer of Python plotting library Matplotlib, rejected an AI bot's code submission, citing a requirement that contributions come from people. But that bot wasn't done with him.…

As if snooping on your workers wasn't bad enough

Your supervisor may like using employee monitoring apps to keep tabs on you, but crims like the snooping software even more. Threat actors are now using legit bossware to blend into corporate networks and attempt ransomware deployment.…

Wireless earbuds are now the default option for everyday listening, whether you're heading out for a commute, fitting in a workout or just watching videos at home. The best wireless earbuds combine reliable connectivity, comfortable fits and sound quality that holds up across music, calls and podcasts, all without the hassle of cables. Most are small enough to disappear into a pocket and pair quickly with phones, tablets and laptops.

What sets one pair apart from another often comes down to priorities. Some earbuds lean heavily on active noise cancellation, while others focus on long battery life, compact charging cases or lower prices. Features like water resistance, customizable controls and app support can also make a real difference day to day. This guide breaks down the best wireless earbuds available now to help you find the right match for how you listen.

Best wireless earbuds of 2026

What to look for in the best wireless earbuds

When it comes to shopping for earphones, the first thing to consider is design or wear style. Do you prefer a semi-open fit like AirPods or do you want something that completely closes off your ears? If you're shopping for earbuds with active noise cancellation, you'll want the latter, but a case can be made for the former if you want to wear them all day or frequent places where you need to be tuned in to the ambient sounds. The overall shape of earbuds can determine whether you get a comfortable fit, so can the size and weight, so you'll want to consider all that before deciding. And remember: audio companies aren't perfect, so despite lots of research, the earbud shape they decided on may not fit you well. Don't be afraid to return ill-fitting earbuds for something that's more comfortable.

As wireless earbuds have become the norm, they're now more reliable for basic things like consistent Bluetooth connectivity. Companies are still in a race to pack as much as they can into increasingly smaller designs. This typically means a longer list of features on the more premium sets of earbuds with basic functionality on the cheapest models. Carefully consider what you can't live without when selecting your next earbuds, and make sure key items like automatic pausing and multipoint connectivity are on the spec sheet. You'll also want to investigate the volume and touch controls as you'll often have to sacrifice access to something else to make that adjustment via on-board taps or swipes. Some earbuds even offer app settings to tweak the audio profiles or firmware updates to improve performance over time.

For those in the Apple ecosystem, features like auto-pairing with devices, especially with AirPods Pro 3, can be an added advantage, while Android users may want to look for models that offer similar cross-device functionality.

When it comes to battery life, the average set of earbuds lasts about five hours on a single charge. You can find sets that last longer, but this is likely enough to get you through a work day if you're docking the buds during lunch or the occasional meeting. You'll want to check on how many extra charges are available via the case and if it supports wireless charging.

Companies will also make lofty claims about call quality on wireless earbuds. Despite lots of promises, the reality is most earbuds still leave you sounding like you're on speakerphone. There are some sets that deliver, but don't get your hopes up unless reviews confirm the claims.

Sound can be subjective, so we recommend trying before you buy if at all possible. This is especially true if you're an audiophile. We understand this isn't easy when most of us do a lot of shopping online, but trying on a set of earbuds and listening to them for a few minutes can save you from an expensive case of buyer's remorse. If a store doesn't allow a quick demo, most retailers have return policies that will let you take earbuds back you don't like. Of course, you have to be willing to temporarily part with funds in order to do this.

We also recommend paying attention to things like Spatial Audio, Dolby Atmos, 360 Reality Audio and other immersive formats. Not all earbuds support them, so you'll want to make sure a perspective pair does if that sort of thing excites you, especially if you plan to use them for playback of high-quality audio.

How we test wireless earbuds

The primary way we test earbuds is to wear them as much as possible. We prefer to do this over a one- to two-week period, but sometimes embargoes don't allow it. During this time, we listen to a mix of music and podcasts, while also using the earbuds to take both voice and video calls. Since battery life for earbuds is typically less than a full day, we drain the battery with looping music and the volume set at a comfortable level (usually around 75 percent).

To judge audio quality, we listen to a range of genres, noting any differences in the sound profile across the styles. We also test at both low and high volumes to check for consistency in the tuning. To assess call quality, we'll record audio samples with the earbuds' microphones as well as have third parties call us.

When it comes to features, we do a thorough review of companion apps, testing each feature as we work through the software. Any holdovers from previous models are double checked for improvements or regression. If the earbuds we're testing are an updated version of a previous model, we'll spend time getting reacquainted with the older buds. Ditto for the closest competition for each new set of earbuds that we review.

Other wireless Bluetooth earbuds we tested Sony WF-1000XM6

Since we established this best wireless earbuds guide, Sony's current 1000X model has consistently been the top pick. However, with the WF-1000XM6, there are two key areas where the company's latest flagship set doesn't measure up well versus the competition. Overall ANC performance lags behind Bose, and even Sony's own WF-1000XM5. Speaking of the M5, the company did well there to address the issues I had with fit when it switched to foam ear tips on the WF-1000XM4, but it regressed in that area on the M6. There's still plenty to like in terms of features and sound quality, but there are also caveats to consider now that could be dealbreakers.

Sony WF-C710N

The WF-C710N is a set of compact and comfy earbuds that offer several of Sony's best features. While the ANC performance is above average for this price ($120), sound quality isn't as good as the company's slightly more expensive options. Battery life fell below stated figures and call performance isn't good enough to use these buds for work.

Beats Powerbeats Pro 2

The newest version of the Powerbeats Pro have an improved, comfortable design, balanced bass and new H2 chips and a heart rate sensor inside. But heart rate support is currently limited on iOS.

Samsung Galaxy Buds 3

The Galaxy Buds 3 combine ANC with an open-type design, which renders the noise-blocking abilities of the earbuds mostly useless. Still, there's great low-end tone with ample bass when a track demands it. There are also lots of handy features, most of which require a Samsung phone. But at this price, there are better options from Google, Beats and Sony

Sennheiser Momentum Sport

I really like the overall shape of the Momentum Sport earbuds. They're more comfortable than the Momentum True Wireless 4 and fit in my ears better. What's more, the body temperature and heart rate sensors work well, sending those stats to a variety of apps. However, that sport-tracking feature works best with Polar's app and devices, so there's that consideration. Also, the audio quality and ANC performance isn't as good as the MTW4, and these earbuds are pricey.

Beats Solo Buds

There's a lot to like about the Solo Buds for $80. For me, the primary perk is they're very comfortable to wear for long periods of time thanks to some thoughtful design considerations. You only get the basics here in terms of features and, as expected, the overall sound quality isn't as good as the pricier models in the Beats lineup. You will get 18 hours of battery life though, since the company nixed the battery in the case and beefed up the listening time in the buds themselves.

Bose Ultra Open Earbuds

Bose created something very unique for this set of earbuds that allows you to stay in-tune with the world while listening to audio content. The clip-on design is very comfortable, but sound quality suffers due to the open-type fit, especially when it comes to bass and spatial audio.

Audio-Technica ATH-TWX7

These stick buds have a compact design that's comfortable to wear and the warm sound profile is great at times. However, overall audio performance is inconsistent and there's no automatic pausing.

Master & Dynamic MW09

Retooled audio, better ambient sound mode and reliable multipoint Bluetooth are the best things the MW09 has to offer. They're expensive though, and you can find better ANC performance elsewhere.

Wireless earbud FAQs What is considered good battery life for true wireless earbuds?

Most wireless earbuds will last five hours on a single charge, at the least. You can find some pairs that have even better battery life, lasting between six and eight hours before they need more juice. All of the best wireless earbuds come with a charging case, which will provide additional hours of battery life — but you'll have to return each bud to the case in order to charge them up.

Is sound quality better on headphones or earbuds?

Comparing sound quality on earbuds and headphones is a bit like comparing apples and oranges. There are a lot of variables to consider and the differences in components make a direct comparison difficult. Personally, I prefer the audio quality from over-ear headphones, but I can tell you the sound from earbuds like Sennheiser's Momentum True Wireless 3 is also outstanding.

Which wireless earbuds have the longest battery life?

With new models coming out all the time, tracking the hours of battery life for each this can be difficult to keep tabs on. The longest-lasting earbuds we've reviewed are Audio-Technica's ATH-CKS5TW. The company states they last 15 hours, but the app was still showing 40 percent at that mark during our tests. The only downside is these earbuds debuted in 2019 and both technology and features have improved since. In terms of current models, Master & Dynamic's MW08 offers 12 hours of use on a charge with ANC off (10 with ANC on) and JBL has multiple options with 10-hour batteries.

What wireless earbuds are waterproof?

There are plenty of options these days when it comes to increased water resistance. To determine the level of protection, you'll want to look for an IP (ingress protection) rating. The first number indicates intrusion protection from things like dust. The second number is the level of moisture protection and you'll want to make sure that figure is 7 or higher. At this water-resistance rating, earbuds can withstand full immersion for up to 30 minutes in depths up to one meter (3.28 feet). If either of the IP numbers is an X, that means it doesn't have any special protection. For example, a pair of wireless earbuds that are IPX7 wouldn't be built to avoid dust intrusion, but they would be ok if you dropped them in shallow water.

Which earbuds stay in ears the best?

A secure fit can vary wildly from person to person. All of our ears are different, so audio companies are designing their products to fit the most people they can with a single shape. This is why AirPods will easily fall out for some but stay put for others. Design touches like wing tips or fins typically come on fitness models and those elements can help keep things in place. You'll likely just have to try earbuds on, and if they don't fit well return them.

What wireless earbuds work with PS5?

PlayStation 5 doesn't support Bluetooth audio without an adapter or dongle. Even Sony's own gaming headsets come with a transmitter that connects to the console. There are universal options that allow you to use any headphones, headset or earbuds with a PS5. Once you have one, plug it into a USB port on the console and pair your earbuds with it.

Recent updates

February 2026: Updated to include new top picks.

January 2026: Updated to ensure our top picks have remained the same.

September 2025: Updated to add AirPods Pro 3 to our top picks.

May 2025: Updated to ensure top picks and buying advice remain accurate.

March 2025: Updated the top pick for the best sounding wireless earbuds - runner up.

January 2025: Updated the top pick for best sounding wireless earbuds.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/audio/headphones/best-wireless-earbuds-120058222.html?src=rss

Attorney General Pam Bondi for the first time acknowledged the existence of a secret list of domestic terrorist organizations during a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Wednesday. 

"I know Antifa is part of that," Bondi said under questioning about the list from Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon, D-Pa., the ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on Constitution and Limited Government. Bondi refused to offer any further details about the "domestic terrorist organization" database being compiled under President Donald Trump's National Security Presidential Memorandum 7, or NSPM-7.

"The goal was to get her - even by denying that she would produce it - to acknowledge that it existed and then raise the alarm," Scanlon told The Intercept.

The Justice Department had previously refused to acknowledge the list to The Intercept, despite being asked scores of questions about it over a period of months.

NSPM-7, which conflates constitutionally protected speech and political activism with "domestic terrorism" — a term that has no basis in U.S. law - specifically targets those that espouse what the administration defines as anti-Americanism, anti-capitalism, anti-Christianity, anti-fascism, and radical gender ideologies, as well as those with "hostility toward those who hold traditional American views."

An implementation memo Bondi issued in December directed the FBI to "compile a list of groups or entities engaged in acts that may constitute domestic terrorism."  The initial report was to be submitted to Bondi on January 3 with regular updates issued every 30 days.

Related FBI Counterterrorism Agents Spent Weeks Seeking a Climate Activist — Then Showed Up at His Door

A November FBI internal report obtained by The Guardian revealed that there were multiple active FBI investigations related to NSPM-7 in 27 locations.  The Intercept revealed on Thursday that the FBI appears to be investigating Extinction Rebellion NYC, a climate activism group that could potentially be related to NSPM-7.

Bondi's revelation that she has a working domestic terrorist list came during four hours of back-and-forth with lawmakers that mostly focused on the recently released Justice Department files related to the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. When repeatedly asked if she would commit to providing the House Judiciary Committee with the NSPM-7 list, Bondi snapped at Scanlon: "I'm not going to commit to anything to you because you won't let me answer questions."

After Scanlon clarified that this meant Bondi now had a "secret list of people or groups that you are accusing of domestic terrorism, but you won't share it with Congress," Scanlon noted that such secrecy precluded Americans from challenging their inclusion on the list. Bondi refused to address the issue and instead insulted Scanlon.

Asked about the NSPM-7 list, the FBI told The Intercept that it had "no comment."  Justice Department spokesperson Natalie Baldassarre failed to respond to questions about the size of the list or the persons or groups on it.

For months, the White House and Justice Department have continually failed to answer a troubling question from The Intercept regarding NSPM-7: Are Americans that the federal government deems to be members of domestic terrorist organizations subject to extrajudicial killings like those it claims are members of designated terrorist organizations who are targeted in boat strikes in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean?

Scanlon entered one of the Intercept's stories on this issue into the record during the Wednesday hearing.

Related Trump Calls His Enemies Terrorists. Does That Mean He Can Just Kill Them?

Bondi's December memo, "Implementing National Security Presidential Memorandum-7: Countering Domestic Terrorism and Organized Political Violence," defines "domestic terrorism" in the broadest possible terms, including "conspiracies to impede … law enforcement."

Federal immigration agents have said they consider observing, following, and filming their operations a crime under the statute that prohibits assaulting, resisting, or impeding a federal officer. This is also the foremost statute in a directory of prioritized crimes listed in NSPM-7.

Federal officers frequently confront and threaten those observing, following, and filming them for "impeding" their efforts. In numerous instances, they have unholstered or pointed weapons at the people who filmed or followed them. Both Renee Good and Alex Pretti were killed by federal agents in Minneapolis while observing immigration agents.

When asked if Good or Pretti were on any domestic terrorism list, watchlist, or under surveillance by federal authorities, a bureau spokesperson said: "The FBI has no comment."

"The administration is keeping lists of Americans who the White House says are engaged in domestic terrorism. Those lists could include Americans who have not committed any acts of terrorism but simply disagree with this administration, people like Renee Good and Alex Pretti," Scanlon noted during the Wednesday hearing.

When questioned about the NSPM-7 list, Bondi stated that "on February 5, 2025, an Antifa member was arrested in Minneapolis." Baldassarre did not reply to a request for clarification, but Bondi was likely referring to a Minneapolis man who allegedly described himself as an "Antifa member" who was arrested on February 5 of this year, not 2025.

"This man allegedly doxxed and called for the murder of law enforcement officers, encouraged bloodshed in the streets, and proudly claimed affiliation with the terrorist organization Antifa before going on the run," said Bondi, last week, of Kyle Wagner, 37, who was arrested on federal charges of cyberstalking and making threatening communications.

Bondi's Justice Department memo claims that "certain Antifa-aligned extremists" profess "extreme viewpoints on immigration, radical gender ideology, and anti-American sentiment" and "a willingness to use violence against law-abiding citizenry to serve those beliefs." Over the last decade, Republicans have frequently blamed antifa for violence and used it as an omnibus term for left-wing activists, as if it were an organization with members and a command structure.

In September, Trump signed an executive order designating antifa as a "domestic terror organization," despite the fact that it is essentially a decentralized, leftist ideology — a collection of related ideas and political concepts much like feminism or environmentalism.

In addition to the Epstein files and NSPM-7, Bondi fielded questions about her department's unsuccessful effort a day earlier to prosecute six Democratic lawmakers who posted a video on social media in which they reminded military personnel that they are required to disobey illegal orders. The November video led to a Trump tirade that made the White House's failure to dismiss the possibility of summary executions of Americans even more worrisome.

"This is really bad," the president wrote on Truth Social, "and Dangerous to our Country. Their words cannot be allowed to stand. SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR FROM TRAITORS!!! LOCK THEM UP???" A follow-up post read: "SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR, punishable by DEATH!" Trump also reposted a comment that said: "HANG THEM GEORGE WASHINGTON WOULD !!"

Scanlon told The Intercept that while it was clear that Bondi was not going to provide substantive answers, the hearing did allow her and her colleagues to raise the alarm on a number of issues, including NSPM-7. 

"Every day, we're seeing this administration weaponize government to go after people who disagree with it. Whether it's shooting citizens who protest or trying to indict members of Congress who suggest that it's giving illegal military orders or trying to go after attorneys general around the country. It's not one isolated thing," Scanlon said. "It's connected to a whole bunch of areas where the government isn't doing its job and instead, is just pursuing the president's political enemies. It's truly frightening."

The post Pam Bondi Admits DOJ Has a Secret Domestic Terrorist List appeared first on The Intercept.

The European Commission has opened a new probe into Google, this time focused on the company's massive online advertising business, Bloomberg reports. European Union regulators have already fined Google billions for violating the Digital Markets Act, and being found guilty of anticompetitive behavior in online advertising could add to that total.

While the Commission has yet to announce a formal investigation, Bloomberg writes that it has started contacting Google's customers and competitors for information about its dominance across multiple online advertising markets. Regulators are particularly concerned that Google could be "artificially increasing the clearing price" of ad auctions "to the detriment of advertisers." If the company is found to be violating the EU's competition rules, Google could be fined 10 percent of its global annual sales.

Google's approach to advertising to minors was reportedly already under investigation by the EU as of December 2024, and besides fines, regulators have ordered the company to open up Android to competing AI assistants and share search data with rivals. In the US, there's also precedent for finding Google's approach to online advertising anticompetitive.

A US federal judge found that Google is a monopolist in online advertising in April 2025, the conclusion of a legal battle that started with a Department of Justice lawsuit accusing the company of dominating the ad market and using its control to charge more and keep a larger portion of ad sales. The DOJ ultimately wants Google to sell its ad tech business, but a final decision hasn't been reached as to how the company's anticompetitive behavior should be remedied.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/eu-reportedly-opens-another-probe-into-googles-ads-pricing-194435095.html?src=rss

The head of the antitrust division is out at the US Department of Justice. Gail Slater, a former JD Vance adviser and Fox Corp VP, reportedly clashed with Attorney General Pam Bondi. Their longstanding feud is said to have centered around Slater's skepticism of corporate mergers.

"It is with great sadness and abiding hope that I leave my role as [Assistant Attorney General] for Antitrust today," Slater posted on X. "It was indeed the honor of a lifetime to serve in this role."

Although Slater technically resigned, The Guardian reports that she was forced out. The fallout was said to be over her differences with Bondi (who just yesterday yelled, insulted and deflected her way through a hearing over the DOJ's stonewalling of the Epstein files). In recent weeks, Bondi reportedly reiterated to the White House that Slater's views on the antitrust division's direction made the pair's relationship irreconcilable.

Attorney General Pam Bondi (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)Win McNamee via Getty Images

The tensions reportedly began simmering last summer, when Slater sought to block the merger between Hewlett-Packard Enterprise and Juniper Networks. She opposed the deal out of concerns that it would create a duopoly in cloud computing and wireless networking. In addition, Slater reportedly told Bondi that US intelligence hadn't raised any concerns about blocking the merger. However, CIA Director John Ratcliffe later claimed that blocking it would pose national security risks because it could lead to the loss of business to China. The Trump administration's merger-friendly DOJ ultimately approved the deal.

Alongside Bondi, Slater was overseeing the DOJ's review of Netflix's proposed acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery. In December, Trump said he would be involved in the regulatory review. That followed intense lobbying by Netflix and Paramount, the latter of which launched a hostile takeover bid. Earlier this month, The Wall Street Journal reported that the department was investigating whether Netflix was involved in anticompetitive practices during the process.

Slater's ousting also comes weeks ahead of the DOJ's antitrust trial against Ticketmaster owner Live Nation. The department's lawsuit was filed during the Biden administration. It claims that Live Nation is operating as a monopoly, harming competition, fans, industry promoters and artists.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/antitrust-head-overseeing-netflix-warner-merger-resigns-192854114.html?src=rss

Federal Bureau of Investigation agents, at least one of whom works on counterterrorism, went to the home of a former member of a climate activism group for questioning last week, potentially signaling a new escalation in the Trump administration's promise to criminalize nonprofits and activist groups as domestic terrorists. 

Two FBI agents, one from New York's Joint Terrorism Task Force, told a former member of Extinction Rebellion NYC they wanted to ask him about the group at his home upstate on Friday, an attorney for the group told The Intercept. The visit followed a prior attempt to reach him at his old address.

The FBI's apparent probe of Extinction Rebellion NYC comes as the Justice Department ramps up its surveillance of activists protesting immigration enforcement and the Trump administration creates secret lists of domestic enemies under Trump's National Security Presidential Memorandum 7, or NSPM-7.

"I believe this to be a significant escalation of the criminal legal system against XR and find it very troubling," said Ron Kuby, the Extinction Rebellion attorney. "This is usually the way we find out an actual investigation is underway and is often followed by other visits and other actions." 

The former Extinction Rebellion member, who asked to remain anonymous out of fear for his safety, said that the visit came after a phone call in January from a special agent that he assumed was a scam.

"I was skeptical the phone call was really from the FBI, but after I declined to speak with the agent, she said that she was standing outside my door," he said. She was actually at the activist's former address, which he said made him additionally dubious. But last week, when the agents showed up at his current address, he said he saw the agent's business card through his door.

Kuby confirmed that the agent's business card information corresponded to a current member of the FBI's New York Joint Terrorism Task Force. A text message from the agent, reviewed by The Intercept, shows she identified herself and stated that she was at the former member's house to question him about Extinction Rebellion. Her name, title, and phone number match a known special agent on the task force, according to court records.

Reached by The Intercept, a public affairs officer for the New York FBI field office said, "Per longstanding DOJ policy, we cannot confirm or deny the existence or nonexistence of any investigation."

The DOJ did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Extinction Rebellion NYC is a chapter of a loose international climate justice movement that does highly public direct actions, like an April Earth Day spray-painting over the presidential seal inside Trump Tower in Manhattan. Kuby said none of the group's actions are violent or rise above the level of misdemeanors, and would not typically be of interest to federal counterterrorism investigators.

The former member said he had not been involved in any Extinction Rebellion actions in two years and hadn't participated in anything that he thought would send the FBI to his door. 

"They repeatedly pursued this member and traveled hundreds of miles - this suggests a real investigative effort."

"All of our actions are incredibly public," he said. He recalled that the agent said she had some questions about Extinction Rebellion NYC, and that he wasn't in any trouble, before the activist declined to speak and closed his door.

Why the FBI's counterterrorism task force would investigate Extinction Rebellion is unknown, Kuby said.

"Often, the FBI starts with former members of a group, or less central people, to begin investigations," Kuby said. "The fact that they repeatedly pursued this member, and traveled hundreds of miles from his old address in NYC - this suggests a real investigative effort."

Trump's September presidential memorandum, dubbed NSPM-7, called for the National Joint Terrorism Task Force and its local offices to investigate a broad spectrum of progressive groups and donors for "anti-fascism" beliefs. 

Related Longtime Paid FBI Informant Was Instrumental in Terror Case Against "Turtle Island Liberation Front"

A November FBI internal report obtained by The Guardian revealed that there were multiple active FBI investigations related to NSPM-7 in 27 locations, including New York, where the agent investigating Extinction Rebellion works. Trump's directive instructed Joint Terrorism Task Forces to proactively investigate groups and activists with vague language that civil liberty watchdogs say could easily criminalize protected speech and protest.

FBI agents also visited several activists affiliated with Extinction Rebellion and other climate groups in the Boston area last March, according to a local news report. The reasons for those visits remain unclear, and the activists involved said nothing came of them. The FBI's Boston Division declined to comment to the press at the time.

After Extinction Rebellion NYC members protested New York Democratic Rep. Tom Suozzi's town hall at a Long Island synagogue last month, objecting to his vote to increase ICE funding, Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon posted on X that she would be investigating the protest to see "whether federal law has been broken."

None of the activists involved in the Suozzi protest have been contacted by federal investigators, representatives for the group told The Intercept. Suozzi did not reply to messages. 

In 2023, then-Florida Senator and current Secretary of State Marco Rubio wrote a letter to then-FBI Director Christopher Wray and DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas asking them to bar members of Extinction Rebellion in the U.K. from the U.S. in response to a report that the group planned to protest at federal properties.

"Among other things, the group will allegedly block highways and disrupt federal properties, but violence and terrorist acts cannot be discounted given the group's past threats," Rubio wrote in the 2023 letter. He also used similar language in proposed legislation against "antifa" protests in 2022.

Nate Smith, an Extinction Rebellion activist who took part in the Suozzi protest, objected to characterizations of the group's activism as terrorism.

"Is petitioning an elected official at a public event what makes America great, or a federal offense?" Smith said. "I get if you don't like it. That's half the point, but 'terrorism'?" 

There have also been scattered reports of FBI agents visiting anti-ICE protesters around the country. While the FBI's interest in Extinction Rebellion remains unclear, the group pointed to Trump's NSPM-7 directive. 

"We did not anticipate that we would be among the first groups of those who speak inconveniently to be targeted," Extinction Rebellion NYC said in a public statement. "We did not anticipate the level of capitulation from our country's hallowed institutions and political opposition." 

The post FBI Counterterrorism Agents Spent Weeks Seeking a Climate Activist — Then Showed Up at His Door appeared first on The Intercept.

The DHS and its components want to find non-white people to deport by any means necessary. Of course, "necessary" is something that's on a continually sliding scale with Trump back in office, which means everything (legal or not) is "necessary" if it can help White House advisor Stephen Miller hit his self-imposed 3,000 arrests per day goal.

As was reported last week, DHS components (ICE, CBP) are using a web app that supposedly can identify people and link them with citizenship documents. As has always been the case with DHS components (dating back to the Obama era), the rule of thumb is "deploy first, compile legally-required paperwork later." The pattern has never changed. ICE, CBP, etc. acquire new tech, hand it out to agents, and much later — if ever — the agencies compile and publish their legally-required Privacy Impact Assessments (PIAs).

PIAs are supposed to precede deployments of new tech that might have an impact on privacy rights and other civil liberties. In almost every case, the tech has been deployed far ahead of the precedential paperwork.

As one would expect, the Trump administration was never going to be the one to ensure the paperwork arrived ahead of the deployment. As we covered recently, both ICE and CBP are using tech provided by NEC called "Mobile Fortify" to identify migrants who are possibly subject to removal, even though neither agency has bothered to publish a Privacy Impact Assessment.

As Wired reported, the app is being used widely by officers working with both agencies, despite both agencies making it clear they don't have the proper paperwork in place to justify these deployments.

While CBP says there are "sufficient monitoring protocols" in place for the app, ICE says that the development of monitoring protocols is in progress, and that it will identify potential impacts during an AI impact assessment. According to guidance from the Office of Management and Budget, which was issued before the inventory says the app was deployed for either CBP or ICE, agencies are supposed to complete an AI impact assessment before deploying any high-impact use case. Both CBP and ICE say the app is "high-impact" and "deployed."

While this is obviously concerning, it would be far less concerning if we weren't dealing with an administration that has told immigration officers that they don't need warrants to enter houses or effect arrests. And it would be insanely less concerning if we weren't dealing with an administration that has claimed that simply observing or reporting on immigration enforcement efforts is an act of terrorism.

Officers working for the combined forces of bigotry d/b/a/ "immigration enforcement" know they're safe. The Supreme Court has ensured they're safe by making it impossible to sue federal officers. And the people running immigration-related agencies have made it clear they don't even care if the ends justify the means.

These facts make what's reported here even worse, especially when officers are using the app to "identify" pretty much anyone they can point a smartphone at.

Despite DHS repeatedly framing Mobile Fortify as a tool for identifying people through facial recognition, however, the app does not actually "verify" the identities of people stopped by federal immigration agents—a well-known limitation of the technology and a function of how Mobile Fortify is designed and used.

[…]

Records reviewed by WIRED also show that DHS's hasty approval of Fortify last May was enabled by dismantling centralized privacy reviews and quietly removing department-wide limits on facial recognition—changes overseen by a former Heritage Foundation lawyer and Project 2025 contributor, who now serves in a senior DHS privacy role.

Even if you're the sort of prick who thinks whatever happens to non-citizens is deserved due to their alleged violation of civil statutes, one would hope you'd actually care what happens to your fellow citizens. I mean, one would hope, but even the federal government doesn't care what happens to US citizens if they happen to be unsupportive of Trump's migrant-targeting crime wave.

DHS—which has declined to detail the methods and tools that agents are using, despite repeated calls from oversight officials and nonprofit privacy watchdogs—has used Mobile Fortify to scan the faces not only of "targeted individuals," but also people later confirmed to be US citizens and others who were observing or protesting enforcement activity.

TLDR and all that: DHS knows this tool performs worst in the situations where it's used most. DHS and its components also knew they were supposed to produce PIAs before deploying privacy-impacting tech. And DHS knows its agencies are not only misusing the tech to convert AI shrugs into probable cause, but are using it to identify people protesting or observing their efforts, which means this tech is also a potential tool of unlawful retribution.

There's nothing left to be discussed. This tech will continue to be used because it can turn bad photos into migrant arrests. And its off-label use is just as effective: it allows ICE and CBP agents to identify protesters and observers, even as DHS officials continue to claim doxing should be a federal offense if they're not the ones doing it. Everything about this is bullshit. But bullshit is all this administration has.

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You may have heard last week that actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt went to Washington DC and gave a short speech at an event put on by Senator Dick Durbin calling for the sunsetting of Section 230. It's a short speech, and it gets almost everything wrong about Section 230. Watch it here:

Let me first say that, while I'm sure some will rush to jump in and say "oh, it's just some Hollywood actor guy, jumping into something he doesn't understand," I actually think that's a little unfair about JGL. Very early on he started his own (very interesting, very creative) user-generated content platform called HitRecord, and over the years I've followed many of his takes on copyright and internet policy and while I don't always agree, I do believe that he does legitimately take this stuff seriously and actually wants to understand the nuances (unlike some).

But it appears he's fallen for some not just bad advice, but blatantly incorrect advice about this. He's also posted a followup video where he claims to explain his position in more detail, but it only makes things worse, because it compounds the blatant factual errors that underpin his entire argument.

First let's look at the major problems with his speech in DC:

So I understand what Section 230 did to bring about the birth of the internet. That was 30 years ago. And I also understand how the internet has changed since then because back then message boards and other websites with user-generated content, they really were more like telephone carriers. They were neutral platforms. That's not how things work anymore.

So, that's literally incorrect. If JGL is really interested in the actual history here, I did a whole podcast series where I spoke to the people behind Section 230, including those involved in the early internet and the various lawsuits at the time.

Section 230 was never meant for "neutral" websites. As the authors (and the text of the law itself!) make clear: it was created so that websites did not need to be neutral. It literally was written in response to the Stratton Oakmont v. Prodigy case (for JGL's benefit: Stratton Oakmont is the company portrayed in Wolf of Wall Street), where the boiler room operation sued Prodigy because someone posted in their forums claims about how sketchy Stratton Oakmont was (which, you know, was true).

But Stratton sued, and the judge said that because Prodigy moderated, that because they wanted to have a family friendly site, that is because they were not neutral, they were liable for anything they decided to leave up. In the judge's ruling he effectively said "because you're not neutral, and because you moderate, you are effectively endorsing this content, and thus if it's defamatory you're liable for defamation."

Section 230 (originally the "Internet Freedom and Family Empowerment Act") was never about protecting platforms for being neutral. It was literally the opposite of that. It was about making sure that platforms felt comfortable making editorial decisions. It was about letting companies decide what to share, what not to share, what to amplify, and what not to amplify, without being held liable as a publisher of that content.

This is important, but it's a point that a bunch of bad faith people, starting with Ted Cruz, have been lying about for about a decade, pretending that the intent of 230 was to protect sites that are "neutral." It's literally the opposite of that. And it's disappointing that JGL would repeat this myth as if it's fact. Courts have said this explicitly—I'll get to the Ninth Circuit's Barnes decision later, where the court said Section 230's entire purpose is to protect companies because they act as publishers—but first, let's go through the rest of what JGL got wrong.

He then goes on to talk about legitimate problems with internet giants having too much power, but falsely attributes that to Section 230.

Today, the internet is dominated by a small handful of these gigantic businesses that are not at all neutral, but instead algorithmically amplify whatever gets the most attention and maximizes ad revenue. And we know what happens when we let these engagement optimization algorithms be the lens that we see the world through. We get a mental health crisis, especially amongst young people. We get a rise in extremism and a rise in conspiracy theories. And then of course we get these echo chambers. These algorithms, they amplify the demonization of the other side so badly that we can't even have a civil conversation. It seems like we can't agree on anything.

So, first of all, I know that the common wisdom is that all of this is true, but as we've detailed, actual experts have been unable to find any support for a causal connection. Studies on "echo chambers" have found that the internet decreases echo chambers, rather than increases them. The studies on mental health show the opposite of what JGL (and Jonathan Haidt) claim. Even the claims about algorithms focused solely on engagement don't seem to have held up (or, generally, it was true early on, but the companies found that maximizing solely on engagement burned people out quickly and was actually bad for business, and so most social media adjusted the algorithms away from just that).

So, again, almost every assertion there is false (or, at the very least, much more nuanced that he makes it out to be).

But the biggest myth of all is the idea that getting rid of 230 will somehow tame the internet giants. Once again, the exact opposite is true. As we've discussed hundreds of times, the big internet companies don't need Section 230.

The real benefit of 230 is that it gets vexatious lawsuits tossed out early. That matters a lot for smaller companies. To put it in real terms: with 230, companies can get vexatious lawsuits dismissed for around $100,000 to $200,000 dollars (I used to say $50k, but my lawyer friends tell me it's getting more expensive). That is a lot of money. But it's generally survivable. To get the same cases dismissed on First Amendment grounds (as almost all of them would be), you're talking $5 million and up.

That's pocket change for Meta and Google who have buildings full of lawyers. It's existential for smaller competitive sites.

So the end result of getting rid of 230 is not getting rid of the internet giants. It's locking them in and giving them more power. It's why Meta literally has run ads telling Congress it's time to ditch 230.

What is Mark Zuckerberg's biggest problem right now? Competition from smaller upstarts chipping away at his userbase. Getting rid of 230 makes it harder for smaller providers to survive, and limits the drain from Meta.

On top of that, getting rid of 230 gives them less reason to moderate. Because, under the First Amendment, the only way they can possibly be held liable is if they had actual knowledge of content that violates the law. And the best way to avoid having knowledge is not to look.

It means not doing any research on harms caused by your site, because that will be used as evidence of "knowledge." It means limiting how much moderation you do so that (a la Prodigy three decades ago) you're not seen to be "endorsing" any content you leave up.

Getting rid of Section 230 literally makes Every Single Problem JGL discussed in his speech worse! He got every single thing backwards.

And he closes out with quite the rhetorical flourish:

I have a message for all the other senators out there: [Yells]: I WANT TO SEE THIS THING PASS 100 TO 0. There should be nobody voting to give any more impunity to these tech companies. Nobody. It's time for a change. Let's make it happen. Thank you.

Except it's not voting to give anyone "more impunity." It's a vote to say "stop moderating, and unleash a flood of vexatious lawsuits that will destroy smaller competitors."

The Follow-Up Makes It Worse

Yesterday, JGL posted a longer video, noting that he'd heard a bunch of criticism about his speech and he wanted to respond to it. Frankly, it's a bizarre video, but go ahead and watch it too:

It starts out with him saying he actually agrees with a lot of his critics, because he wants an "internet that has vibrant, free, and productive public discourse." Except… that's literally what Section 230 enables. Because without it, you don't have intermediaries willing to host public discourse. You ONLY have giant companies with buildings full of lawyers who will set the rules of public discourse.

Again, his entire argument is backwards.

Then… he does this weird half backdown, where he says he doesn't really want the end of Section 230, but he just wants "reform."

 Here's the first thing I'll say. I'm in favor of reforming section 230. I'm not in favor of eliminating all of the protections that it affords. I'm going to repeat that because it's it's really the crux of this. I'm in favor of reforming, upgrading, modernizing section 230 because it was passed 30 years ago. I am not in favor of eliminating all of the protections that it affords.

Buddy, you literally went to Washington DC, got up in front of Senators, and told everyone you wanted the bill that literally takes away every one of those protections to pass 100 to 0. Don't then say "oh I just want to reform it." Bullshit. You said get rid of the damn thing.

But… let's go through this, because it's a frequent thing we hear from people. "Oh, let's reform it, not get rid of it." As our very own First Amendment lawyer Cathy Gellis has explained over and over again, every proposed reform to date is really repeal.

The reason for this is the procedural benefit we discussed above. Because every single kind of "reform" requires long, expensive lawsuits to determine if the company is liable. In the end, those companies will still win, because of the First Amendment. Just like how one of the most famous 230 "losses" ended up. Roommates.com lost its Section 230 protections, which resulted in many, many years in court… and then they eventually won anyway. All 230 does is make it so you don't have to pay lawyers nearly as much to reach the same result.

So, every single reform proposal basically resets the clock in a way that old court precedents go out the window, and all you're doing is allowing vexatious lawsuits to cost a lot more for companies. This will mean some won't even start. Others will go out of business.

Or, worse, many companies will just enable a hecklers veto. Donald Trump doesn't like what people are saying on a platform? Threaten to sue. The cost without 230 (even a reformed 230 where a court can't rely on precedent) means it's cheaper to just remove the content that upsets Donald Trump. Or your landlord. Or some internet troll.

You basically are giving everyone a veto by the mere threat of a lawsuit. I'm sorry, but that is not the recipe for a "vibrant, free, and productive public discourse."

Calling for reform of 230 is, in every case we've seen to date, really a call for repeal, whether the reformers recognize that or not. Is there a possibility that you could reform it in a way that isn't that? Maybe? But I've yet to see any proposal, and the only ones I can think of would be going in the other direction (e.g., expanding 230's protections to include intellectual property, or rolling back FOSTA).

JGL then talks about small businesses and agrees that sites like HitRecord require 230. Which sure makes it odd that he's supporting repeal. However, he seems to have bought in to the logic of the argument memeified by internet law professor Eric Goldman—who has catalogued basically every single Section 230 lawsuit as well as every single "reform" proposal ever made and found them all wanting—that "if you don't amend 230 in unspecified ways, we'll kill this internet."

That is… generally not a good way to make policy. But it's how JGL thinks it should be done:

Well, there have been lots of efforts to reform section 230 in the past and they keep getting killed uh by the big tech lobbyists. So, this section 230 sunset act is as far as I understand it a strategy towards reform. It'll force the tech companies to the negotiating table. That's why I supported it.

Again, this is wrong. Big tech is always at the freaking negotiating table. You don't think they're there? Come on. As I noted, Zuck has been willing to ditch 230 for almost a decade now. It makes him seem "cooperative" to Congress while at the same time destroying the ability of competitors to survive.

The reason 230 reform bills fail is because enough grassroots folks actually show up and scream at Congress. It ain't the freaking "big tech lobbyists." It's people like the ACLU and the EFF and Fight for the Future and Demand Progress speaking up and sending calls and emails to Congress.

Also, talking about these "efforts at reform" getting "killed by big tech lobbyists." This is FOSTA erasure, JGL. In 2018 (with the explicit support of Meta) Congress passed FOSTA, which was a Section 230 reform bill. Remember?

And how did that work out? Did it make Meta and Google better? No.

But did it destroy online spaces used by sex workers? Did it lead to real world harm for sex workers? Did it make it harder for law enforcement to capture actual human traffickers? Did it destroy online communities? Did it hide historical LGBTQ content because of legal threats?

Yes to literally all of those things.

So, yeah, I'm freaking worried about "reform" to 230, because we saw it already. And many of us warned about the harms, while "big tech" supported the law. And we were right. The harms did occur. But it took away competitive online communities and suppressed sex positive and LGBTQ content.

Is that what you want to support JGL? No? Then maybe speak to some of the people who actually work on this stuff, who understand the nuances, not the slogans.

Speaking of which, JGL then doubles down on his exactly backwards Ted Cruz-inspired version of Section 230:

Section 230 as it's currently written or as it was written 30 years ago distinguishes between what it calls publishers and carriers. So a publisher would be, you, a person, saying something or a company saying something like the New York Times say or you know the Walt Disney Company publishers. Then carriers would be somebody like AT&T or Verizon, you know, the the the companies that make your phone or or your telephone service. So basically what Section 230 said is that these platforms for user-generated content are not publishers. They are carriers. They are as neutral as the telephone company. And if someone uses the telephone to commit a crime, the telephone company shouldn't be held liable. And that's true about a telephone company. But again, there's a third category that we need to add to really reflect how the internet works today. And that third category is amplification.

Again, I need to stress that this is literally wrong. Like, fundamentally, literally he has it backwards and inside out. This is a pretty big factual error.

First, Section 230 does not, in any way, distinguish between "what it calls publishers and carriers." This is the "publisher/platform" myth all over again.

I mean, you can look at the law. It makes no such distinction at all. The only distinction it makes is between "interactive computer services" and "information content providers." Now some (perhaps JGL) will claim that's the same thing as "publishers" and "carriers." But it's literally not.

Carriers (as in, common carrier law) implies the neutrality that JGL mentioned earlier. And perhaps that's why he's confused. But the purpose of 230 was to enable "interactive computer services" to act as publishers, without being held liable as publishers. It was NOT saying "don't be a publisher." It was saying "we want you to be a publisher, not a neutral carrier, but we know that if you face liability as a publisher, you won't agree to publish. So, for third party content, we won't hold you liable for your publishing actions."

Again, go back to the Stratton Oakmont case. Prodigy "acted as a publisher" in trying to filter out non-family friendly content. And the judge said "okay now you're liable." The entire point of 230 was to say "don't be neutral, act as a publisher, but since it's all 3rd party content, we won't hold you liable as the publisher."

In the Barnes case in the Ninth Circuit, the court was quite clear about this. The entire purpose of Section 230 is to encourage interactive computing services to act like a publisher by removing liability for being a publisher. Here's a key part in which the court explains why Yahoo deserves 230 protections for 3rd party content because it acted as the publisher:

In other words, the duty that Barnes claims Yahoo violated derives from Yahoo's conduct as a publisher—the steps it allegedly took, but later supposedly abandoned, to de-publish the offensive profiles. It is because such conduct is publishing conduct that we have insisted that section 230 protects from liability….

So let me repeat this again: the point of Section 230 is not to say "you're a carrier, not a publisher." It's literally to say "you can safely act as a publisher because you won't face liability for content you had no part in its creation."

JGL has it backwards.

He then goes on to make a weird and meaningless distinction between "free speech" and "commercial amplification" as if it's legally meaningful.

At the crux of their article is a really important distinction and that distinction is between free speech and commercial amplification. Free speech meaning what a human being says. commercial amplification, meaning when a platform like Instagram or YouTube or Tik Tok or whatever uses an algorithm to uh maximize engagement and ad revenue to hook you, keep you and serve you ads. And this is a really important difference that section 230 does not appreciate.

The article he's talking about is this very, very, very, very, very badly confused piece in ACM. It's written by Jaron Lanier, Allison Stanger, and Audrey Tang. If those names sound familiar, it's because they've been publishing similar pieces that are just fundamentally wrong for years. Here's one piece I wrote picking apart one, here's another picking apart another.

None of those three individuals understands Section 230 at all. Stanger gave testimony to Congress that was so wrong on basic facts it should have been retracted. I truly do not understand why Audrey Tang sullies her own reputation by continuing to sign on to pieces with Lanier and Stanger. I have tremendous respect for Audrey, who I've learned a ton from over the years. But she is not a legal expert. She was Digital Minister in Taiwan (where she did some amazing work!) and has worked at tech companies.

But she doesn't know 230.

I'm not going to do another full breakdown of everything wrong with the ACM piece, but just look at the second paragraph:

Much of the public's criticism of Section 230 centers on the fact that it shields platforms from liability even when they host content such as online harassment of marginalized groups or child sexual abuse material (CSAM).

What? CSAM is inherently unprotected speech. Section 230 does not protect CSAM. Section 230 literally has section (e)(1) that says "no effect on criminal law." CSAM, as you might know, is a violation of criminal law. Websites all have strong incentives to deal with CSAM to avoid criminal liability, and they tend to take that pretty seriously. The additional civil liability that might come from a change in the law isn't going to have much, if any, impact on that.

And "online harassment of marginalized groups" is mostly protected by the First Amendment anyway—so if 230 didn't cover it, companies would still win on First Amendment grounds. But here's the thing: most of us think that harassment is bad and want platforms to stop it. You know what lets them do that? Section 230. Take it away and companies have less incentive to moderate. Indeed, in Lanier and Stanger's original piece in Wired, they argued platforms should be required to use the First Amendment as the basis for moderation—which would forbid removing most harassment of marginalized groups.

These are not serious critiques.

I could almost forgive Lanier/Stanger/Tang if this were the first time they were writing about this subject, but they have now written this same factually incorrect thing multiple times, and each time I've written a response pointing out the flaws.

I can understand that a well meaning person like JGL can be taken in by it. He mentions having talked to Audrey Tang about it. But, again, as much as I respect Tang's work in Taiwan, she is not a US legal expert, and she has this stuff entirely backwards.

I do believe that JGL legitimately wants a free and open internet. I believe that he legitimately would like to see more upstart competitors and less power and control from the biggest providers. In that we agree.

But he has been convinced by some people who are either lying to him or simply do not understand the details, and thus he has become a useful tool for enabling greater power for the internet giants, and greater online censorship. The exact opposite of what he claims to support.

I hope he realizes that he's been misled—and I'd be happy to talk this through with him, or put him in touch with actual experts on Section 230. Because right now, he's lending his star power to one of the most dangerous ideas around for the open internet.

The BBC has reported that a '"brazen" rail fare dodger' has been fined over £3,600 for not paying for hundreds of journeys. However, it quickly becomes clear that the man is actually homeless and was sleeping on the trains. So why didn't the BBC cover it that way?

BBC paints a homeless man as a criminal

The BBC article reports that Charles Brohiri, 29, "travelled" on Govia Thameslink Railway trains 112 times "without buying a ticket" in just under two years. He was given a suspended sentence and ordered to pay back £3,629. Brohiri had previously been sentenced for 36 charges of failing to pay for a ticket in August 2024. He pleaded guilty to 76 recent charges.

The judge at Westminster Magistrates' Court, Nina Tempia, said Brohiri had a "sense of entitlement" and "acted as if he was invincible."

The BBC also mentions that he continued to travel without paying after initially being charged in court in January, right up until the day before the current hearing. Apparently, there have been a further 16 offences since then.

What it glosses over, though, is the reason why Brohiri continued to commit the 'crime'. He's actually been homeless for the last three years and has had no choice but to sleep on trains, as well as in hospitals and libraries.

State incompetence to blame

His defence, Eleanor Curzon, said Brohiri had attempted to get support but struggled to engage with charities. She said it was:

a combination of a lack of support, a negative mental health space and not knowing how to go about maintaining support from services

Curzon also told the court that Brohiri wanted to make a change in his life, and getting sober three years ago demonstrated that. She also pointed out that he had always complied when caught by authorities.

Brohiri has admitted his crimes and wants to be given a chance to get into work and be supported back into having somewhere to live. Curzon told the court:

He reiterated to me this morning that if he is given the opportunity to work with probation they can assist him in securing accommodation and employment.

It is really these two factors which will put an end to Mr Brohiri's offending.

BBC thinks homeless man not paying £15k is a bad thing

Thankfully, Brohiri was given a suspended sentence. He has, however, been ordered to carry out 150 hours of unpaid work. Hopefully, he will also be able to get paid employment alongside that, so he can live safely.

While Brohiri has to (somehow) pay the fine, he thankfully doesn't have to pay the £15,120 prosecution fees. The article frames this as a bad thing, naturally. This is the part where they finally quote Govia Thameslink, who say that people not paying fares:

diverted public funding away from improving services for passengers. That is unfair both on taxpayers and on the vast majority of passengers who pay for their journeys.

However, if they hadn't prosecuted a homeless man for the 'crime' of literally sleeping somewhere safe, that money could've been spent on homeless services.

As Adam Smith said on Twitter:

And we're supposed to think our justice system is working? That £15,000 couldn't have been spent actually helping this guy, and many others like him?

No, instead we'll hound someone for money they don't have. Like they do to all of us, these days.

BBC puts corporations before people's lives, as usual

This is clearly a story about how the system is failing vulnerable people who fall through the cracks. The fact that the BBC frames this as a "fare dodger brought to justice" and not a sharp look at the way the state treats poor people tells you everything you need to know about who the BBC serves. And let's be honest, the BBC aren't strangers to twisting the truth to fit their narrative. 

When it was discovered that Brohiri was repeatedly 'offending' because he had nowhere to sleep, the effort should've been on finding him somewhere safe. Instead, the system punished him and slapped a fine on a man with no possible means of paying it.

The true injustice in this story is being done to people like Brohiri every day. Not faceless corporations — worth millions — that force the taxpayer to pay for their sham trials. That's what the BBC should be reporting on, instead of sucking off scumbag CEOs.

Featured image via Housing Digital

By Rachel Charlton-Dailey

The results are in - and surprise, surprise Northern communities are bearing the brunt of water companies capitalising on the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) Universal Credit deductions scheme.

As the Canary previously revealed, across 18 months, water firms robbed welfare claimants of £32.4m in Universal Credit.

However, the scale of individual water firms milking this punitive DWP debt clawback mechanism has been a mystery - until now.

Using a combination of publicly available data and Freedom of Information (FOI) requests, the Canary has been able to calculate ballpark figures revealing the likely biggest culprits snatching millions in welfare from some of the poorest households.

And among privatised providers engaged in routine sewage dumping, rampant profiteering, and opportunistic bill hikes, certain companies stood out as clear exploiters of this DWP deductions regime.

DWP Universal Credit deductions: the water companies cashing in

Unlike other services, monopoly suppliers dominate by location. What this means is that water companies serve fixed regional areas. Thanks to this, the Canary was able to estimate how much each company might have taken in UC deductions. However, there are a number of significant caveats to the following data, explained here.

Through an FOI, the Canary acquired UC deductions data for every parliamentary constituency in England and Wales. The data spans the 18 months between March 2024 - August 2025.

However, water company coverage does not exactly match up with regional boundaries. This meant we had to use water company parliamentary constituency data to collate the FOI information into our own dataset. Once we had this, we could make estimates for each water company:

So in total, constituencies that the regional water monopolies cover accounted for approximately £28.7m. However, it's important to note that this will include significant double-counting, since suppliers will crossover in some constituencies.

Together, these regional companies supply water services to 30,099,891 postcodes. Small new entrant companies account for the remaining 159,524.

The most reliable data we have

Then, if we estimate deductions for the joint water and sewerage suppliers only, excluding parliamentary constituencies where the water company was different to the sewerage company, we get the following:

The above data was complicated by the fact that companies wouldn't always cover the same number of postcodes for water services versus sewerage in any one given constituency.

As such, we only used data wherever sewerage postcodes were within 10% of the number of water postcodes.

The bottom line all this speculative data underscores is that it's hard to know with any certainty how much each of the major water companies is extracting in Universal Credit deductions.

The key culprits

Nevertheless, the tentative estimates still provide a general idea of which companies are cashing in at welfare claimant's expense.

United Utilities appears the most prolific user of the deductions regime by some margin. For a start, the company seems to make up the largest chunk of the £32.4m in deductions. Under all calculations, United Utilities nabbed somewhere north of £9m in Universal Credit. Moreover, even proportional to the number of postcodes it covers, the company is the clear forerunner.

In January 2025, regulator Ofwat greenlit United Utilities hiking customer bills by 32% over the next five years. Since it began raising bills in April, it has seen a 131% profit surge.

Meanwhile, Yorkshire Water and Northumbrian Water extracted the next largest sums from customer's Universal Credit. At more than £2.95m and £2.65m respectively, the two northern utility giants also ranked high as a proportion of the postcodes they covered. For Yorkshire Water, it came in fourth behind United Utilities, Northumbrian in second place, and Dwr Cymru in third place as a ratio of deductions to the postcodes they supply services to.

In October 2025, Northumbrian Water was among five companies that lobbied the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) for further bill hikes. The company had already secured permission in January to increase bills by 21%.

And of course, Ofwat slapped both United Utilities and Yorkshire Water with boss's bonus bans in November. These were due to category 1 pollution incidents in 2024. In Yorkshire Water's case, it was also down to its "serious failures" over sewage, which had resulted in "excessive spills".

So as these companies provided atrocious services and mass polluted watercourses, they were also running roughshod over some of their poorest customers.

Northern water utilities running roughshod over welfare claimants

What's immediately noticeable here is that, with the exception of Dwr Cymru, the biggest culprits are the companies administering water and sewerage in the North.

It tallies with broader statistics on Universal Credit deductions. During the same 12-month period, the North East had the highest number of Universal Credit households where the government or third parties had made one or more deductions. Specifically, it stood at 53%.The North West followed this, at 50%.

The North East (21.5%) and North West (20.2%) also has the highest number of highly deprived neighbourhoods in England. On the one hand, the high levels of deprivation offer an explanation for the significant scale of water debt. This is because, it logically follows that more people would be experiencing debt thanks to state-sanctioned poverty. However, on the other, it points to water companies and their extortionate bill hikes exacerbating the problem. And of course, eating into customer's social security will also only compound this deprivation further.

Ultimately, the key point is that going after some of the poorest customers for outstanding payments is a choice. Water companies reporting mega-profits aren't strapped for cash - and could easily take the hit. These unscrupulous firms are robbing welfare claimants of their social security to fund eye-watering shareholder dividends and executive pay packages. This needs to be recognised for the absolute scandal it is.

As ever, the most marginalised - particularly Northern - communities are bearing the brunt of this egregious cost of greed crisis fuelled by the DWP. This data shows clearly that it's one in which the privatised water racket is undoubtedly playing a significant part.

Featured image via the Canary

By Hannah Sharland

Sir Jim Ratcliffe, co-owner of Manchester United, has come under heavy criticism for saying that immigrants are "colonising" the UK. He said:

You can't have an economy with nine million people on benefits and huge levels of immigrants coming in. I mean, the UK has been colonised. It's costing too much money.

The UK has been colonised by immigrants, really, hasn't it?

The racist shithead also claimed that the UK's population grew by 12 million people in 5 years. That's bollocks too, as BBC Verify reported:

it's actually increased by 2.7 million.

And, that statistic doesn't take into account the economic benefit of immigrants doing all the shitty jobs white people don't want. And that, in turn, doesn't take into account that we're talking about people - people who have a right to safety and welcome.

Manchester United began in 1878 as Newton Heath, formed by railway workers who wanted solidarity and community within industrial labour. The club grew from working-class collectivism. Migrant communities in Manchester sustained it. Players of colour built its modern success. When the co-owner describes immigrants as colonisers, he positions himself against the communities that shaped the institution he now partially controls.

The Politics of His Non-Apology

Keir Starmer waded in to urge Ratcliffe to apologise:

Offensive and wrong.

Britain is a proud, tolerant and diverse country.

Jim Ratcliffe should apologise.https://t.co/7mSnVV33oo

— Keir Starmer (@Keir_Starmer) February 11, 2026

That would be the same man who made the now infamous "island of strangers" speech.

There is something deeply unsettling about watching Britain distance itself from the language of colonisation while still struggling to confront what that word represents in its own history. The state can condemn vocabulary, yet condemnation does not equal reckoning, especially when the same political culture continues to frame immigration through the language of control, pressure, and strain.

Starmer's objection might sound firm, but it is utterly meaningless when his government are overseeing a hostile environment for immigrants.

His apology doesn't change his stance

Ratcliffe did eventually apologise, but it was predictably a non-apology:

I am sorry that my choice of language has offended some people in the UK and Europe and caused concern but it is important to raise the issue of controlled and well-managed immigration that supports economic growth.

The apology focused on offence rather than on the framing itself. While discomfort was acknowledged, the imagery of invasion was left untouched. He did not withdraw the claim. He softened it. As a result, the premise stayed in place, only dressed in calmer language.

Language like this does not appear from nowhere, particularly not from someone operating at that level of influence. Words reflect assumptions. When a historically loaded term such as colonisation is replaced with managerial phrasing about "management" and "control," the logic beneath it does not disappear; it becomes easier to defend. The adjustment feels strategic rather than reflective.

Meanwhile, the political exchange unfolds in a predictable way. Disapproval is voiced. An apology is requested. Regret is offered in careful terms. Yet ownership remains intact and authority remains intact. The tone shifts, but the structure does not.

Ultimately, this episode exposes more than a dispute over wording. It shows how power can absorb backlash without surrendering position, how language can be recalibrated without the worldview behind it being unsettled, and how accountability can be signalled without materially changing who controls the narrative.

Featured image via the Canary

By The Canary

The Palestine Youth Movement (PYM) joined community members in Lambeth on Thursday 5 February to kick Labour out of their hometown. As a result, local people realised their democratic power in being the first community in the UK to launch the 'Vote Palestine' pledge campaign for the upcoming local elections in May.

Lambeth leading the way

The Lambeth event was led by Mariam of the PYM and London Votes Palestine campaign. Mariam gave an inspiring masterclass in how ordinary people can come together. In turn, she showed how voters across the country can use their democratic power to get the change they want to see in their hometowns.

Activists from Jewish Voice for Liberation (JVL) and Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) joined other local activists and people who have had enough of Labour's ongoing complicity and willingness to ignore Israel's flagrant breaches to countless international laws. Former ANC member and arms trade corruption investigator Andrew Feinstein also attended the event.

In true unity and solidarity, organisers inspired and energised local people to get Palestine on the ballot.

'No divestment: No votes'

Mariam of the Palestine Youth Movement passionately introduced the Lambeth campaign and what it hopes to achieve:

Lambeth Vote Palestine is not just launching here, but it's part of a national campaign that is launching in 12 boroughs across London because people are fed up of Labour councils that are not listening to people that are pushing resolutions for divestment from genocide. It's launching in Manchester, in Greater Manchester, in Newcastle, in Birmingham and in Sheffield. And the first national launch is taking place here today in Brixton in Lambeth.

So, the way that Vote Palestine came together has essentially come from all these local organisers that have tried to push divestment resolutions to get money out of Israel and money into our council and into the people of this council. But we know that Labour councillors have lied to us about just how much political power they have in order to take on divestment. We know that Labour councillors have watered down resolutions that have managed to pass and protests have been tried, resolutions have been tried, all sorts of attention against Labour majority councils have been tried.

And we know that they're not interested in divestment from Israel because it's a party of genocide. It's a party that's done nothing against austerity. It's a party that with Rachel Reeves' latest budget is raising taxes on ordinary working people. And we see this in Lambeth as well. It is a council that has ignored us time and time again.

So up and down the country, We know that the elections are coming in May 2026. And we've gotten started a little bit early, but actually right now, Labour is preparing itself for who's going to be standing in the next election, and preparing its candidates and other parties are doing that as well. But so is Vote Palestine. We are preparing to say: no divestment, no vote. So, we are asking two things nationally, as well as here in Lambeth.

The first is what's called a councillor's pledge. We are asking that any sitting councillor or new candidate signs a councillor's pledge that commits them to getting money out of Israel and money into our communities. No divestment, no votes.

But there's a second portion to this, because this is also a grassroots campaign and a people-driven campaign, one that's going to be powered forward by us giving it a little bit of time every month and getting a big impact out through just a little bit of labour together. And that is the People's Pledge. So we are also asking voters to take a pledge that will say, 'if this candidate has not endorsed the councillor's pledge, we will not be voting for them'. And we're going to take that to councillor's and say, 'hey, you know what? In Lambeth, hundreds of people have committed to the Palestine pledge, to the people's pledge, and these people will not be voting for candidates that have not endorsed divestment, that have not endorsed Palestine.'

Mariam later referred to the response they receive on the ground from constituents in London, adding:

We've been talking to people all over London around what's the issue that needs more funding? And no one says genocide. So this campaign is really about… We're putting Palestine on the ballot. We know that the people are with Palestine. We also know from the last election, with the election of the Gaza Independents, that there is a Palestine-first voter. It's time to show that in the local elections. And we're going to make that known.

From Lambeth, from Brixton, all the way up to Newcastle and the country over, we're going to put Palestine on the ballot and make it a non-negotiable issue. No divestment, no votes.

'At the expense of our NHS, our benefit system, and all local services'

In Lambeth, Feinstein discussed the clear corruption at the heart of our current UK government, namely Keir Starmer's lucrative relationship with billionaire-owned Quadrature:

And the reality is, I've just come from a Zoom meeting with four Palestinian journalists who are fortunate to be alive. What sort of a sick world do we live in? When journalists start a conversation when they introduce themselves by saying, I'm thankful to be alive. Because hundreds of their colleagues are not.

But what relevance does that have for Brixton and for Lambeth? It has every relevance. The reality is that the biggest political donation in British electoral history was paid by a company called Quadrature Capital to the campaign of Keir Starmer for the 2024 local election. That resulted in a situation where Starmer, who didn't once show his face in his own constituency because he knows he would have been drummed out of town, spent tens of thousands of pounds on direct social media advertising. Our independent campaign was allowed to spend £17k in total on everything. Because the political system here is fixed.

Within three weeks of coming to power, Keir Starmer announced two policy proposals. One is he went back on his commitment to a new green economic plan that he'd committed at least £20bn to. And then he increased defence spending by £3.5bn a year until 2027. At which point, defense spending will increase by £15.4bn. Quadrature capital's asset value at the end of those three weeks of Starmer being in power increased exponentially for the expenditure of £5m in their political donations.

And that is why Britain today lives in the best democracy money can buy. Our politicians are bought and paid for. Keir Starmer is a puppet. He is a puppet, not just of Morgan McSweeney, the little worm who is his chief of staff, but he is the puppet of billionaires and corporate interests like Quadrature. Quadrature has invested primarily in fossil fuels and arms company. Of that £15.4bn increase in our defense budget in 2027, a huge proportion of it will land up being used against the people of Palestine.

And that £15.4 bn is at the expense of our NHS, our benefit system, and all of our local services. Because frankly, and I'll ask you to excuse my language here, but as you might gather, I'm a little bit angry about this. People like Keir Starmer and all of our establishment politicians don't give a fuck about us. And if ever that was brought to our attention, it's in the reality that people like them were more concerned about the fact that Jeremy Corbyn could not pronounce Jeffrey Epstein's name properly, which they regarded as anti-Semitic. Then they are about the fact that Lord Peter Mandelson was who is an architect of the Starmer Project, is closest friends with a paedophile, with a man who has abused and sex-trafficked hundreds and hundreds of children for abuse by the old white men who run this world and profit from it.

'Legal responsibility to take action' in Lambeth

Local activist Jan O'Malley gave an eye-opening and inspiring speech about the sheer scale of Lambeth council investment in Israel and its ongoing genocide. Referring to the power of the BDS movement, O'Malley said:

BDS, you all know about BDS, boycott, divestment and sanctions. We are the D in BDS. So how big is this problem? PSC has done a massive amount of work on research on this, which has been a great resource for us all. And they have found that 81 local government pension schemes have collectively invested over £12bn in companies complicit with Israel's oppression of the Palestinians. It's genocide, it's apartheid and it's illegal occupation. And the British government as a party to the genocide convention has a legal responsibility to take action to prevent further genocide.

PSC has sent a letter to every pension committee member across the country, telling them about this legal duty. It's not worth waiting until the ICJ finally concludes there is a genocide, they're meant to prevent genocides. And this means that we take immediate action to start divesting. So, in Lambeth, how big is the problem? Well, the figures that we got from FOIs that PSC did was that the Lambeth Pension Fund had £52.4m invested in companies complicit with Israel. And this included £25m in Amazon, £20m in Alphabet.

They may say, 'oh, we all use them', and at the council meeting, they were joking about that. 'Do you mean we ought to stop us using Amazon and Uber and things in our everyday lives? This is what these unrealistic people who are petitioning us are saying.' But both of those companies are involved in providing Project Nimbus, which is a computing technology system of surveillance, which has been used to target the journalists, the doctors, the people in Gaza that they wanted to target…. it's used and bought and helps and supports the Israeli government and military. Other investments are arms companies like Boeing, Rolls Royce, but also Israeli government bonds, which are actually lending money to the Israeli government, and Barclays, which funds so many arms companies.

Referring to a petition sent to Lambeth Council and its pensions committee, O'Malley finished by saying:

We took our petition. We presented it middle of November last year, thinking the council needed time to check the addresses and everything. And then we had to give them enough time. And they were meant to let us know in 10 days, if there was anything wrong with our petition. They didn't until the day before the full council meeting, when they rejected the petition on the grounds that it was about something that they do not control, and they pointed a little item J in their constitution about petitions which will be rejected. They're saying they've changed their constitution to take out the word control and amend all the weaselly words. They only administer.

So, what has the Pensions Committee been doing every three months when they meet and take decisions? It's a total farce. It's ludicrous. It's dishonest. So shame on Lambeth Council. I was really shocked at this. It took me, I'm quite cynical and I've been demonstrating an activism since I was 14, but I've not known a council behave like this in my lifetime. So it shocked me. I wasn't ready for it. So what are we going to do? We're going to challenge. this attack on solidarity with Palestine, which is what it is, and democracy, which is what it is, by all available means, including in the local elections in May, which leads us to why we're here tonight. And we will support alternative candidates who take the pledge for Palestine. And we will challenge Labour councillors who refuse to take the pledge and collude with this despicable denial of democracy. So let's challenge them on the doorsteps. Let's get busy with Lambeth Votes Palestine.

'Get these shits out of their offices'

As ever, another powerful speech in Lambeth was delivered by Glyn Secker of what was formerly Jewish Voice for Labour (JVL). First Secker told us that the 'L' no longer stands for Labour, as a result of their pro-genocide actions, but now stands for 'liberation' in solidarity with Palestinians. Secker has long refused to be connected to the hostile state of Zionist Israel particularly as a Jewish man, stating:

We represent a very different perspective on what it means to be a Jew in this country, a very different point of view from the Jewish establishment, the Board of Deputies of British Jews, the Jewish Leadership Council. I'm going to give you a perspective, a historical one, tied up with where we are now.

Jews in this country represent 0.5% of the population. Muslims represent about 5%. So you might ask, why is the Israeli lobby so damn powerful? Why is their establishment here has minimal concerns with Islamophobia, but maximal focus on anti-Semitism and its weaponization?

But we can do no more than understand racism without understanding imperialism and slavery, than we can understand Islamophobia without understanding oil imperialism, which replaced slavery as a financial driver of the second stage of the development of international capitalism.

The economic foundations of Israel were laid by mercantile Jews, traders, financiers, and then developing into international bankers. the privileged upper-class Jews with a role in developing the first stage of capitalism. To jump very quickly from that to Israel and Zionism, Zionism translated that role into a nationalist form, a little loyal Jewish Ulster in a sea of hostile Arabism, as a British colonial agent in the Middle East described it at the time. And what happened was the development of Israel took over that role of Jewish capital when the bankers began, the Jewish bankers, Rothschilds and so on, began to give way to the large financial institutions developing in the States.

And so Israel took on that role of American imperial interest in the Middle East. Like the financials before them, they slotted neatly into servicing the dominant economic and political order. And so you have the United States' multi-billion pound transfers to Israel, not just now during the genocide, but it's accelerated. It's been going on for decades, from the beginning of Israel's inception, pretty much. So it's imperative to draw a distinction between Israel and its ideology, political Zionism and Jew. Because I have nothing to do with what's going on there, as far as I'm concerned, and I will not be identified with that. And there are many hundreds of thousands, probably a couple of million of us around the country.

Secker finished with a bit of advice for those out on doorsteps facing the inevitable allegations of antisemitism for refusing to support mass-murder, advising:

So what do you do on the doorstep when you're told that it's anti-Semitic? Well, you just say, there's a whole lot of Jews in this country, who are deeply committed to it, because they're deeply committed against genocide, who are deeply committed against any Holocaust, whoever perpetrates it.

And if it's Jews, well for me, I'm deeply against that from the bottom of my being, because that is not something that I identify with in terms of my integrity and my humanity. So, I can't tolerate, as a Jewish pensioner, drawing a lamb of pension that my deferred wages are invested in weapons companies that are slaughtering Palestinians.

So, I am deeply behind this campaign to get these shits out of their offices so we can disinvest.

Featured image via the Canary

By Maddison Wheeldon

Following yet another Epstein bombshell, the royal parasites are in trouble again. It appears that the £12m that Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor paid to Virginia Giuffre out of court in 2022 was stumped up by several prominent members of his family. Including King Charles.

The Sun is reporting that not only did the late Queen loan ex-Prince Andrew millions to pay £12m to Virginia Guiffre, but Charles chipped in £1.5m https://t.co/oX2JgpCqFp

— Victoria Derbyshire (@vicderbyshire) February 11, 2026

A royal cover-up form King Charles that hurts women

The pay off happened before more allegations against Andrew surfaced in the latest release of the Epstein Files.

We knew that the queen stumped up a lot of cash to silence Giuffre and get her little nonce out of trouble, but £7m is a wild sum of money. Couple that with the fact that £3m came from the late prince Philip's estate. And now we've found out prince (now king) Charles stumped up £1.5m towards the case too.

Read that again.

Our now-king paid a large amount of money to cover the tracks of an alleged nonce and to silence one brave woman's fight for justice.

And the 'king' will never be prosecuted for this:

The monarch is immune from prosecution, by the way, so there will be no investigation https://t.co/DOCz7XhY8b pic.twitter.com/x4aIaoLTQ1

— Svetlana Lokhova (@RealSLokhova) February 12, 2026

Our royal family is silencing victims

I am absolutely fucking disgusted with these utter parasites. This is a clear sign of one rule for us, another for them.

It shows absolute contempt for us, the lowly serfs that they supposedly serve. It shows if you have enough money, you can hush up even the worst kind of crimes. You can avoid justice and prison if you have deep enough pockets to pay for it.

There's thousands of accusations of crimes against women in the Epstein files. Thousands of names of girls and women we will never know and the royal family are spitting on every single one of them.

And our fucking king has done this. He paid to silence the voices of so many women who need to be heard.

King Charles who famously said, at the age of 29 that Diana was "an attractive 16yr old."

King Charles who was close friends with Jimmy Saville and called him a "national treasure."

Abolish the monarchy.

Featured image via The Canary

By Antifabot

It appears that The Jerusalem Post is allowing anyone to write for them nowadays. Stephen Yaxley-Lennon (a.k.a. Tommy Robinson) wrote an opinion piece for them on Wednesday 11 February entitled "Jeffrey Epstein and the system that protected him."

After months of silence on the Files, he finally spoke out.

But there's several issues surrounding this piece that we need to look into. first is Robinson's dramatic shift in prose. It uses clinical, polished language that stands in contrast with his usual street-level shouting.

And many are claiming he wrote it with AI:

It seems Israel's PR crisis has reached rock bottom. This piece by Tommy Robinson for the Jerusalem Post is almost certainly AI written.

Anyone familiar with Tommy's posting knows he struggles with the written word, and anyone familiar with AI slop will recognise the many… https://t.co/wGOE7Kae9n

— Keith Woods (@KeithWoodsYT) February 11, 2026

We also need to ask why this prominent racist grifter is even being given a platform to spew his bile.

His use of AI isn't the issue here

It's certainly plausible that Tommy Robinson used AI for his article. It has all the tells, and to be honest, it would be more surprising if he had written it himself. Robinson can barely string a sentence together on Twitter, so these accusations hold a lot of weight.

But it's not Robinson's lack of literacy skills which are the problem here.

The problem is that, yet again, this racist, little grifter has completely fucked his own argument. By staying silent on the Epstein Files, literally the biggest white-led grooming gang of all time, all future input he has on the matter is null and void.

The Epstein Files have been out for a while. For months we have seen the censored images of women and children blasted across our screens. We have looked at thousands of redacted names of women who will never be able to come forward and tell their stories.

Why the fuck didn't Robinson comment on this then? Why wait this long when you're so desperate to 'protect all women'?

The Epstein files have revealed what is probably the largest grooming-gang in the world.

And the guy running it was fucking white.

That's why he's been so silent. Because it doesn't fit his ridiculously racist propaganda that he shovels down the neck of the British public. He is a hypocrite and a liar who is willing to ignore systematic abuse when the perpetrators look like him.

Oh, and the fact that he was in the files, because Epstein himself was a fan of his.

Tommy Robinson: a legacy of lies and hate

Nobody should listen to a single 'take' this opportunist has, whether it's AI or not. Tommy Robinson's history proves he is a danger to a better world.

I mean, it doesn't really scream 'protect all women' when Robinson attacked a copper who was intervening in a domestic issue between himself and his partner. This cocaine soaked rat has so many convictions it's hard to count. But they include intent to supply, harassing a literal child because he was an immigrant, leading football hooligans into a mass brawl, possessing and using a false passport, mortgage fraud, the list goes on.

Those actions alone mean that this little racist should be buried in the annals of history. But it's made so much worse when this man does nothing but weaponise sexual violence to target migrant communities to stoke division.

For this convicted criminal, the abuse of women and girls was never the point. He only cares about sexual violence when he can turn the narrative and blame Black and Brown people.

Laundering his racist brand

Tommy Robinson is now leaning into a pro-Israel narrative to shield his racism. Hiding behind a literal genocidal state which is killing hundreds of thousands of Muslims is absolutely disgusting, but it didn't stop Robinson going on a tour of the Zionist state. Robinson was called out by The Board of Deputies of British Jews for his trip, with them calling Robinson a "thug" and the "very worst of Britain".

This AI slop in a shit publication shows how far Robinson has fallen. But he needs to fall further and into absolute oblivion. Robinson doesn't give a shit about women. He only gives a shit about lining his greasy little pockets and shouting about innocent black and brown people to his legions of knuckle-dragging followers.

Rather than letting Robinson's new grift flourished, it is time to see him for what he is. A racist little grifter who doesn't give a shit about women and girls being raped.

He only cares about where he can get his next bag and how he can somehow turn the narrative on vulnerable marginalised groups.

Featured image via The Canary

By Antifabot

In an era of state repression and mass murder backed by the most powerful nations on earth, it takes something special to speak truth to power. Nine Belfast activists have done just that. This February they face the full power of the genocide-complicit British state.

The Canary understands three of those charged will go on trial on 13 February. Another will be in court on 16 February and a fifth will face British 'justice' on 20 February.

The charges stem from two road blockades carried out on July and October 2025. In a powerful statement, the group made it clear that the real criminals are those who support Israel's genocidal assault on Palestine.

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by BDS Belfast (@bdsbelfast)

Active genocide participants

BDS Belfast pulled no punches in their statement:

Stormont and Westminster have been active participants in the genocide of the Palestinian people.

Yet, it is 9 Belfast activists, from across multiple solidarity groups, who participated in peaceful civil disobedience, who the police are attempting to criminalise.

They added:

The only thing that we are guilty of is standing for the simple principle that Palestinians are entitled to the same rights as the rest of humanity.

We will not be deterred

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by BDS Belfast (@bdsbelfast)

The original protests were focused on the role of the so-called 'Gaza Humanitarian Foundation' and the Global Sumud Flotilla respectively and, more broadly, Stormont and Westminster's support for Israel.

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by BDS Belfast (@bdsbelfast)

The Canary understands the charges will range from "obstructive sitting" and "unauthorised procession". So peaceful protest then….

The nine plan to plead not guilty to all charges.

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by BDS Belfast (@bdsbelfast)

The British state would suppress every trace of human solidarity with Palestinians if it could. And it will do this at any cost to basic freedoms and rights. These activists are heroic figures. The Canary will keep you updated in the case as it progresses.

Featured image via the Canary

By Joe Glenton

US attorney general Pam Bondi may have walked herself into a sticky situation after declaring under oath to congress that there is:

no evidence that Donald Trump has committed a crime.

Pam Bondi: liar

Ted Lieu instantly called this out as a lie under oath. Lieu is vice chair of the House Democratic Caucus and a former Air Force colonel. Continuing, Lieu quoted a deeply concerning transcript from the Epstein Files. This transcript has raised urgent questions about the US President's potential involvement in serious criminal acts. The Epstein Files have revealed a significant and highly suspicious relationship between Trump and convicted paedophile, Jeffrey Epstein.

Rep. Jasmine Crockett also took Bondi to task, arguing that she and the Trump administration cannot distinguish right from wrong.

Pam Bondi, "There is no evidence that Donald Trump has committed a crime"

Ted Lieu, "You just lied under oath. There is ample evidence in the Epstein files"

Pam Bondi, "Don't you ever accuse me of a crime"

Ted Lieu, "You just lied under oath, and this is on video tape"

Ted… pic.twitter.com/v2Feci6P4u

— Farrukh (@implausibleblog) February 11, 2026

'Epstein should rot in hell, so should the men who patronised this operation'

Pam Bondi: There is no evidence that Donald Trump has committed a crime. Everyone knows that. This has been the most transparent presidency. He's the one that asked that those files be released.

Ted Lieu: I'm going to claim my time. I got your answer. You said there's no evidence.

Bondi: President Trump asked that he sign the legislation.

Lieu: This is time. Time belongs to the gentleman from California. Okay. I'm going to put up another document from… a witness who called the FBI's National Threat Operation Center because I believe you just lied under oath. There is ample evidence in the Epstein file.

Bondi: Don't you ever accuse me of a crime.

Lieu: I believe you just lied under oath, and this is all on videotape. You said there's no evidence of a crime. I'm showing you. Here is a witness statement who called into the FBI's Threat Operation Center. He drove Donald Trump around in a limo. He overheard what Donald Trump said to Jeffrey on his cell phone. He was so angry, he was going to stop the limo and hurt Donald Trump. And he met a girl who said she was raped by Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein.

She later had her head blown off, and officers at the scene said that could not have been suicide. No one, no one at the Department of Justice interviewed this witness. You need to interview this witness immediately. Epstein should rot in hell, so should the men who patronised this operation. And as we sit here today, there are over 1,000 sex trafficking victims, and you have not held a single man accountable. Shame on you. If you had any decency, you would resign right after this hearing concludes.

You cannot shame the shameless
Impeach her finished https://t.co/BOGYZ3m3GI

— Where We Going, We Don't Need Britches

Big Red joins AWS on a multi-cloud defense platform

Oracle has picked up an $88 million contract with the US Air Force to provide cloud infrastructure services for the department's Cloud One program.…

Last year Apple secured the exclusive rights to broadcast Formula 1 racing in the United States from 2026 to 2030. Apple TV subscribers can now watch every practice and qualifying session as well as every sprint and Grand Prix of a race weekend on the F1TV app by linking their Apple account.

Right now, those with an existing F1TV subscription will still see an active status in their "my subscription" page on desktop that shows the plan's renewal date. However, after logging in via Apple with an Apple TV subscription, a second active F1TV subscription appears with an Apple TV logo and the label "Official U.S. broadcaster of Formula 1." Users are advised to cancel the duplicate subscription they had directly with F1TV, which can be done in the F1TV app.

For those that don't have an existing F1TV account, simply create one and activate it using your Apple account. Users who don't pay for Apple TV can still view "select races" and practice sessions throughout the season.

Apple has yet to release precise details on what content will be viewable from within the Apple TV app compared to the F1TV app, where users are accustomed to features like multi-view, onboard cameras, live team radios and live timing and telemetry. With the first race of the F1 season kicking off March 7 in Australia, we should have these answers soon.

Fans can currently check out preseason testing taking place in Bahrain this week and next through the F1TV app.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/streaming/how-to-get-f1tv-with-your-apple-tv-subscription-171534300.html?src=rss

Luke Pollard, the Minister for Defence Procurement, was grilled over the Government's deals with US spy-tech giant Palantir. Pollard repeatedly failed to answer basic questions, one time blaming his recent trip to Saudi Arabia's arms fair for his lack of answers.

I'm here in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, supporting UK SMEs and wider industry partners attending the World Defence Show 2026. Defence is an engine for growth, and the UK is proud to stand with Saudi Arabia in difficult times and to build on our partnership and friendship. pic.twitter.com/Ql0iCG5uPH

— Luke Pollard MP (@LukePollard) February 9, 2026

Pollard seemingly absolved Peter Mandelson's links to Palantir from playing any role in the government awarding a contract worth £240 million to Palantir, signed in December 2025. Pollard maintained, repeatedly, that the £240 million deal was merely an extension of the 2022 agreement signed by the previous Conservative Government.

He said:

This Government took over what the Tories started in 2022, but we made it work better for Britain and better for our forces. As the Defence Secretary has said, the contract was his decision, and his alone. Peter Mandelson had no influence on the decision to award this contract

 And again:

I have been clear in my answers today that the decision to extend the 2022 contract signed under the previous Government was made by the Secretary of State alone. It was his decision to do so.

The February 2025 Washington meeting between the Prime Minister, Peter Mandelson, and Palantir CEO Alex Karp, was asked about twice, and twice the Pollard could not give a straight answer. The meeting, after all, preceded the December 2025 contract. The minutes of that meeting were not noted.  At the time, Palantir was a client of Global Counsel, the lobbying firm Mandelson founded. Palantir is a US company that specialises in artificial intelligence-powered military and surveillance technology and data analytics. Billionaire Trump donor Peter Thiel was a co-founder of the company.

Jeremy Corbyn asked whether Britain should be entangled with a company complicit in the destruction of Gaza, a company that had, in his words, "wormed" its way into UK government contracts and the NHS.

"A trap": Palantir links to Epstein Slammed The £1 NHS COVID contract from 2020 was raised by Labour MP Dawn Butler, and she did not mince words:

When I was in opposition, I raised concerns about Palantir and the £1 deal that was made. It was always a trap to ensure that Palantir got its foot in where no one else could. The co-founder of Palantir is mentioned in the Epstein files. I think that anyone who is mentioned in the Epstein files should be fully investigated by this House and by the police; the scandal is an absolute disgrace.

Green MP Dr Ellie Chowns also had questions. Chowns posed three questions: would the MOD cancel the Palantir contract, launch an independent inquiry into the company's billions in UK framework deals, and confirm whether Mandelson shared privileged information with the firm?

Labour's Clive Lewis had already called the whole affair a stink. Chowns agreed.

The govt is refusing to commit to an inquiry into the MOD's contracts with US-based spy tech giant Palantir despite the web of shady connections between Mandelson, Epstein, and Palantir co-founder Peter Thiel - this absolutely stinks. pic.twitter.com/UDVi7P7GmO

— Dr Ellie Chowns MP (@EllieChowns) February 10, 2026

We agree — it is a stinking mess!

By The Canary

Not-onamous by a long shot

Nobody likes folding laundry, but you really have to hate it to spend $7,999 on a robot that'll fold it for you with a whole heap of limitations - including company employees getting the occasional peep at your tough-to-fold unmentionables.…

Apple's Vision Pro is a curious product — it initially wowed me two years ago, but it was hard to ignore that the visionOS platform felt incomplete without dedicated apps for YouTube and Netflix. Well, it seems that Google has finally decided to take the Vision Pro seriously, as it's launching a YouTube app on the platform today. Previously, you could only view YouTube videos via Safari, or through third-party apps like Tubular Pro.

According to an Apple representative, the YouTube Vision Pro app features every video on on the service, including shorts, 360, 3D and VR 180 content. I haven't tried it myself yet, but it certainly couldn't be worse than trying to navigate through YouTube's desktop app via finger gestures. Now that Google is spinning up its Android XR ecosystem, the company probably couldn't avoid the Vision Pro for long. And don't forget, we may also see a cheaper Vision Air next year.

Your move, Netflix.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ar-vr/apple-vision-pro-finally-gets-a-youtube-app-today-170000886.html?src=rss

Wildlight Entertainment, the studio behind Highguard, has laid off many staffers. Level designer Alex Graner wrote in a LinkedIn post that the layoffs impacted "most of the team." The company says it's keeping a "core group of developers to continue innovating on and supporting the game." That sounds like a skeleton crew.

Today we made an incredibly difficult decision to part ways with a number of our team members while keeping a core group of developers to continue innovating on and supporting the game.

We're proud of the team, talent, and the product we've created together. We're also grateful…

— Wildlight Entertainment (@WildlightEnt) February 12, 2026

Highguard is an arena shooter with an impressive pedigree. The team included many Apex Legends and Titanfall developers. The title was first announced as a "one more thing" surprise during the 2025 Game Awards, which was met with a lukewarm response by those looking for something a bit more exciting to close out the show.

The game was released at the end of January, but the response to the final game was also a bit tepid. However, Wildlight proved quick to make adjustments based on player feedback. That's not always the case.

Despite the company's efforts, the concurrent player count on Steam quickly dropped from around 100,000 to under 3,000 (where it sits right now.) It looks like that dwindling player count has now translated to massive layoffs just weeks after the initial release. Wildlight says it's "grateful for players who gave the game a shot, and those who continue to be a part of our community."

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/highguard-studio-lays-off-most-of-its-team-just-weeks-after-the-game-went-live-165919815.html?src=rss

At the end of last month, Ubisoft workers in the publisher's native France threatened to strike in the wake of sweeping layoffs and cost-cutting measures. This week, they made good on those threats. According to GamesIndustry.biz, union members confirmed that at least 1,200 staff participated in the three-day strike, which was due to run from February 10 to February 12.

While the strike action primarily took place in France, GamesIndustry.biz was told that Ubisoft's Milan office also took part. The union Solidaires Informatique, which represents French workers from a number of companies in the video game sector, including Blizzard and Ubisoft, had previously called for strikes to take place on January 27. Their demands included a 10 percent increase on all salaries and the implementation of a 4-day work week.

Some striking employees held up signs outside Ubisoft's Paris headquarters, with one (pictured) wearing a Rabbids mask to hide their face. Their grievances are wide-ranging. As well as reportedly laying off hundreds of employees already in 2026, Ubisoft also introduced a mandate for its staff to return to work on site for five days a week. One employee who publicly voiced their disapproval of the new policy was reportedly fired for doing so.

Ubisoft has had a rocky start to 2026 on the software side too. The long-awaited Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time remake was among six games canceled by the struggling publisher last month, when it also confirmed several studio closures as part of the company's organizational restructuring.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/1200-ubisoft-workers-went-on-strike-in-response-to-company-restructuring-and-mandatory-return-to-work-policy-163714986.html?src=rss

Trump 1.0 took a hatchet to media ownership limits. Those limits, built on the back of decades of bipartisan collaboration, prohibited local broadcasters and media from growing too large, trampling smaller (and more diversely-owned) competitors underfoot. The result of their destruction has been a rise in local news deserts, a surge in right wing propaganda outlets pretending to be "local news," less diverse media ownership, and (if you hadn't noticed) a painfully disinformed electorate.

Trump 2.0 has been significantly worse.

Trump's FCC has finished demolishing whatever was left of already saggy media ownership limits, and are eyeing eliminating rules that would prevent the big four (Fox, ABC, CBS, NBC) from merging (a major reason why these networks have been such feckless authoritarian appeasers).

They're also working hard to let all of our local right wing broadcast companies merge into one, even larger, shittier company, something Donald Trump is very excited about!

More specifically Nexstar (a very Republican friendly company that also owns The Hill), is asking the FCC for permission to acquire Tegna in a $6.2 billion deal that is illegal under current rules (you might recall that Nexstar-owned The Hill recently fired a journalist whose reporting angered Trump).

The deal would give Nexstar ownership of 265 stations in 44 states and the District of Columbia and 132 of the country's 210 television Designated Market Areas (or DMAs). Nexstar appears to have beaten out rival bids by Sinclair, which has also long-been criticized as Republican propaganda posing as local news. It wouldn't be surprising if Nexstar and Sinclair are the next to merge.

Keep in mind, this is an industry that was already terrible agitprop, as this now seven-year-old Deadspin video helped everyone realize:

You might be inclined to say: "but Karl, local TV broadcasters are irrelevant. Who cares if they consolidate a dying industry." But the consolidation won't stop here. The goal isn't just the consolidation of local broadcasters, it's the consolidation of national and local media giants, telecoms, tech companies, and social media companies. All under the thumb of terrible unethical people.

Trump's rise to power couldn't have been made possible without the Republican domination of media. For the better part of a generation Republicans have dominated AM radio, local broadcast TV, and cable news, and have since done a remarkable job hoovering up what's left of both major media companies (CBS, FOX) and modern social media empires (TikTok, Twitter). The impact is everywhere you look.

Over on Elon Musk's right wing propaganda platform, Brendan Carr was quick to praise President's Trump bold support for more media consolidation. And, as he has done previously, he openly lied and trying to pretend that local broadcast consolidation is something that aids competition:

I've covered Brendan Carr professionally since he joined the FCC in 2012. This is a man who has coddled media and telecom giants (and their anti-competitive behavior) at literally every opportunity. One of his only functions in government has been to rubber stamp shitty mergers. Here, he's pretending to "protect competition" with a cute little antisemitic dog whistle about the folks in "Hollywood and New York."

Amusingly, Carr and Trump's push to allow all manner of problematic consolidation among these terrible local broadcasters has been so abrupt, it's actually causing some infighting between them and other right wing propaganda companies like Newsmax.

There's a reason the Trump administration is destroying media consolidation limits, murdering public media, harassing media companies, threatening late night comedians (or having them fired), and ushering forth all this mindless and dangerous consolidation. There's a reason Larry Ellison and Elon Musk are buying all the key social media platforms and fiddling with the algorithms.

They very openly (and so far semi-successfully) are trying to build a state media apparatus akin to what they have in Orban's Hungary and Putin's Russia. Our corporate press is already so broken and captured it's incapable of communicating that to anybody. It simply wouldn't be in their best financial interests for existing media conglomerates to be honest about this sort of thing.

One plus side, nobody involved in any of this — from CBS's News boss Bari Weiss to Sinclair Broadcasting — appear to have any competent idea of what they're doing. They're not good at journalism (because they're trying to destroy it), but they're generally not good at ratings-grabbing propaganda. As a result it's entirely possible they destroy U.S. media before their dream of state media comes to fruition.

Still, it might be nice if Democrats could stop waiting for "the left's Joe Rogan" and finally start embracing some meaningful media reforms for the modern era, whether that's the restoration of media consolidation limits, the creation of media ownership diversity requirements, an evolution in school media literacy training, support for public media, or creative new funding models for real journalism.

Because the trajectory we are on in terms of right wing domination of media heads to some very fucking grim places, and it's not like any of that has been subtle.

PlayStation's first State of Play of the year is shaping up to be quite newsworthy. While Sony hasn't revealed too much about what it will show off (with one notable exception), the stream is slated to last for over an hour, so there should be at least some interesting stuff. The showcase will get underway at 5PM ET on February 12. You can click the play button on the YouTube video above to watch the State of Play in English when the time is right.

The PlayStation YouTube channel is hosting alternative versions of the stream. One has English subtitles and the other is in Japanese. Otherwise, you can react to all the reveals live in Twitch chat.

The showcase will include "news, gameplay updates and announcements from game studios across the globe," Sony said. It will "spotlight eye-catching third-party and indie games headed to PS5, along with the latest from teams at PlayStation Studios."

Sony's slate of first-party games has been relatively slim over the last few years, but the company is preparing to release a trio of them over the next couple of months. It's likely that all three of those (Saros, Marathon and MLB The Show 26) will make appearances during the State of Play. Bungie has confirmed that Marathon will definitely be in the mix, though it dispelled rumors that another playtest for the extraction shooter will take place this weekend.

There are positive signs for news on the Silent Hill front as well. Konami has scheduled a Silent Hill Transmission presentation for 7PM on Thursday, which is soon after the State of Play wraps up. That stream will include new information about Silent Hill: Townfall, which was announced all the way back in 2022, but we could get a peek at that game during the State of Play too.

Elsewhere, we may get an update on Marvel Tōkon: Fighting Souls, a nifty looking tag-fighting game from Arc System Works that Sony is publishing. That's slated to arrive this year on PS5 and PC (Steam and Epic Games Store). A recent update to the game's Steam page — which was quickly reverted — revealed that the game will have 20 fighters at the outset, with more to come. The timing of the leak suggests that Marvel Tōkon: Fighting Souls may well show up during the State of Play.

However, Marvel's Wolverine, which is set to arrive this fall, may not be featured during this particular State of Play. Developer Insomniac Games indicated on X that it would reveal more details about the game this spring. However, that doesn't entirely preclude Sony from featuring the game at Thursday's showcase. Perhaps we'll get even a release date, given that GTA VI (a game that most publishers will want to stay very far away from) now actually seems to be on track to arrive in November.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/playstation/how-to-watch-playstations-hour-long-state-of-play-and-what-to-expect-162128585.html?src=rss

Sony's 1000X earbuds have been at the top of Engadget's best wireless earbuds list since we first published it. With each new generation, the company managed to retain its crown, primarily thanks to a massive collection of features and an effective mix of sound quality and active noise cancellation (ANC) performance. Today, Sony revealed the latest entry in the series, the WF-1000XM6, delivering yet another redesign both inside and out. The company's tried and true formula of features and audio performance remains, but it may no longer be enough to elevate the M6 above the competition.  

Design

For the third time in a row, Sony overhauled the 1000X earbuds' design. While the WF-1000XM5 was a clear revision of the WF-1000XM4, the M6 is a departure from both of them. The company managed to reduce overall size even further by using a rounder, pill-shaped enclosure for the earbuds' main housing. I certainly applaud Sony for making these as tiny as possible, but I'm still not a fan of the company's foam ear tips. 

Sony introduced foam ear tips on the 1000XM4 earbuds and that led to an unstable fit during my testing. In fact, I ended up switching to the silicone M3 tips for a better feel. Things were slightly better on the M5, but the company regressed here on the M6. I tried every size of ear tips in the box and the fit test in the Sound Connect app only ever confirmed an air-tight seal in my right ear. This can impact sound quality and ANC performance, and the earbuds don't feel like they're sitting far enough inside my ears. I never got used to the fit in my three weeks of testing. 

The exterior panel of the WF-1000XM6 is still touch sensitive, accepting a variety of taps for playback controls, calls, noise settings and more. Sony also included a repeated tapping gesture that's used for volume control. Keep tapping on the right earbud to raise the volume and do so on the left to lower it. My disdain for touch controls is well-documented at this point, but the M6 reliably and quickly responded without me having to repeat a tap sequence. 

WF-1000XM6 features The WF-1000XM6 accepts taps for touch-based controls.

As is typically the case with its 1000X earbuds, Sony has loaded the M6 with features. Nearly all of these are holdovers from previous models, including Adaptive Sound Control that can automatically adjust settings based on your activity or location. Speak-to-Chat still pauses audio and activates ambient sound when you start talking, but it's also still easily duped by coughs or clearing your throat. A quick access feature can put Amazon Music, Apple Music, Endel, Spotify and YouTube Music two or three taps away, depending on how you configure it.

The M6 earbuds also allow you to accept and reject calls with head gestures and you'll have the option to pipe in your own voice during a call. Sony retained its existing option of operating the earbuds with voice commands: If you say "Assistant," you can then ask it to play, pause, skip and replay songs. It will also adjust the volume for you, but that's the extent of its abilities. 

Sony included some handy power management features as well. First, there's an Auto Power Save mode that will disable any custom EQ settings, DSEE Extreme upscaling, Speak-to-Chat and voice control/voice assistant to reduce power consumption when the M6 hits 20 percent battery remaining. A Battery Care tool will extend the life of the earbuds' battery by stopping charging before it reaches 100 percent. Lastly, Automatic Power Off will turn the earbuds off when they're outside of the case and haven't been worn for some time. 

Basic conveniences like multipoint Bluetooth, wireless charging and IPX4 water resistance are also here. Wear detection is onboard and you can use Sony's EQ presets to alter the sound profile, or make your own and save them for future use. The Sound Connect app puts the battery levels of the individual earbuds and the case front and center, and you can edit the main screen to hide the features displayed there if you don't need them.

Sound quality and ANC performance Sound quality is one of Sony's strengths and that continues on the M6. Billy Steele for Engadget

If Sony's long list of features is its top advantage over the competition, overall sound quality is number two. For the WF-1000XM6, the company built new drivers with soft edges for deeper bass and a more rigid, lightweight dome for clearer treble. There are also notches around the edges for "clearer and smoother" sound quality overall, according to Sony. And of course, DSEE Extreme upscaling helps to recover details lost to compression while 360 Reality Audio and Spatial Sound Optimization are available for more immersive listening. 

I found the M6 earbuds at their best with the stock EQ and DSEE Extreme active, much like I have on previous 1000X models. The sound is deep and warm, with thick bass that's adequate without ever overpowering the mix. Highs cut through and there's ample midrange, keeping those finer details from getting lost. Erika de Casier's atmospheric Lifetime is a great example of what the WF-1000XM6 can do. Vocals seem to float over the top of the bassline and drums, with percussive piano chopping though and subtle synth details popping up throughout. When strings arrive on "Seasons," the M6 ushers them into a prominent position rather than relegating them behind the beat. 

On the WF-1000XM6, the chaos of Spiritbox's "Holy Roller" doesn't get condensed to a messy heavy metal roar either. And there's plenty of texture in the synth-driven noise of Nine Inch Nails' "As Alive As You Need Me To Be." Even more straightforward rock tracks like Jimmy Eat World's "Bleed American" have ample punch, with a wide soundstage that never feels claustrophobic or sounds compressed. Overall, the WF-1000XM6 holds its own against the best-sounding earbuds you can buy right now, though some of the competition, like Technics, have an edge in the way they handle the subtlest of nuances in songs.  

If you were hoping for knock-out ANC abilities, I must report that the WF-1000XM6 isn't the noise-canceling powerhouse that is Bose's QC Ultra Earbuds. The M6 struggles mightily with human voices. While that's the downfall of many ANC earbuds, you'll want to keep it in mind if you plan to wear these in the office. I found I could also still hear constant noise sources like fans and white noise machines when wearing the M6 — items that the QC Ultra Earbuds combat effectively.

Using the WF-1000XM6 for calls The WF-1000XM6 isn't as adept at calls as Sony advertises. Billy Steele for Engadget

For calls, Sony says the M6 uses AI for both background noise reduction and voice capture with the beamforming microphones. What's more, the earbuds are equipped with eight total mics for ANC and calls, plus bone conduction tech for improved voice pickup. Unfortunately, all of that doesn't lead to stellar performance during calls. While the WF-1000XM6 is perfectly usable for voice and video calls, the overall quality is far from pristine. To make matters worse, the earbuds make you sound overly processed when you encounter significant background noise. Since the company prided itself on the upgrades here, the results are disappointing. 

Battery life

Sony says the WF-1000XM6 will last up to eight hours on a charge or 24 hours when you factor in the full longevity of the charging case. During a battery test that I mostly ran with ANC active, I had no trouble hitting that single-charge figure. That's with the volume around 75-80 percent and includes calls and virtual meetings where I switched over to ambient sound mode. 

It's worth noting that I had DSEE Extreme upscaling active the entire time, which can impact battery life. Plus, if you use the aforementioned Auto Power Save mode, you can extend play time when you have about a quarter of a tank left. Going without some of the M6's best features in the interest of having tunes for a workout or commute is a fair trade in my book. 

The competition The WF-1000XM6 is still a compelling option, but it's not the clear favorite anymore. Billy Steele for Engadget

When sizing up the competition for the WF-1000XM6, you have to choose your priorities. Simply put, no other company offers the comprehensive suite of features that Sony does. That's been true for a while now and it continues with this model. If you want the strongest active noise cancellation, that will be Bose's second-generation QuietComfort Ultra Earbuds. If the best sound quality is your goal, the Technics AZ100 is your best bet in this price range. I'll also mention Sennheiser's Momentum True Wireless 4 which offers great sound quality, respectable ANC and a comfier fit than the M6, but that set is almost two years old at this point.

Wrap-up

Sony continues its run of great earbuds with the WF-1000XM6, but this model isn't the polished package that some of its predecessors were. The two most obvious places the company is lagging behind the competition is ANC performance and overall voice quality, not to mention my continued dissatisfaction with the fit that Sony's foam tips provide. The M6 is also more expensive than the previous version, which makes it even harder to overlook any flaws. What you will get on the WF-1000XM6 is a ton of features, great sound quality and reliable touch controls in a smaller package. And for some, that might be enough to make you forget about the rest. 

The WF-1000XM6 is available today in silver and black for $330.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/audio/headphones/sony-wf-1000xm6-review-facing-tougher-competition-160000652.html?src=rss

At first, Steven Saari said, federal immigration agents seemed to think he was one of them.

Saari, a Marine Corps combat veteran who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, went to the scene of Alex Pretti's killing in Minneapolis less than an hour after federal agents fired the fatal shots. He was wearing his Marine camouflage and carrying a lawfully owned 9mm Glock handgun on his right hip, as he does every day, he told The Intercept. Agents on the scene "thought I was undercover," Saari said. "They kept asking what agency I was with."

When Saari told them he was not with any agency, their demeanor shifted. Federal immigration agents soon aimed M4-style rifles at his head, footage reviewed by The Intercept shows, their fingers on the trigger less than a minute's walk away from where Pretti was killed.

"More and more Border Patrol and ICE agents gathered around me," Saari said. "Then they moved in with rifles and handguns drawn."

The encounter raises questions about how federal agents assessed threats, used force, and made arrest decisions in the immediate aftermath of Pretti's killing. In Saari's case, he and his attorney told The Intercept, federal agents took scans and samples of his biometric data and made a copy of his phone — without obtaining a warrant.

Related "Uptick in Abductions": ICE Ramps Up Targeting of Minneapolis Legal Observers

Before the agents apprehended him, Saari said he was standing on the sidewalk observing events — not recording, protesting, or engaging with federal agents until they approached him. When they did, Saari said agents issued conflicting commands and attempted to handcuff him without first securing his firearm. He said officers briefly positioned his right hand on his handgun while pulling his arms behind his back, leaving him unsure how they expected him to comply.

Standard law enforcement firearms training typically emphasizes securing a weapon before attempting to restrain an armed person.

Saari said he feared agents might shoot him when his hand brushed the gun, even though he said officers, not his own movements, placed it there.

Agents arrested Saari and brought him to the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building in Minneapolis, where he was detained for at least six hours before being released without charges.

Reached for comment, ICE referred The Intercept to Customs and Border Protection. Neither CBP nor the Department of Homeland Security responded to requests for comment.

Inside the federal building, Saari said agents shackled his hands and feet, photographed him, scanned his face, and forced him to provide a DNA sample by depressing his tongue and swabbing the inside of his mouth. He said agents denied him access to an attorney, even though they were present elsewhere in the building and in contact with civilians and federal officials that day.

"I asked for an attorney probably a hundred times and was never given one," Saari said. "I was never told why I was being arrested."

Then, Saari said, "They took my cell phone and cloned it. They actually told me they did that."

Saari said agents did not ask him to unlock the device, nor did they provide a warrant, paperwork, or explanation authorizing the search.

"They took my cell phone and cloned it. They actually told me they did that."

"Every step of this process raises red flags," said Shauna Kieffer, the vice president of the Minnesota Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, who is now representing Saari. "You don't get to detain someone without cause, deny them access to counsel, seize their phone, and then search or copy it without a warrant."

Law enforcement may seize a phone during an arrest, but officers generally cannot access or duplicate its data without judicial authorization, said Nathan Wessler, deputy director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project. He said the only exception involves narrow emergency circumstances, which typically do not apply once both a person and their phone are already in custody.

"Once the phone is secured and the person is secured, it's very hard to imagine what kind of emergency would justify searching or copying it without a warrant," Wessler said.

Failure to get a warrant raises serious concerns of violating the Fourth Amendment, Wessler added, pointing to the 2014 Supreme Court case Riley v. California, in which the court found police are generally not allowed to search an arrested person's cell phone without a specific warrant.

"The government needs a warrant to search or copy the contents of a phone, just as it would need a warrant to look through it," Wessler said. And that warrant "has to be particularized to the evidence the government actually has probable cause to seek," he added. "You don't get a blank check to rummage through someone's digital life."

"You don't get a blank check to rummage through someone's digital life."

About seven hours after his arrest, Saari was released into sub-zero temperatures without transportation, unsure of where he was. He said he didn't know if he remained under investigation, nor whether the government would retain copies of his phone data or DNA sample.

"Finding out that someone who served our country was being denied access to counsel was heartbreaking," said Kieffer, who was connected with Saari two days after his detention through a colleague. "He should never have been invisible to us."

While he was in detention, Saari said, agents provided minimal food and water, and detainees with visible injuries did not receive timely medical care.

"I asked for water about a dozen times," he told The Intercept. "At one point they brought three bottles of water for seven people."

Saari said detainees had to use their drinking water to clean blood off of their injured peers, which is consistent with accounts from another civilian arrested that day and previously reported by The Intercept.

Related He Witnessed an Earlier Shooting. Feds Arrested Him at the Scene of Alex Pretti's Killing.

"There was a man with a golf-ball-sized contusion on his head who didn't get medical attention," Saari said. "There was a 70-year-old Marine Corps veteran with a deep gash on his elbow who was bleeding."

Saari said the treatment he received stood in sharp contrast to how he handled detainees during his own military service, including during combat operations in Iraq.

During one raid in Fallujah, Saari said his unit detained men who surrendered without resistance. After the operation, he said, they reviewed video footage showing the detainees had recently planted an improvised explosive device targeting a U.S. convoy.

Despite the brutality of some operations in Fallujah, where U.S. forces repeatedly killed Iraqi civilians, Saari said his unit restrained, searched, and turned over the detainees without abuse or humiliation.

"We still treated them as humans," Saari said. "To be treated worse here, at home, than people who had attacked our unit in a war zone, it's been hard to understand."

The post Marine Detained in Minneapolis Says Feds Copied His Phone Without a Warrant appeared first on The Intercept.

As the pro-Israel lobby seeks to shape a set of congressional races in Illinois, national progressive groups are pushing to elect a vocal advocate for Palestinian rights outside of Chicago. 

The national progressive outfit Justice Democrats and the Peace, Accountability, and Leadership PAC, a new group that launched Wednesday to support candidates advocating for Palestine in the upcoming midterms, are endorsing activist Kat Abughazaleh for Congress in Illinois's 9th District. 

The endorsement comes as the American Israel Public Affairs Committee has made its biggest investment so far this cycle in electing pro-Israel Democrats in and around deep-blue Chicago, which is home to one of the nation's largest populations of Palestinian residents. 

Abughazaleh is one of over a dozen candidates running in the Democratic primary to replace retiring Rep. Jan Schakowsky. Also running are state Sen. Laura Fine, Evanston Mayor Daniel Biss, local school board member and activist Bushra Amiwala, former hostage negotiator and agent for the Federal Bureau of Investigation Phil Andrew, and state Rep. Hoan Huynh. 

Related AIPAC Strategy Backfires as Progressive Underdog Wins Key House Race in New Jersey

Schakowsky was a longtime recipient of support from J-Street, a moderate pro-Israel group, and AIPAC appears to view the race as an opportunity to replace her with a more hardline supporter of Israel. The pro-Israel lobby has already taken one opportunity to go after a centrist who strayed from its party line, when it ran attack ads against former New Jersey Democratic Rep. Tom Malinowski — a strategy that appeared to backfire and ultimately help get the progressive in the race elected.

Now, pro-Palestine groups see an opening in Chicago amid mounting public criticism of the pro-Israel lobby.

Both groups said the endorsement was a reflection of a historic level of public support for Palestinian human rights and cutting U.S. funding to Israel. Abughazaleh is the 12th candidate Justice Democrats has endorsed this cycle as it looks to more aggressively counter the pro-Israel lobby and come back from major losses in 2024.

Abughazaleh told The Intercept she's running to hold Democrats to a higher standard. 

"There's been this idea of 'vote blue no matter who' for a long time that has gotten us to the moment that we're in, because we haven't held our Party accountable," she said. She added that she was the first candidate to launch her campaign in the race before Schakowsky announced her retirement. 

"I didn't wait in line or ask for permission," Abughazaleh said. "I think a big part of that is because I felt a sense of urgency that many establishment politicians just don't because they're not facing the consequences that we are."

"Kat has spent her career doing what so many voters are desperate to see the Democratic Party do right now: fight back against Republican extremism and fight for everyday people," Justice Democrats spokesperson Usamah Andrabi said in a statement to The Intercept. "At a time when so many career politicians in the Party have to be convinced to condemn genocide, we are proud to support a first-time candidate with the moral clarity to oppose bottomless budgets for Israel's ethnic cleansing, abolish ICE and fight for every person to afford the life they deserve."

While AIPAC hasn't officially endorsed in the race, its donors have made their pick clear. AIPAC donors have flooded Fine's campaign and sent fundraising emails on her behalf. AIPAC is also reportedly behind just under half a million dollars in ads launched last week for Fine by the Super PAC Elect Chicago Women. Fine has distanced herself from AIPAC and said she isn't seeking its support — despite fundraising with AIPAC's board president.

Related AIPAC Head Hosts Fundraiser for House Candidate Who Swears AIPAC Isn't Backing Her

Abughazaleh, a Palestinian American activist, has made her criticism of the genocide in Gaza and U.S. military support for Israel a central piece of her campaign. She's also facing a federal indictment on felony conspiracy charges stemming from protest actions against Immigration and Customs Enforcement. She turned her congressional office into a mutual aid hub and is running on Medicare for All, fixing the affordable housing crisis, and fighting authoritarianism. 

"AIPAC is so toxic that they have been doing everything they can to pretend that they are not in our race when they very clearly are," Abughazaleh said. She said voters "understand the stakes, and they're sick of their tax dollars being used to commit crimes against humanity."

Abughazaleh said she's the only one of the top three Democratic candidates — counting herself, Fine, and Biss — who's never met with AIPAC. Biss previously met with local AIPAC representatives, but he said he did not share the group's "hardline views" and had never sought their support. 

Both Abughazaleh and Biss have been vocal in criticizing AIPAC's efforts to boost their opponent, Fine. During a candidate forum last week, Biss directly criticized Fine's support from AIPAC donors and said voters should be troubled by her support for unconditional U.S. military aid.

"That is deeply problematic," Biss said. "That is a right-wing policy that is bad for Palestinians, Jews, Israelis, America, and the world."

Meanwhile, United Democracy Project and AIPAC are spreading their resources around the state. UDP is also reportedly backing ads from a PAC that calls itself Affordable Chicago Now!, which is teaming up with Elect Chicago Women to back Fine, Melissa Bean in the 8th District, and Donna Miller in the 2nd District.

UDP is also planning to spend close to $3 million backing Chicago City Treasurer Melissa Conyears-Ervin in the 7th District and bought its first $500,000 in ads for her on Tuesday. The move by the pro-Israel lobby has raised talk about what AIPAC donors who originally backed another candidate, real estate mogul Jason Friedman, will do now. 

The post AIPAC Is Flooding Illinois With Cash. Pro-Palestine Groups Are Backing Kat Abughazaleh appeared first on The Intercept.

Amazon is launching a feature that will add a new artificial intelligence layer to its writing tablets. "Send to Alexa+" is rolling out to the current generation of Kindle Scribe and Kindle Scribe Colorsoft devices. This concept was announced when Amazon first debuted the Kindle Scribe Colorsoft last fall, but the company said that the feature wouldn't be available until this year.

As the name implies, "Send to Alexa+" lets users share their notebooks and documents from their supported Kindle with the Alexa+ AI assistant, making their information accessible on other Amazon platforms, including Alexa.com and the Alexa app. Prime members and Alexa+ subscribers will also be able to reach their Kindle documents on Echo and Fire TV devices. Alexa+ will be able to perform additional tasks such as summarizing notes, creating to-do lists and adding either calendar items or reminders.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/tablets/amazons-send-to-alexa-feature-arrives-on-kindle-scribe-and-scribe-colorsoft-140000093.html?src=rss

NVIDIA's cloud gaming service, GeForce Now, has expanded to another platform. Starting today, folks with select Amazon Fire TV sticks can install a native GeForce Now app. While it was already possible to access GeForce Now through the Fire TV platform, you won't necessarily need to sideload an Android app to do so anymore.

At the outset, the new app is compatible with the second-gen Fire TV Stick 4K Plus and second-gen Fire TV Stick 4K Max (running Fire OS 8.1.6.0 and later). It also works with the original Fire TV Stick 4K Max if you're running Fire OS 7.7.1.1 or later. 

On the Fire TV platform, GeForce Now streaming quality tops out at a resolution of 1080p and a frame rate of 60 fps, with SDR visuals, H.264 video encoding and stereo audio. So you won't necessarily get the best GeForce Now experience here as the service has support for up to 5K resolution and up to 360 fps, along with HDR10 and 7.1 audio at the highest tier. But it's not a bad option if you already have the right hardware. You'll need a controller too, of course.

NVIDIA announced the GeForce Now app for Fire TV during CES last month. It joins other cloud gaming services on the Fire TV platform, including Xbox Cloud Gaming (PC Game Pass titles are available on GeForce Now as well) and Amazon's own Luna.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/nvidias-geforce-now-app-lands-on-amazon-fire-tv-sticks-140000516.html?src=rss

MasterClass is offering 50 percent off its annual memberships right now, cutting the cost of its plans in half for a limited time. That brings the Premium tier down to $10 per month when billed yearly, while the Plus and Standard plans are also discounted to $8 monthly and $5 monthly, respectively. Each tier unlocks the full catalog of classes, with the main differences coming down to how many devices can stream at once and whether offline viewing is included.

There are more than 200 classes on MasterClass now, and many are led by big names at the top of their fields. Depending on your interests, you might pick up cooking tips from Gordon Ramsay, learn storytelling from Margaret Atwood, explore business strategy with Richard Branson or get insights into performance and mindset from athletes and entertainers. The catalog spans everything from film and TV to wellness, music, science, leadership and photography, so it's easy to dip in and find something that holds your attention.

Over the years, MasterClass has expanded into a broad learning platform that feels like part streaming service and part educational library. The catalog spans categories like food, film, music, wellness, sports and entrepreneurship, with lessons designed to be short and easy to follow. Since every plan includes access to the full course library, the choice mostly comes down to convenience. The Standard tier supports one device and doesn't include offline mode, the Plus plan allows streaming on two devices with downloads, and the Premium tier increases that to six devices with offline access as well.

Classes are structured to be approachable whether you want to learn a new skill or just explore a topic out of curiosity. Lessons are broken into bite-sized segments, so it's easy to watch one or two at a time on a commute or in the evening. Members also get access to a global community, occasional newsletters and the ability to switch between video and audio listening on supported classes.

If you've been considering trying MasterClass, this deal makes it a more affordable way to see if it works for you. A subscription can also double as a thoughtful gift, which is one reason it has appeared in Engadget's roundup of the best subscription gifts to send to loved ones. With the current 50 percent discount applied across all tiers, it's a relatively low-cost way to get access to a large library of professionally produced courses that you can watch at your own pace throughout the year.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/masterclass-deal-get-half-off-subscriptions-ahead-of-presidents-day-130500563.html?src=rss

Apple's long-delayed AI-powered Siri redesign may not be rolling out this year, at least in the way the company had planned. According to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman, Apple found problems with its software upon testing, such as the virtual assistant taking too long to accomplish tasks or even not processing queries properly altogether. Siri's new version was also reportedly so sluggish during testing that its developers believed Apple would have to push back its launch by months. Instead of releasing the redesigned assistant in March as was previously reported, Gurman says Apple will roll out its capabilities piecemeal over future software updates.

The company originally unveiled the redesigned Siri back in 2024, promising an AI-powered assistant that can do tasks for you, such as finding specific photos or tracking details, adding information to contact cards, editing photos and sharing note summaries to be sent as emails. It was slated to make its way to iOS users in 2025, but Apple announced that year that it was going to be delayed. "It's going to take us longer than we thought to deliver on these features and we anticipate rolling them out in the coming year," the company said. Bloomberg reported back then that the new AI-infused Siri was going to be included in a planned iOS 26.4 update due in March instead. Based on this latest report, however, we might only get a portion of Siri's new capabilities next month. More capabilities could be released with iOS 26.5 in May and with iOS 27 later this year.

In January this year, Apple confirmed reports that Google's Gemini models will help power the new Siri. "After careful evaluation, Apple determined that Google's Al technology provides the most capable foundation for Apple Foundation Models and is excited about the innovative new experiences it will unlock for Apple users," the company said in a statement. The revamped assistant is expected to behave like an AI chatbot, similar to OpenAI's ChatGPT, when it does become available.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/apples-siri-relaunch-is-reportedly-behind-schedule-125347471.html?src=rss

Amnesty International UK has labelled the government's immigration reforms as "cruel", "inefficient" and "costly".

The UK government published "A Fairer Pathway to Settlement: A statement on earned settlement" in November 2025. It sets out proposals to change how our current immigration system works.

Effectively, it would change how migrants who are permitted to become permanent residents are able to do so.

The proposals include:

• Making permanent residency less available to people.
• Increasing the amount of time most people spend in the immigration system before they may apply for permanent residence.
• Reducing that if they have: a higher level of English proficiency, if they are high earners, if they hold senior positions in a public service, or if they have undertaken 'extensive' volunteering.
• Increasing that time for people who: arrive on a visitor visa, breach immigration rules, or have ever received public funds.
• Completely remove the option of permanent residency for anyone who has: ever received a criminal conviction, has outstanding litigation, or has NHS, tax, or other government debts.

Children born without citizenship

Amnesty is warning that the proposals will cause many more children to be born in the UK without British citizenship. This is because their parents, although long-time UK residents, will not be British citizens or permanent residents.

Amnesty states:

While the children who grow up here will become entitled to that citizenship under the British Nationality Act 1981, that right is not well understood and has over the last few decades become subject to several unjust barriers meaning many children who grow up here are at risk of losing their citizenship rights altogether.

Additionally, the proposals will "undermine integration". Immigration reforms will make the lives of many migrants far more uncertain, for far longer. This will have substantial financial implications, from having to pay more times for permission to stay, to having to pay the very high migrant health charge more often.

Amnesty adds:

At best, people will be made less welcome and more marginalised. At worst, people will be made more at risk of destitution, homelessness, ill-health, and exploitation.

Amnesty also states:

The proposals are likely to increase pressure on the European Convention on Human Rights by not satisfying those who are antagonistic to both that Convention and migrant rights, while increasing reliance on human rights laws by migrant people seeking to protect themselves against the proposals' worst consequences. If so, the impact - particularly given the Government is encouraging hostility to migrant people and their rights - is likely to further threaten commitment to the Convention.

The proposals are highly likely to reward and fuel xenophobia and racism, which are a direct response to the government's hostility towards migrant people.

Of course, this is the exact opposite of what any responsible government should be doing. It risks encouraging even more demand for awful policies, which ultimately, only penalise and demonise migrants even further.

The government needs to take a long, hard look at itself—and ask if it wants to head towards a US-style system, full of fear and hatred, or one where migrants are recognised as being the backbone of any functioning society.

Feature image via UK Government

By HG

The 'Earthshot Prize' eco-charity set up by royal Prince William and David Attenborough has been reported to the Charity Commission for donations linked to serial child-rapist Jeffrey Epstein. The charity awards five prizes of £1m each to environmental projects each year.

Emirati billionaire Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem's logistics company DP World is an Earthshot 'founding partner'. Sulayem appears in the latest release of the Epstein records in the US, having apparently sent a 'torture video' to Epstein. The child rapist replied in 2009 and he had "loved the torture video". At the time, he was serving his first prison sentence at the time.

Sulayem's email address is illegally redacted in the publicly available files. However, US congresspeople who viewed the unredacted files subsequently named him as Epstein's correspondent. Sulayem also appears in the files emailing Epstein about the sex he had with another young woman.

Anti-monarchy group Republic lodged the complaint with the Charity Commission. The group's CEO Graham Smith told the commission that the situation involving Epstein had undermined public trust.

the seriousness of this matter requires a full and comprehensive investigation.

Smith said: Discussions regarding the links to Epstein should not be ignored.

William has lots of questions to answer about what he knew about Andrew and Epstein and now he must explain his relationship with Sulayem. It is not credible to believe the Foreign Office, security services or other advisors were not aware of Sulayem's character and would have been able to advise accordingly.

Earthshot has a duty to do due diligence, to ask questions about donors and where money is coming from. Did they do that here? If so, did William over rule their better judgement? In the context of this widening scandal we need answers.

William was also allowed to promote his project on a Government-funded visit to the UAE. Smith added: Due to the Epstein connection, there are serious concerns that must be addressed.

Earthshot is not a UK Government project, so why was he using visits to the Middle East to promote the charity?

The Windsors have faced repeated heckling in recent weeks for their inaction over the king's disgraced brother Andrew. William was also questioned yesterday, 11 February 2026, about the issue during a visit to Saudi Arabia. None of the royals have ever apologised to Epstein's victims for Andrew's part in the serial trafficking and exploitation.

For further details on the Epstein Files, please read the Canary's article on how the media circus around Epstein is erasing the experiences of victims and survivors.

Featured image via the Canary

By Skwawkbox

Students, staff and trade unionists will rally at King's College London (KCL), Strand Campus, on Thursday 12 February at 2pm. It's part of the national workplace day of action for Palestine.

Organisers say the rally comes amid Israel's genocide in Gaza, the de facto annexation of the occupied West Bank, and the:

escalating repression of Palestine solidarity activism in the UK.

Repression at KCL

The protest will demand the immediate reinstatement of Usama Ghanem. He's an Egyptian KCL student who has been indefinitely suspended and had his student visa revoked. He now faces the threat of imminent deportation to Egypt, where his life is at risk.

Organisers say Usama's case is part of a broader crackdown targeting pro-Palestine staff and students, including disciplinary action and intimidation. At KCL, more than twenty students - primarily students of colour - have faced disciplinary procedures linked to Palestine activism. However, far-right and Zionist groups have repeatedly targeted demonstrators on campus.

The rally is organised by KCL student societies, KCL UCU, and University and College Workers for Palestine, and endorsed by the Stop the War Coalition.

A spokesperson for University and College Workers for Palestine said:

Repression in the UK is not separate from what is happening in Palestine. It is part of the same system of dispossession, apartheid and genocide. Universities are disciplining and deporting activists while Israel destroys Gaza's education system and annexes the West Bank.

A KCL staff member talked about the broader context of Usama's suspension. They noted that the college:

escalated disciplinary action against pro-Palestine students, closed down hard-won fora on divestment and the reconstruction of Gaza's education system, rejected all divestment demands, and unilaterally introduced new protest restrictions.

At the same time, it has failed to challenge Zionist and fascist groups like Stop the Hate and Betar, allowing them to intimidate and assault staff and students with impunity.

Thursday's rally will demand of KCL:

• Reinstate Usama Ghanem.
• Stop the repression and deportations of pro-Palestine activists.
• Fascists off campus.
• Divestment now.

London trade union branches with banners and delegations are due to attend at KCL. A major pledge campaign launched by supporters has already raised over £17,000 in under two weeks. It will support legal action connected to Usama's case.

Featured image via the Canary

By The Canary

As we've reported, the recently released Epstein Files have shone an unflattering light on many powerful people. President Donald Trump is among those exposed, which is why it was unsurprising to see so many unnecessary (and illegal) redactions in the released documents.

Providing some additional transparency, members of congress have been given permission to view un-redacted files at a Department of Justice (DoJ) facility. Alarmingly, however, we've now discovered the following:

It is totally inappropriate and against the separations of powers for the DOJ to surveil us as we search the Epstein files. Bondi showed up today with a burn book that held a printed search history of exactly what emails I searched. That is outrageous and I intend to pursue this… https://t.co/nyZjmHoGUq

— Rep. Pramila Jayapal (@RepJayapal) February 11, 2026

'Burn book'

As we reported, the Epstein Files Transparency Act put it into law that the DoJ must publish all the documents related to the dead paedophile. The law allows for redactions to protect victims, but no one else. Despite this, the DoJ redacted the names of Epstein's associates and potential co-conspirators.

As a result of members of congress having access to the un-redacted Epstein Files, we've learned information such as the following:

BREAKING: Congressman Jamie Raskin says Trump's name shows up in the unredacted Epstein files 1 MILLION TIMES (it was 38,000 in the redacted files) - Axios

— Secular Talk (KyleKulinskiShow@bsky.social) (@KyleKulinski) February 10, 2026

The above would mean we only have access to 3.8% of the times that the files mention Donald Trump. Trump was not a victim of Epstein, and so his name should not have been redacted.

More has come out too, including the names of "powerful men" linked to Epstein:

BREAKING: RO KHANNA JUST UNVEILED THE NAMES OF 6 POWERFUL MEN WHO WERE REDACTED IN THE EPSTEIN FILES

Here they are:

• Salvatore Nuara
• Zurab Mikeladze
• Leonic Leonov
• Nicola Caputo
• Sultan Ahmed Bin Sulayem
• Leslie Wexner

Why did the Trump DOJ cover for them? pic.twitter.com/qIh6Xtn0dC

— Sulaiman Ahmed (@ShaykhSulaiman) February 10, 2026

Others highlighted the improper redactions:

Hey ⁦@DAGToddBlanche⁩, I saw the unredacted version of this email, and there is no reason it should be redacted from the public.

Unless, of course, you are trying to protect your master @realdonaldtrump. pic.twitter.com/unEuN0GGRj

— Daniel Goldman (@danielsgoldman) February 11, 2026

Yesterday @RepRoKhanna and I found a list of names and photos in the Epstein files that DOJ had improperly redacted.

DOJ promptly unredacted the men's names as well as several women in the list that we didn't flag. The two redacted names are victims. https://t.co/fLLzGW9rR7 pic.twitter.com/DTfK30Kppk

— Thomas Massie (@RepThomasMassie) February 10, 2026

We also learned the identity of a the man who sent an email referencing a "torture video":

12-strong founding team down to 6 as boss looks Moonwards

Elon Musk has framed the recent exodus of talent from his artificial intelligence startup, xAI, as a necessary growing pain, saying the company's evolution "required parting ways with some people."…