Category Archives: NEWS

‘EU Is Better For Business’: Microsoft Boss Slams UK After Blocked Takeover

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A furious boss at Microsoft has the claimed the European Union is better for business than Britain after a UK regulator blocked the purchase of the maker of Call of Duty.

Brad Smith, Microsoft’s vice chair and president, warned the “English Channel has never seemed wider” as the the software company’s £55 billion takeover of gaming firm Activision Blizzard stalled.

He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme the move was “probably the darkest day” in its 40-year history in the UK and “had shaken confidence” in Britain.

“There’s a clear message here. The European Union is a more attractive place to start a business if you want some day to sell it than the United Kingdom,” he said.

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) defended its decision to block Microsoft’s deal for Activision and said the UK was “absolutely open for business”.

The spat comes after the regulator on Wednesday prevented the mammoth buyout over concerns in the cloud gaming sector.

Xbox owner Microsoft struck a deal to buy the maker of Candy Crush and Call Of Duty in January 2022.

The CMA said the tie-up would make Microsoft stronger in cloud gaming – where video games are played using remote servers and have no need for downloads – “stifling competition in this growing market”.

It claimed that Microsoft already accounted for between 60% and 70% of cloud gaming services.

Microsoft submitted a proposal in an effort to address concerns but the watchdog said this contained a “number of significant shortcomings”.

Microsoft and Activision have both said they will appeal the decision.

Smith told the Today programme: “I think the impact on the UK, unfortunately, is to shake the confidence among the business community in the UK, and the CMA as a regulatory agency.”

He added: “This decision, I have to say, is probably the darkest day in our four decades in Britain. It does more than shake our confidence in the future of the opportunity to grow a technology business in Britain than we’ve ever confronted before.”

Downing Street dismissed criticism of the UK’s position as a place for tech firms to invest.

Prime minister Rishi Sunak’s official spokesman said: “Those sorts of claims are not borne out by the facts.”

He added that the UK’s games market had doubled in size to £7 billion over the past decade.

CMA head Sarah Cardell insisted the regulator wanted “to create an environment where a whole host of different companies can compete effectively, can grow and innovate”, claiming this was the “best thing for consumers and businesses”.

She told BBC’s Today programme that after a “long and careful investigation” into the Microsoft deal, “combining those two businesses would really reinforce Microsoft’s strong position in cloud gaming”.

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China’s Mars Rover Is Hibernating And Doesn’t Want To Wake Up

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China’s rover on Mars has not woken up after months of hibernating, the scientists operating it finally explained on Tuesday.

Zhurong, as the solar-powered rover is known, was in a scheduled sleep during the red planet’s winter. And though it was named after an ancient Chinese god of fire, it seems remarkably… docile, right now.

So what’s stopping it from waking up? Dust, apparently, as this stops it turning sunlight into electricity.

Chief designer of the Mars exploration programme, Zhang Rongqiao, explained: “Based on our analysis, the most likely possibility is that an unpredictable accumulation of dust from Mars led to a decrease in its ability to produce electricity, such that it’s insufficient for it to wake up.”

If the dust levels exceed more than 40% that the Chinese engineers had prepared for, it would become inactive “forever”. No amount of solar activity could help it, Zhang told Chinese state broadcasters.

He did not explain how much dust is already on it.

The rover successfully landed back in May 2021, meaning China was only the second country after the US to succeed to landing a probe like this on Mars.

The landing was seen as a sign that Beijing was really starting to establish itself in space exploration.

When the rover first touched down, it explored Mars for about a year in Earth days (358 days in Martian time) and covered 1.2 miles, even though it was only meant to look around for three Martian months.

It was then put to sleep in May 2022, and was meant to autonomously wake up December 2022 during the planet’s northern spring equinox.

Five months later, it’s looking like the rover has decided it would rather stay sleeping. And who can blame it?

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Brits Need To Accept They’re Poorer, Says Bank Of England Economist

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Britain needs to stop playing “pass-the-parcel” with someone accepting that they are poorer to get inflation under control, the chief economist of the Bank of England has said.

Huw Pill said that people and businesses have responded to higher bills and costs by asking for higher wages or charging their customers more money.

But households and companies trying to pass on their higher costs, he said, adds to inflation, pushing up prices even further across the economy.

UK inflation – the measure of the rising cost of goods and services – hit 10.1% in the year to March. It was a fall from 10.4% in February, but still remains stubbornly high – and above the 9.8% that experts had predicted.

The Bank of England is tasked with keeping inflation under control, targeting 2% a year.

Speaking on the Beyond Unprecedented podcast from Columbia Law School, Pill said: “The UK, which is a big net importer of natural gas, is facing a situation where the price of what you’re buying from the rest of the world has gone up a lot, relative to the price of what you’re selling to the rest of the world, which is mainly services in the case of the UK.

“You don’t need to be much of an economist to realise that if what you’re buying has gone up a lot relative to what you’re selling, you’re going to be worse off.

“So, somehow in the UK, someone needs to accept that they’re worse off and stop trying to maintain their real spending power by bidding up prices whether through higher wages or passing energy costs on to customers etc.

“What we’re facing now is that reluctance to accept that, yes, we’re all worse off and we all have to take our share; to try and pass that cost onto one of our compatriots and saying, ‘we’ll be alright, but they will have to take our share too’.

“That pass-the-parcel game that’s going on here, that game is one that’s generating inflation, and that part of inflation can persist.”

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Even The Pope Has Lost His Twitter Blue Tick

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Pope Francis, Cristiano Ronaldo and Beyonce are among the first big-name casualties as Twitter removed the “blue tick” from legacy verified accounts.

Twitter Verified tweeted that legacy checkmarks would be removed from the site on April 20, with the main way of getting a blue tick being to sign up for Twitter Blue, which includes an £8 monthly fee for those based in the UK.

The legacy checkmarks began disappearing towards the tail end of Thursday.

Some of the biggest accounts losing their ticks include former president Donald Trump, as well as the official Twitter page for the Pope.

Some legacy accounts seemed to retain their ticks if linked to a verified organisation, including Barack Obama’s personal page.

Elon Musk had promised to take away all of Twitter’s blue check marks doled out to Hollywood stars, professional athletes, business leaders, authors and journalists unless they start buying a monthly subscription to the social media service.

Musk’s goal was to shove the advertising-dependent platform he bought for $44 billion last year into a pay-to-play model.

Twitter Verified Organisations enables bodies of “all types”, including businesses, non-profits and government institutions, to sign up and manage their verification and to affiliate and verify any related account. But it costs a base price of £950 a month.

Some were wistfully saying goodbye to their status …

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Greggs To Fight Late Night Ban Fuelled By ‘Crime And Disorder’ Fears

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Pasty and sausage roll chain Greggs is to appeal a council’s decision to prevent its flagship central London store selling hot food past 11pm after police warned of the risk of fuelling “crime and disorder”.

The high-street baker opened its Leicester Square store with a blue-carpet premiere in 2022 – but Westminster City Council denied the store permission to serve hot food 24 hours a day.

Now it will appeal against the decision to refuse an extended licence during a three-day hearing at Westminster Magistrates’ Court from May 16.

A spokesperson for Greggs said: “Greggs have been trying to extend their licence in order to serve hot food until later, around 3am, because it’s really in line with what local peers and restaurants are doing.

“There are restaurants down the road that are open until 3am serving their customers hot food at all hours, Greggs are very keen to be able to offer customers their hot food favourites until that time.”

The ban applies to Greggs’ hot food menu, which requires extra licensing due to the fact food is kept hot in store, but does not include the Greggs staple products of sausage rolls and pasties which are baked elsewhere and reheated in stores.

Instead, the appeal involves recently launched menu items such as potato wedges, chicken goujons, BBQ chicken bites and hot baguettes, which require special permissions from local authorities to be sold between 11pm and 5am.

Westminster City Council refused Greggs this licence in July 2022, saying: “The sub-committee concluded that the application would have the likely effect of an increase in crime and disorder in the area and an increased demand on police resources which are already stretched.”

Minutes from the licensing committee show that Metropolitan Police officer Thomas Stewart raised concerns that “a rise in licensable activities such as late-night refreshment could lead to an increase in criminal activities and anti-social behaviour”.

The licensing sub-committee added that Greggs had “failed to demonstrate how by selling hot food or hot drink in the West End cumulative impact zone that this would not add to negative cumulative impact and promote the licensing objectives”.

Westminster Council told the Evening Standard that in order to successfully appeal against the ban “Greggs would need to try to convince the court that their evidence provides exceptional reasons for allowing the premises to operate until 5am, despite being located in a cumulative impact zone”.

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King Charles And Camilla’s ‘Coronation Quiche’ Is Not To Everyone’s Taste

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A recipe picked to mark the King’s coronation as a “good sharing dish” has been given lukewarm reviews on social media.

King Charles and the Queen Consort have personally chosen a recipe for “Coronation Quiche” in celebration of the Big Lunches due to be staged at the me time as the ceremony.

The recipe for the open baked savoury tart, which features spinach, broad beans and tarragon, was shared on the royal family’s official Twitter account revealed.

For the late Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation in 1953, Coronation Chicken – cold chicken in a curry cream sauce with a well-seasoned dressed salad of rice, green peas and mixed herbs – was invented to feed the foreign guests who were entertained at Buckingham Palace after the ceremony.

The new recipe is by royal head chef Mark Flanagan and was chosen by Charles and Camilla in collaboration with him.

Buckingham Palace said the quiche was chosen because it worked as a sharing dish, can be served hot or cold, suits a wide variety of dietary requirements and can be easily adapted to suit different tastes.

The Palace also said it had the benefit of not being too complicated and not requiring costly or hard-to-source ingredients.

Quiche is known as a classic French dish, but is said have actually originated in Germany in the Middle Ages with the word quiche from the German kuchen, meaning cake.

But not everyone was impressed with the choice as the UK battles with stubbornly high inflation, despite the Palace suggesting the cost-of-living crisis was taken into consideration.

Broadcaster Richard Bacon tweeted: “Hands up if you’re starting to find this event very silly?”

Others pointed out it comes soon after the UK faced an eggs shortage – and argued that quiche just isn’t very nice.

The Coronation Big Lunch aims to brings neighbours and communities together to celebrate the May 6 coronation.

Camilla has been patron of the Big Lunch initiative since 2013

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‘The Pain Level Of Twitter Has Been Extremely High’: Musk Gives Free-Wheeling Interview To BBC

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Twitter CEO Elon Musk on Tuesday sat down for a spontaneous interview with the BBC at the social media network’s San Francisco headquarters, speaking about some of his regrets and offering a glimpse into how he envisions the future of the company about six months after he bought it.

Musk conceded he can sometimes be impulsive when it comes to posting on the platform. He has come under fire for several controversial tweets, including one in which he shared a conspiracy theory around the hammer attack on Paul Pelosi, the husband of former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

“Have I shot myself in the foot with tweets multiple times? Yes,” Musk told the BBC’s James Clayton.

“I think I should not tweet after 3 am,” he continued.

The self-professed “free speech absolutist” purchased Twitter in October ― despite trying to get out of a $44 billion agreement to do so ― and quickly set about reshaping the company. He decimated its staff and publicly attacked his own employees. He welcomed back banned users including former US president Donald Trump, who was kicked off the platform for instigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, as well as right-wing figures and other accounts blocked for misinformation. He criticised the media and spread misinformation himself.

Asked about how the first six months have gone, Musk replied: “It’s not been boring.”

He said managing the company has been “quite a rollercoaster”, but that overall usage was up and the site was performing well despite some outages and glitches. He claimed the company will be cash flow positive by the next quarter.

Musk said the hardest moment he faced in the past six months was closing down a server centre at the end of last year, thinking it was redundant — a move that he described as “catastrophic” and which had to quickly be reversed.

“The pain level of Twitter has been extremely high,” he said. “This hasn’t been some sort of party. It’s really been quite a stressful situation.”

The CEO told the BBC the current headcount is at around 1,500, down from the roughly 8,000 people the company employed before he took over.

Musk reportedly agreed to the wide-ranging interview just a few hours before its start.

The Tesla and SpaceX CEO defended his company over the latest controversy around requiring Twitter users to pay for verification. Prior to his takeover, the social media platform applied the badges to the accounts of notable individuals and businesses to deter impostors.

Musk vowed to remove all legacy blue checks by April 20, after missing an earlier deadline he had set for the action for April 1.

Musk has already stripped The New York Times of its badge after a user notified him the newspaper didn’t intend to pay for it.

“I must confess there’s some delight in removing the verified badge from The New York Times,” he told the BBC. “That was great.”

He claimed that the goal of his verification strategy is not to necessarily create another revenue stream, but more so to “massively raise the cost of disinformation and bots in general”.

“My prediction is that any social media company that does not insist on paid verification will simply be overwhelmed by advanced AI bots,” he added.

Musk had attempted to get out of the sale agreement with Twitter, saying there was “material breach of multiple provisions” and that the company did not disclose information on spam bot accounts. But Musk told the BBC he moved forward in the end because he expected a judge would have forced him to complete the sale anyway after Twitter sued to enforce the agreement.

While he originally told the BBC he wouldn’t sell the company for the $44 billion he bought it for, he quickly switched his answer: “If I was confident that they would rigorously pursue the truth, then I guess I would be glad to hand it over to someone else.”

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Dalai Lama Apologises After Video Shows Him Telling Boy: ‘Suck My Tongue’

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Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama has apologised on Monday after a video showing him kissing a child on the lips triggered criticism.

A statement posted on his official website said the 87-year-old leader regretted the incident and wished to “apologise to the boy and his family, as well as his many friends across the world, for the hurt his words may have caused”.

The incident occurred at a public gathering in February at the Tsuglakhang temple in Dharamsala, where the exiled leader lives. He was taking questions from the audience when the boy asked if he could hug him.

The Dalai Lama invited the boy up toward the platform he was seated on. In the video, he gestured to his cheek, after which the child kissed him before giving him a hug.

The Dalai Lama then asked the boy to kiss him on the lips and stuck out his tongue. “And suck my tongue,” the Dalai Lama can be heard saying as the boy sticks out his own tongue and leans in, prompting laughter from the audience.

The footage triggered a backlash online with social media users condemning his behavior as inappropriate and disturbing.

“His Holiness often teases people he meets in an innocent and playful way, even in public and before cameras,” the statement from the Dalai Lama read.

The Dalai Lama has made the hillside town of Dharmsala his headquarters since fleeing from Tibet after a failed uprising against Chinese rule in 1959. India considers Tibet to be part of China, though it hosts Tibetan exiles.

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5 Dead In Louisville Bank Shooting

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LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — A shooting Monday at a bank building in downtown Louisville killed five people and wounded at least six others, police said. The suspected shooter was also dead, police said.

Louisville Metro Police Department deputy chief Paul Humphrey told reporters officers who arrived on the scene “encountered active gunshots still being fired inside the location at that time.”

“The shooter was confirmed to be dead on the scene,” Humphrey said. “We do not know exactly the circumstances of his death at this time.”

Humphrey said at least six wounded people, including one police officer, were taken to a hospital but he had no details on their conditions.

Witnesses who left the building told Louisville station WHAS-TV they heard gunfire inside the building and television footage showed numerous police vehicles in the area.

In a tweet, Kentucky governor Andy Beshear said he was heading to the scene.

“Please pray for all of the families impacted and for the city of Louisville,” Beshear said.

The FBI said its agents were also responding to the shooting.

The shooting happened in a building on East Main Street that houses the Old National Bank not far from the Louisville Slugger Field and Waterfront Park.

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King Charles Shows Support For Research Examining Royal Family’s Ties To Slavery

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Buckingham Palace has said that King Charles takes a new research project looking into the British royal family’s connection to slavery “profoundly seriously” in a significant new statement on Thursday.

The palace issued a statement after it was contacted by The Guardian, following the news organisation’s discovery of a document from the Royal African Company, which at one point held a monopoly in the British slave trade, showing a transfer to King William III in 1689.

“This is an issue that His Majesty takes profoundly seriously,” the palace said before citing the king’s speech at the opening ceremony of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Rwanda last year.

In the speech, Charles spoke of “the depths of my personal sorrow at the suffering of so many as I continue to deepen my own understanding of slavery’s enduring impact”.

The palace said that Charles’ “process has continued with vigour and determination since His Majesty’s accession” before mentioning how the institution is aiding the research project investigating “the links between the British monarchy and the transatlantic slave trade during the late 17th and 18th centuries”.

The statement concluded: “As part of that drive, the royal household is supporting this research through access to the royal collection and the royal archives.”

The PhD project in question comes from historian Camilla de Koning, co-sponsored by the Historic Royal Palaces charity. The research is expected to conclude in 2026.

The royals have increasingly faced calls to apologize for their role in the slave trade, as some groups have also called for reparations.

Prince William condemned slavery as “abhorrent” during the then-Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s controversial tour of the Caribbean last year.

“I strongly agree with my father, the Prince of Wales, who said in Barbados last year that the appalling atrocity of slavery forever stains our history,” William said during a speech in Jamaica in March 2022. “I want to express my profound sorrow. Slavery was abhorrent. And it should never have happened.”

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