Disney and ABC sue FCC over early license review, alleging retaliation

The lawsuit comes after the FCC ordered ABC to seek renewals between two and five years before its TV stations' licenses were set to expire.

Meta's federal trial begins over child social media addiction claims

The lawsuit accuses the social media giant of contributing to the youth mental health crisis by deliberately designing features that addict children to its platforms.

Madonna leads 2026 MTV VMAs with 11 nominations

Madonna leads all artists with 11 nominations at this year's MTV VMAs, and a full sweep would tie her with Beyoncé and Taylor Swift for the most VMA wins in history.

Appeals court upholds block on immigration arrests at certain houses of worship

A federal appeals court sided with houses of worship from the Quaker, Sikh, and Cooperative Baptist Fellowship religious traditions.

Justice Department to send a record 1,000 monitors to midterm polling places

The Justice Department is planning to deploy a record 1,000 federal monitors to polling places throughout the U.S. for the midterm elections.

Nvidia's AI moat is shifting from chips to capital

Nvidia still has dominant market share in AI chips, but with competition picking up steam, the company is taking greater advantage of another key asset.

The ‘big-ass bag’ – do you really need a tote you can carry a small human in?

Lululemon’s absurdly capacious 80-litre bag will set you back £228 – and it’s one of the cheapest giant holdalls on the market

Name: Big-Ass Bags.

Age: The titular “Big-Ass Bag” launched this month (but large carrying receptacles have been available for centuries).

Human remains found in Lake Mead as water levels reach record low

The skeletal remains were found on Sunday, two years after similar drought conditions exposed bodies in the lake.

Death and alleged torture of man in detention sparks protests in Syria

Picture showing White Helmets volunteer unconscious and with bruises on his body went viral

Syrians have protested over the death of a man who was arrested and allegedly beaten by security forces, sparking widespread anger at a practice thought to have ended under the regime of Bashar al-Assad.

A crowd gathered in the city of Aleppo, demanding accountability for the security forces who carried out the alleged torture, with participants holding signs and slogans such as: “Do not repeat the same oppression that we revolted against.” Protests were also planned to take place in front of Syria’s parliament in Damascus on Tuesday, as well.

I’m 50 years old. Why do I still struggle with the need to be liked?

An over-investment in people-pleasing can be emotionally costly. Here’s how I’m training myself to be OK with letting people down

A few months ago, my 10-year-old daughter and I went to our neighborhood cafe. At the counter, the owner greeted us with her typical effusion of warmth and welcome. Instead of greeting her in kind, my daughter looked on with a stony expression and ungiving eyes.

My face flushed. I was embarrassed and incensed by what I perceived as blatant rudeness. You could at least smile, I thought.

Infantino ally insists Fifa president still has backing of most football associations

• Mosengo-Omba says Fifa’s congress backs Infantino

• Fecofa president admits he did not support sell-off plan

One of Gianni Infantino’s closest allies has said he would “take a bullet” for the Fifa president and is confident that he still has the overwhelming support of its all-powerful congress despite mounting pressure.

But Véron Mosengo-Omba, who served as Fifa’s chief member associations officer until 2021 and is now president of the Congolese Football Federation (Fecofa), also criticised Infantino’s Fifa Forward Enterprise (FFE) scheme that wanted to sell off more than 20% of the World Cup to private investors.

DOJ to stop using outside experts to help vet competitive grant applicants

The Justice Department is scrapping its longtime practice of hiring outside experts to help review competitive grant applications, multiple sources told CBS News.

OpenAI launches ChatGPT for Teens with stronger safeguards

Teen version is intended for children aged 13 to 17 and includes content protections on self-harm and sexual chats

OpenAI is launching a version of ChatGPT designed for teenagers – the first generation to grow up with artificial intelligence – who are already using it for schoolwork, questions about daily life and even companionship.

The San Francisco-based company says ChatGPT for Teens, which launches on Tuesday, is tailored for children aged 13 to 17 with stronger protections including content restrictions around things such as suicide, self-harm and romantic or sexual chats. It also provides homework and study support designed to help students learn rather than spit out answers and school essays.

Data centers, crypto, and tax revisions take center stage in Tuesday primaries

Incumbent Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan of Alaska is facing a serious challenge from former Democratic Rep. Mary Peltola.

S. Korea stresses US alliance amid confusion over Trump drill cut

Lee's comments Tuesday come as many South Koreans remain baffled and concerned about U.S. President Donald Trump's abrupt order to "substantially reduce" military exercises with South Korea.

Wladimir Klitschko pays tribute to ex-partner Hayden Panettiere: ‘She left this world too soon’

Boxing champion says he will raise their daughter, Kaya, to remember the late actor’s ‘immense talent’

Hayden Panettiere’s daughter will be raised to remember her mother’s “immense talent” and “incredible career”, according to a tribute posted on social media on Tuesday by Wladimir Klitschko, the ex-lineal world heavyweight boxing champion and the late Hollywood actor’s former partner.

Their daughter, Kaya, has been raised by the Ukrainian retired world boxing champion since 2018, when Panettiere ceded full custody to concentrate on her battles with alcoholism, depression and substance abuse.

I’ve decided motherhood is not for me. But being an auntie? It’s what I was born to do

I’m a backup caregiver, a teller of stories, a giver of snacks. Also, kids ask too many questions for their parents to answer them all

“She doesn’t have kids!” My littlest niece, Bonnie, said to my sister one day, about me.

“That’s why she has so much time to love you,” my sister said. Bonnie did some deep, earnest thinking, as toddlers do when they’re really considering something. Then she nodded, as if to say: yes, that is an extremely valid choice. If only everyone understood so easily.

‘Low carb’, ‘gluten-free’, with collagen or electrolytes: is it really possible for alcohol to be healthy?

Premixed drinks are ultra-processed products but their marketing claims create a ‘health halo’ that takes the focus away from the harms of alcohol, researchers say

Premixed alcoholic drinks are not known for their health benefits. But that hasn’t stopped a boom in products being marketed with “better for you” claims designed to appeal to younger, more health-conscious drinkers.

Labels such as “low sugar”, “gluten-free” and “low carb” are being used in advertising to promote the products, and social media influencers spruik the products under the hashtag #healthydrinking.

Melissa Davey is Guardian Australia’s medical editor

Antiviral is a fortnightly column that interrogates the evidence behind the health headlines and factchecks popular wellness claims

Outshine Fruit Bars recalled over possible glass, parent Dreyer's says

Five flavors of Outshine Fruit Bars sold nationwide were recalled because they may include glass, Dreyer's Grand Ice Cream said.

IRS proposal would force nonprofits to disclose leaders' terrorism convictions

The disclosure requirement would be added to the Form 990, the annual return that nonprofit groups file with the IRS.

Patrick Vieira appointed as head coach of Senegal, the country of his birth

• Former Arsenal captain succeeds Pape Thiaw

• Senegal reached last 32 of this summer’s World Cup

Senegal have appointed France’s 1998 World Cup winner Patrick Vieira as head coach, the country’s football federation announced, succeeding Pape Thiaw, who was dismissed in the wake of their World Cup exit.

The appointment of Vieira, who was born in Senegal, is a “strategic move”, the federation said in a social media post, aiming to “establish a high-level technical staff, in line with our country’s sporting ambitions”.

Why is Sweden deporting Britons faster than any other EU country post-Brexit? | David Milstead

The official talk is of the government acting with understanding and flexibility. But devastated lives tell another story

There is anger about the case of Joyce Thomas, a 78-year-old retired nurse who has lived in Sweden for 21 years. Her husband died there; her son, grandchildren and home are there. Yet she has been told to leave because her post-Brexit residence application was late. Her case is appalling and predictable – but far from isolated.

The Guardian has also reported on the plight of Horace Mason, 74, who faces being deported after a court ruling, despite having lived in Sweden for 25 years. This is sad but not surprising.

Where on earth is Melania Trump? | Arwa Mahdawi

In her husband’s first term, her absences sparked conspiracy theories. This time, she is somehow keeping an even lower profile

Anyone seen a 56-year-old woman around lately? Tall, cinnamon blond hair, fond of a fancy hat and, to quote Vogue, occasionally dresses like a “freelance magician”. She goes by the name “Melania Trump” or “first lady”, and she appears to be missing again. According to an analysis by the Daily Beast, Melania has only made 38 public appearances this year – with the last being the World Cup final. She’s been MIA for about a month.

To be fair, this isn’t out of character. During her first stint in the White House, the first lady’s frequent absences sparked various conspiracy theories, including one that she had a body double. But it seems Melania is keeping an even lower profile during Trump 2.0. NBC reported on Monday that she’s done about half as many public events as she did at this point in Trump’s first term. A senior adviser told the outlet she “prioritises results over appearances”. I dunno about that. Her highest-profile public appearance this year was when she held a surprise press conference telling everyone not to speculate about her relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. This had the predictable result of getting everyone to speculate about her relationship with the dead sex offender.

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Football Daily | Infantino wields the axe after Lamour breaks rank inside Fifa’s fiefdom

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A senior Fifa blazer held in such rare high regard that the prescient synth-pop duo Erasure named a single after him long before he entered the intoxicating world of football administration, Kevin Lamour was a lone dissenting voice inside Fifa’s lair when Gianni Infantino’s plot to flog part of the World Cup to private investors – potentially on the cheap – was rumbled last month. A plan so half-baked it succeeded only in ruining the holidays of Proper Journalists who naively hoped they might enjoy some leisure time after weeks of being studiously ignored by Gianni in the foyers of various luxury hotels dotted across North America, the then chief operating officer of Fifa had witheringly described the sell-off proposal as “the project of one person”. Refusing to sign off on the deal, Lamour said the administration had been “deceived” by Gianni, adding that if speaking up against his boss “means I lose my job, then so be it. I will understand and respect that decision. At least I’ll sleep well tonight.”

Upon reading the final article in Monday’s missive [full email edition – Football Daily Ed], I noted the final sentence of Memory Lane commenced with “(insert name of whoever is in the news as being on the end of a bad foul, bad behaviour, etc, here)”. I may be doing you a gross disservice but I couldn’t help feeling this was a Wizard of Oz moment where the curtain was momentarily drawn back, revealing (insert witty denouement here)” – Anthony Brady.

Further to Monday’s letter about players’ wages. To put things into perspective, if we estimate the average Premier League player’s wage to be, say, £5m per annum, or £100,000 per week, this works out that in one week such a player gets (hardly earns) more than the likes of Jimmy Greaves earned in his complete football career. If we go back to players like Finney, Milburn and Lofthouse the difference is even greater” – Stewart McGuinness.

I’m glad Rob Smyth was dissing a lousy movie and not the Gigli, Beniamino, the Italian tenor, in my humble opinion the best there ever has been. Well, I needed something to take my mind off the football!” – Bob Cushion.

This is an extract from our daily football email … Football Daily. To get the full version, just visit this page and follow the instructions. 

Mechanical fault suspected in helicopter crash that killed British newlyweds in Greece

Marie Ebert, Alexander Cromie and their pilot died when their aircraft crashed on island of Sifnos

Greek police believe a mechanical fault may have caused a helicopter to crash moments before it was due to land on the island of Sifnos, killing a British couple on honeymoon and the pilot.

Authorities were focusing on Tuesday on the “strange noise” the aircraft, a privately chartered Bell 206, is reported to have made before falling to the ground and exploding on impact.

‘Even its loos are on the outside!’ Hi-tech, inside-out marvel the Lloyd’s building is partying with the public

It has been likened to a monster, an oil rig – and the Parthenon. Now, for its 40th birthday, the astonishing London landmark has joined the Open House festival, to grant admirers a rare look around the inside

In his 2012 book A New Kind of Bleak, the critic Owen Hatherley called it “monstrous, compelling” and utterly messed-up. Back in the 1980s, a then Prince Charles suggested it had been inspired by a North Sea oil rig. But none of this stopped it from becoming, in 2011, the youngest ever building to be given Grade I-listed status in the UK.

And now, as part of its 40th anniversary celebrations, the Lloyd’s building will open to the public for the first time since 2014 for one day only during London’s Open House festival. The iconic building in the heart of the financial district was designed by architect Richard Rogers to house the global insurance marketplace. Its futuristic facade has been a celebrated part of the City of London skyline since it opened in 1986, but the interior is rarely seen by the public. Visitor galleries with a view of the trading floor have long been shut for security reasons.

Hims & Hers CEO says FTC lawsuit misunderstands how the company works

Hims & Hers CEO Andrew Dudum spoke to CNBC about the FTC's lawsuit against the company, compounded GLP-1 drugs and AI.

Missing woman's family receives texts asking for money, bitcoin

Alisa Goods, 63, disappeared 10 days ago in Las Vegas. Her family has been receiving mysterious messages from her phone.

Ikea to take on eBay and Vinted with UK online secondhand site

Platform set to launch later this year will enable loyalty card members to sell preloved Billy bookcases and Poäng chairs

• Business live – latest updates

Ikea is taking on eBay, Facebook Marketplace and Vinted with its own secondhand selling site in the UK.

The new platform, which will enable shoppers signed up to the Swedish company’s membership scheme to connect directly to one another to buy and sell pre-owned Ikea items locally, is due to launch in the next few months.

The ultra rich are collecting fossils. And that’s bad for science - video

One of the UK’s best fossil collections has been sold overseas in what experts have called a loss to the nation. The collection, which is now on display at the Natural History Museum in Abu Dhabi, was gathered on Dorset’s Jurassic Coast. As dinosaur fossils sell to private collectors for increasingly large sums, scientists are worried that domestic museums are being priced out of the market, and in turn scientists are missing out on the opportunity to make new observations. To find out how fossils became big business and what it could mean for research, Madeleine Finlay hears from science correspondent Nicola Davis

Lindsay Clancy's mom testifies her daughter said she had "thoughts of harming the children"

CBS News legal contributor Caroline Polisi breaks down the latest testimony in the Lindsay Clancy trial from Clancy's family members after the prosecution rested its case on Monday.

WNBA says security was wrong to tell fans to cover shirts about trans athletes at Fever-Dream game

• Two fans were wearing shirts with XX-XY message

• Another fan told to cover shirt supporting trans people

• League: ‘This should not have happened’

At least three fans were asked by WNBA security personnel to cover shirts that had messages about transgender women participating in women’s sports during Sunday’s game in Atlanta between the Dream and the Indiana Fever.

The league said in a statement Monday that the fans should have been allowed to wear the shirts.

UK risks running out of gas by 2030s, ministers told

Government assessment warns of supply shock that could leave homes and businesses without gas within a decade

Great Britain risks running out of gas in the 2030s despite its growing clean energy sources, unless ministers take “unprecedented” action to guard against a future supply shock, according to an official assessment.

The government is considering plans to provide direct financial support to safeguard the country’s ageing gas infrastructure after a consultation found that a “high stress scenario” could mean homes and businesses run out within the next decade.

U.S. Navy destroyer lost power for 4 days while deployed in South China Sea

The USS Benfold, a U.S. Navy destroyer, lost power for four days during its deployment off the coast of Southeast Asia last month. The Navy said there were no injuries, but the cause of the loss of power is still under investigation. Charlie D'Agata has more.

Labour urges Gambling Commission to investigate firms linked to Reform UK donors

Bridget Phillipson writes to watchdog asking it to look into claims Tether.bet and Fispay operated without a licence

The Gambling Commission has been urged to investigate claims that companies linked to Reform UK donors and allies of Nigel Farage have been operating without a licence.

The Labour party’s chair, Bridget Phillipson, has written to the watchdog asking it to look into Tether.bet, a Montenegro-based gambling company, and Fispay, a UK company owned by Reform’s data protection officer, Mowbray Jackson.

Whether Tether.bet, and its operators, provided or advertised remote gambling facilities to consumers in UK without the required licence

Whether Fispay Ltd, or any other UK company, provided or supported gambling facilities or services to consumers in the UK without the required licence.”

A grandma of 5 went missing in Vegas. Now her family is getting messages asking for bitcoin.

There's an urgent search for a New York woman whose family says she disappeared 10 days ago while in Las Vegas. The woman's family hasn't heard from her other than receiving mysterious text messages from her phone asking for payments in cash and bitcoin. Nicole Valdes reports.

Philippine school shooter kills fellow student and himself in livestreamed attack

Country’s second fatal school shooting in two months took place in southern city of ⁠Zamboanga

A student livestreamed himself shooting and killing another pupil in a classroom in the southern Philippines before taking his own ⁠life, ​the second school attack in the country in less than two months.

The shooting took ⁠place at a school attached to Ateneo de Zamboanga University in the southern city of ⁠Zamboanga, a Catholic private institution in western Mindanao. Zamboanga city’s mayor, Khymer Adan Olaso, told the DZMM radio station that the ‌shooter “managed to enter carrying a high-powered firearm and a .45-calibre pistol”.

Trump administration pursues Kilmar Ábrego García on previously dismissed charges

Attorneys for Ábrego, who was wrongfully deported to El Salvador, say the DoJ’s appeal was ‘flat wrong’

The Trump administration has asked a federal appeals court to reinstate criminal charges against Kilmar Ábrego García that were dismissed in May by a judge who said the prosecution of the man who unwittingly became a symbol of the White House’s mass deportation campaign was “vindictive in nature”.

In a filing to the US sixth circuit court of appeals, the justice department insisted that human smuggling allegations against Ábrego are genuine – and not retaliation for challenging his wrongful deportation to El Salvador in March 2025.

Wisconsin dog breeder faced nearly 500 state violations, but didn't see federal enforcement

Despite a growing push to reduce animal testing, USDA records show more than 37,000 dogs were used for research last year in the U.S. A CBS News investigation uncovered questions over the effectiveness of federal oversight on commercial breeding facilities that supply labs across the country. Adam Yamaguchi reports.

Hayden Panettiere was found in cardiac arrest with no signs of foul play

Actress Hayden Panettiere was found in cardiac arrest in a South Carolina apartment, the coroner's office says. The official cause and manner of death for the 36-year-old is still under investigation, but officials say there were no signs of foul play. Mark Strassmann reports.

Scientists who turned to OnlyFans to fund marmot research receive crypto boost

Funding boost worth $100,000 has recently materialized in form of new marmot-themed cryptocurrency

Scientists who turned to OnlyFans to help save long-running research into marmots have raised more than $100,000 after harnessing the support of another, very modern, funding avenue – cryptocurrency.

The 60-year project of continuous study of marmots – stout, ground-dwelling rodents that are the largest members of the squirrel family – across the US west was facing termination following science funding cuts imposed by Donald Trump’s administration.

‘We humans are inept at taking care of baby animals’: why well-fed orphan bears die in the wild

Scientists surprised to find all but two of 12 grizzlies were dead within a year of ‘feelgood’ release, unable to sustain their high-calorie diet and inclined to approach humans

The orphaned grizzly bear cubs were bulked up with a generous diet of roadkill, watermelon, dog food and snacks donated by the public. Their contact with carers was limited to two people. Then, after up to a year in rehabilitation, they returned home to the wilds of British Columbia.

“It’s a feelgood thing – people feel good when the cage opens,” says Dr Lana M Ciarniello, a bear specialist who tracked the Canadian yearlings in a recent study. There is a perception that bears will thrive in their natural habitat, she says. “The reality is they’re not followed up on.”

Over a dozen charged in alleged cocaine trafficking ring at Penn State

More than a dozen current and former Penn State University students, along with one of their parents, have been charged in a major cocaine trafficking ring. Prosecutors allege two off-campus fraternities appeared to be the hubs for the operation. Meg Oliver reports.

American Airlines to add seatback screens, bigger first class in race to catch up to Delta and United

American is trying to add more premium seating and passenger perks after falling behind rivals Delta and United.

Brain-breaking sex, bad boys in leather and queer glory: why TV vampires are so intoxicating

The Vampire Lestat has seduced fans around the world with his eye-popping antics. But this obsession with hot vamps goes way beyond forbidden love, bare chests and a taste for LSD-laced blood

If you want TV audiences to forgive a fictional man for absolutely anything, just sharpen his fangs and stick him in velvet. Case in point? The horny musical drama The Vampire Lestat, which became a cult hit in the US earlier this year. The show has now arrived in the UK and Sam Reid’s searing performance as Lestat has fans on their knees.

The first two seasons, which went by the title Interview With the Vampire, were about the “interview” in which Louis (Jacob Anderson) tells a journalist about his toxic relationship with Lestat. Now, the focus has shifted to Lestat – hence the new title and new narrator – as the golden-locked prince of darkness swaps centuries of secrecy for glam-rock stardom.

Hayden Panettiere's ex-fiancé in "profound shock" after her death

Hayden Panettiere, who shares a daughter with the former boxing champ, died on Sunday at 36 years old.

Woman returns to her community to survey damage from Hurricane Lala in Hawaii: "We need help"

Flash flooding and mudslides left catastrophic damage behind in parts of Hawaii from Hurricane Lala, which struck over the weekend. One community remains trapped after the road in and out was washed away while others are returning home to survey the damage. Jonathan Vigliotti reports.

Phyllida Law, prolific performer across stage and screen, dies aged 94

As adept at comedy and musicals as she was drama, Law acted alongside daughters Sophie and Emma Thompson in a career spanning eight decades

Phyllida Law, whose prolific acting career encompassed a wide range of stage, TV and film roles – a number of which were alongside her daughters, Emma and Sophie Thompson – has died aged 94. Her personal manager, Jacky Leggo, said in a statement that she “died supremely peacefully at home, surrounded by all her family”.

Born in Glasgow in 1932, Law was accepted at the prestigious Bristol Old Vic Theatre school – initially intending to be a stage designer but then switching to acting. She appeared in a number of Bristol Old Vic productions in the 1950s, and it was there she met Eric Thompson, a fellow actor, whom she married in 1957.

Hill sheep sales and a giant dachshund: photos of the day – Tuesday

The Guardian’s picture editors select photographs from around the world

‘The truth about Diana’: Charles Spencer to publish book about late sister

Earl says he wanted to ‘write down my own thoughts and memories’ with 30th anniversary of Diana’s death ‘on the skyline’

Charles Spencer is to publish a book about his sister Diana in September.

In the book – titled Swan Song: Diana, My Sister – Spencer recounts the story of Diana’s life and the week of her death. It marks “the first time that Earl Spencer has spoken openly and at length about his sister”, according to the book’s publisher, the Penguin imprint Michael Joseph. The book will be released on 22 September in the UK.

Russia's economy has defied the skeptics. Cracks are getting harder to hide

Russia's wartime economy is under growing strain as its budget deficit widens and analysts warn pressure could intensify next year.

Cool as a cucumber: recipes and tips to save you from cooking in a heatwave | Kitchen aide

When ovens and stovetops just won’t do, turn to loaded toasts, open sandwiches, cold noodles and smashed cucumbers, say our no-cook experts

It’s too hot to turn on the oven or stove. What can I make for dinner that’s still substantial?
Mark, via email
This sounds like a job for Lucy Carr-Ellison, of Tart London, who is fully functioning in a no-oven household. “We moved in last year and there’s an Aga, which was amazing in winter, but we can’t have it on in summer,” she says, so toast toppers have become a crucial category of cooking: “Try rubbing toasts with garlic, adding a bit of olive oil, some grated tomatoes, lots of salt and tinned anchovies.”

Otherwise, Mark could do away with the toaster and get some focaccia, suggests Jamie Pickles, chef/co-owner of Stow and The Trof, both in Manchester: “Mix picked brown crab meat with mayo, lemon juice and mustard, and spread that over the bread.” Next, combine the picked white meat with chopped chives and coriander, lemon juice, creme fraiche and black pepper. “Mix through some tinned sweetcorn, spread that over the brown crab mayo and finish with watercress.”

Got a culinary dilemma? Email [email protected]

How slavery reparations could help make yearning to return to Africa a reality

Right for people of African descent to return to continent is key pillar of global push for reparatory justice from colonisers

Supporting the right for people of African descent to return to the continent has become a key pillar of the growing global push for reparatory justice from Britain and other colonisers.

When Ghana’s president, John Dramani Mahama, visited Jamaica this month he addressed the issue of repatriation for Jamaicans and others whose ancestors were kidnapped from Africa and sold into transatlantic chattel slavery.

Russia says its economy is strong. It just fired a top economist who warned otherwise

Andrei Klepach was reportedly fired from his role after presenting a report warning that Russia could not win a prolonged war of attrition with Ukraine.

‘Our task is to laugh at these enemies’: the Ukrainian unit posting drone videos of Russian soldiers’ last moments

Creators of chase compilations reject any moral qualms and say they show ‘death is waiting’ for those who join war

To many observers they will appear dehumanising and offensive. To many Ukrainians, however, they are a brutal reminder of the fate that awaits Russian soldiers who take part in Vladimir Putin’s invasion, as well as a potent propaganda weapon.

Over the past year and a half, videos of kamikaze drones chasing Russian service personnel to their deaths have become a distinctive genre on social media. They are the brainchild of Robert Brovdi, the head of Ukraine’s unmanned systems forces and founder of “Magyar’s Birds”, named after his call sign.

U.S. and Iran miss peace talks deadline. And, Alaska, Florida and Wyoming primaries

The U.S. and Iran missed a deadline to begin peace talks this week. The monthslong war has depleted U.S. resources. And, what to know about Alaska's U.S. Senate seat primary.

Hayden Panettiere remembered by co-stars and friends after her death

Co-stars and friends of Hayden Panettiere​ are remembering her for her friendship, intelligence and talent after her shocking death on Sunday.

‘A new normal’: Miami faces worsening seaweed problem as piles of algae wash up on beaches

Officials have had to remove thousands of tons of sargassum from Florida’s beaches amid the climate crisis

Dealing with seaweed is the bulk of Chris Bumpus’s job during the summer. As chief of conservation for Miami-Dade county’s parks, recreation and open spaces department, Bumpus is in charge of cleaning sargassum off 17 miles (27km) of county beaches. But some days, the odds are stacked against him and his team.

More and more sargassum, a kind of floating brown algae, has been washing up on the beaches of south Florida, west Africa, the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean.

‘The ultimate gamers’ mascot’: Sonic the Hedgehog at 35 – from 2D to 3D to a billion-dollar film franchise

Sonic’s creators explain how the speedy scamp has kept on running through generations as an enduring avatar of ‘attitude in the face of adversity’

One day in the early 1990s, I came home from university for the weekend and discovered that my dad had bought himself a Sega Mega Drive, bundled with a copy of Sonic the Hedgehog 2. I knew about Sega’s mascot of course. The launch of the original Sonic the Hedgehog game in 1991 was a landmark moment for the company, massively boosting the sales of its 16bit console in the west, ripping market share from the dominant Super Nintendo. While Mario was the family favourite, Sonic with his speed, attitude and brash visual energy encapsulated the edgy spirit of the early 1990s MTV culture. That weekend, Dad and I did little else but team up for daylong Sonic sessions, the game’s two-player mode letting us play cooperatively as we zoomed through those dense, beautiful play zones.

Thirty-five years later, I am still a Sonic fan. There have been plenty of rough times (Sonic 06, Sonic and the Secret Rings, Sonic Free Riders – sorry, I can’t go on), but there have been plenty of good ones too. (Rush, Mania and Colors, and I have a soft spot for Sonic R, a racer developed by Traveller’s Tales, which went on to make the Lego games). Few people know this rollercoaster better than Takashi Iizuka, who worked on Sonic 3 as a designer and has been series producer for almost 20 years. When he joined Sega in 1992 he wanted to work for the company’s arcade division, but after playing the original Sonic – especially Sonic 2 – he was seduced.

Premier League 2026-27 preview No 14: Liverpool

Andoni Iraola has his hands full – replacing Mo Salah and restoring faith at Anfield – and will hope big name investors bring stability not disharmony

Guardian writers’ predicted position: 4th (NB: this is not necessarily Andy Hunter’s prediction but the average of our writers’ tips)

Last season’s position: 5th

The hill I will die on: Packing light is for cowards. Pack heavy | Max Olesker

Trip-prepping shouldn’t be a grim exercise in minimising your milligrams. Take day outfits, night outfits, gymwear, swimwear – and prepare for an adventure

If you’re on the hunt for a streamlined way to travel internationally while only packing a toothbrush, an iPad, a single white T-shirt made of technical fabric and a lukewarm sachet of Huel, then keep scrolling. I simply couldn’t care less.

Packing for travel shouldn’t be a grim logistical exercise in minimising the milligrams of mass one must transport. It should be a prelude to an adventure – and an adventure in itself!

Max Olesker is a writer and comedian. His show Max Olesker: Making the Cut is playing at the Edinburgh fringe, until 30 August 2026

England’s ancient oak trees dying in extreme hot and dry weather

Woodland Trust says trees struggling in drought stress, with older ‘survivors’ disproportionately affected

England’s ancient oak trees are dying in the summer’s extreme heat and dry weather, according to the Woodland Trust, with trees and ecosystems unable to adapt fast enough to the changing climate.

The heatwaves across much of Europe this summer have had a notable impact on crop growth and plant health. To cope with the extreme conditions, many trees are undergoing “early autumn”, wilting and losing their leaves early.

Crow Leasow oak, Shropshire.

Tea Party oak, Suffolk.

King John oak, Devon.

Enmore oak, Somerset.

Lydham Manor oak, Shropshire.

Old Knobbley, Essex.

Pwllpriddog oak, Carmarthenshire.

Vans, ghosts, sofas and a kiss from Katy Perry: artist France-Lise McGurn and her paint-everything ethos

Tackling grief, time, parties and spaceflight, the Scottish artist uses film stills, magazine ads, family photos and even her own furniture to create a show you can settle into and figure out

‘I love parties,” says France-Lise McGurn, “but they’re complicated, and there’s a time when you leave.” Her new show at Dundee Contemporary Arts, called The Charm Offensive, carries her dynamic, vital paintings into a new era – and on an unprecedented huge scale. Grappling with grief, the passing of time, and the paradoxes and slippery truths of modern womanhood, the work chases the desire to be present, balancing the fun of the party with the melancholy of leaving it.

McGurn was born and raised in Glasgow and studied painting in Dundee, so this show is something of a homecoming. As a student, she lived three doors down from DCA. Although she knows nostalgia can be a “dirty word” among artists, McGurn says that “a melancholic grappling with the past is part of painting”. She has always worked from extensive source material, but for this show, she has allowed that archive of images to be visible to viewers.

‘Migration has been weaponised’: Italy’s security law criticised after death of Moroccan man in police restraint

Case of Abderrahim Fakir is first in which legal shield giving police greater protection from prosecution has been invoked

If, before 19 July, few people in Italy beyond his family and friends knew who Abderrahim Fakir was, by the late afternoon of that day the final moments of his life were being watched across the country.

Video footage widely shared online showed him being handcuffed and forcibly restrained by police on a street in Pilastro, a neighbourhood in the north-east of Bologna.

Governments’ borrowing costs hit further multi-decade highs as US-Iran peace hopes fade

Bond yields in US, UK, Germany France and Japan rise after ceasefire ends and Trump threatens to bomb Oman

• Business live – latest updates

Government borrowing costs in several advanced economies continued to rise to levels not seen in decades on Tuesday, as hopes of an end to the US-Iran war faded.

Concerns about the inflation outlook worsened after the ceasefire between Washington DC and Tehran ended on Monday night without an agreement, with no progress on the reopening of the strait of Hormuz.

Lakers governor Jeanie Buss says siblings cannot sell family’s stake to Bob Iger, Joshua Kushner

Jeanie Buss's lawyer says she has not agreed to sell the team and that any vote suggesting the Buss family is selling "would be and is void."

The grueling fight over who profits from AI music

AI can generate songs in seconds. But behind every AI track is a complicated question: Who should get paid? And, how? The fights have started.

How architect Paul Revere Williams fought racism and changed the face of Los Angeles

Creating homes for Frank Sinatra, Cary Grant and Lucille Ball made Williams a star. A trio of new exhibitions shows he belongs among the 20th century’s greats

When you fly into the Los Angeles airport LAX, a spindly space-age contraption is the first thing that greets your eyes outside the window. Built in the early 1960s, the Theme Building – which once attracted travelers to its in-house restaurant, designed by Walt Disney Imagineering, towering above airfields – was built by a supergroup of architects whose structures helped define the city’s midcentury aesthetic: William Pereira, Welton Becket, Charles Luckman and Paul Revere Williams.

Of these architects, Williams, the first licensed Black architect in California, arguably shaped the contours of Los Angeles most deeply. In the six decades before his death in 1980, Williams completed an estimated 3,000 projects ranging from single-family residences, commercial buildings, affordable housing projects, the Los Angeles county courthouse, a reimagining of the now-razed Ambassador hotel and opulent homes for celebrities including Frank Sinatra, Barbara Stanwyck and Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz. Perhaps most iconic of all is the Beverly Hills hotel; Williams led its renovation, and its recognizable curlicued sign is scrawled in Williams’s own handwriting.

Match review – gory and slyly satirical catfishing horror for the age of Hinge

Online dating’s eternal bugbear reaches a horrific apotheosis in this funny, grimy and impishly directed shocker

Paola (Humberly González) is a pretty young woman about to turn 30 who hasn’t found herself a steady boyfriend – so, like many people of her generation, she’s on all the dating apps. The algorithm finds her match in Henry, who looks clean cut and kind eyed – or, at least, that’s what he seems from a very short video conversation on the phone, which breaks up due to bad signal. Paola’s sister Maria (Shaeane Jimenez) is visiting town because her and Paola’s father (Peter Butler) is going in for an operation, and warns her more trusting sibling not to accept Henry’s invitation to come to dinner at his house, away from the public gaze.

Of course, Paola should have listened to her sister. The good looking guy (played by Luke Volker) turns out to have been a catfishing lure, and the real Henry (Jacques Adriaanse) looks like what you’d get if a troll mated with a slime mould. Plus, it’s actually Henry’s deranged mother, Lucille (a fantastic Dianne Simpson) who’s been writing all those courtly messages to Paola – who is soon sedated with drugged wine and wakes up about to be raped, exactly the sort of scenario your actual mother warned you about.

Samira’s story: the Sudanese refugee who has known no peace since she was 10

Since civil war first reached her village in 2003, Samira has been displaced seven times, enduring devastating losses and injuries along the way

Every morning, she spreads small piles of rice and spices on an aluminium tray in the market of Korsi refugee camp. Some of it comes from her monthly food ration, already meagre, distributed by the UN’s World Food Programme; some she buys when she can and resells for a small profit.

Samira crouches quietly behind her modest display, greeting customers as they pass. Her loose red toub cloth frames her thin face and falls across one side of it, hiding her injured right eye. Every so often she adjusts the long cloth to cover the empty sleeve where her right arm would have been. It is a habit the 33-year-old has developed since the war, but her injuries are only part of the terrible damage it has inflicted.

In Portland, this soap box derby combines downhill speed with extreme pageantry

Soap box derbies send motorless cars down a steep incline. At one event, contestants make their cars look like cartoon characters, subway cars, food, and giant animals (among other outlandish shapes).

Homes destroyed by mudslide brought by Lala on Hawaii's Big Island

"The boulders that were coming down were so heavy they were like shaking the ground," resident Alice Birnbaum told CBS News.

Phoebe Bridgers review – high priestess of ambiguity turns grief Technicolor in intimate church show

Union Chapel, London
Ahead of playing arenas this winter, Bridgers gives her third album, Lost Weekend, a stripped-back UK debut that makes its bewitching songs sound even more astounding

Three days after the rapturous release of her third album, Lost Weekend, Phoebe Bridgers invites 900 people into her bedroom to hear her play some of its devastating songs live – or at least, that’s how it feels inside Union Chapel in north London on this Monday night. With Bridgers plopped on a throw-covered sofa, surrounded by lava lamps and with a TV showing the bouncing DVD logo screensaver, it becomes easy to forget the Victorian gothic architecture looming above our heads.

This intimate scene is the indie superstar’s hugely anticipated first solo UK show since 2022, and the reverent awe in the church is palpable. Fans have obediently locked away their phones in magnetic pouches – as they will also have to on her arena run later this year – and fidget in the pews clutching CDs and T-shirts emblazoned with the artwork for her new record. You can hear a proverbial pin drop when Bridgers opens the show by belting her breakout song Motion Sickness solo with her guitar, her voice somersaulting around the domed ceiling. (After this, she is joined on stage by two bandmates, Nick White and Christian Lee Hutson.) But Bridgers, who hums with a slightly nervous energy, characteristically pierces through any solemnity by encouraging us to scream and sing along as the gig rolls on. After all, she quips: “God’s watching – fuckin’ freak.”

Dickovers, baggravation and botiquette: 18 new words to describe our tech hellscape

There are many tech irritants that are a scourge of modern life, yet we have lacked the vocabulary to describe them ... until now

The “dickover” is the scourge of the modern age. Coined in May by John Gruber, a tech writer, it is defined as “a modal panel, popover, or curtain presented by a website or app, deliberately obscuring its own content to frustrate the user”. Essentially, it is the thing (or more often, things) you have to click away in order to read the thing you wanted to read. It is the “accept cookies” box, the “allow notifications?” box, the “sign in with Google” box, the pop-up video box, etc.

We shouldn’t fool ourselves into thinking that dickovers are the only terrible thing about technology in 2026. Until now, though, we have lacked the vocabulary to describe them, so here are some suggestions.

‘There was a certain hostility’: how Wet Hot American Summer went from miss to hit

Critics might have been sniffy back in 2001 but the silly summer camp comedy has endured and director David Wain has been enjoying the ‘slow-burn’ appreciation

In the summer of 2001, the film critic Roger Ebert wrote a scathing film review in song form, with lyrics set to the tune of a classic song about summer camp. “Hello muddah, hello fadduh / Here I am at Wet Hot American Summah,” it began. The review proceeded to mock the film Wet Hot American Summer in rhyme.

Twenty-five years later, the film’s director and co-writer, David Wain, joined several of its stars on the vast lawn of the Autry Museum in Los Angeles to sing the review to a crowd of thousands, many of them wearing Camp Firewood T-shirts and 80s-style sweat absorbers. The performance preceded an anniversary screening of what has become a cult classic.

The rise and fall of Tony Romo: what comes next for CBS’s $180m NFL analyst?

The former Dallas Cowboys star is on indefinite leave after being arrested on suspicion of drunk driving. His future in a competitive business is now in doubt

After Tony Romo’s arrest last month, TMZ published a 31-minute “extended cut” of the body-camera footage from the Wisconsin police officer who arrested CBS Sports’ star NFL analyst on suspicion of operating a vehicle while under the influence.

It’s an uncanny watch. The former Dallas Cowboys quarterback’s familiar goofy geniality collides with the gravity and stilted formality of an encounter with law enforcement. The video of a disoriented Romo struggling to answer basic questions and failing a field sobriety test, and his rictus-grinning, disheveled, head-askew mug-shot, form a glaring contrast with his smart-suited look a year earlier: beaming as he posed in the spotlight with his play-by-play partner, Jim Nantz, at the network’s preseason media preview.

Many recent grads say AI is making it harder to get a job. Economists aren't so sure

The unemployment rate for young adults with new degrees is higher than the rate for all workers, according to the New York Fed. Is AI the problem, or is it more complicated?

She told no one about her agony except ChatGPT. What her death reveals about AI risks

A 29-year-old woman confided her suicidal thoughts to an AI chatbot — not to her therapist, not to her parents, not to her best friend. What can AI learn from her death?

Morning news brief

Jared Kushner and Israel's prime minister meet in attempt to move Gaza ceasefire plan forward, U.S. focus on Iran draws key resources from Asia, voters head to the polls for primaries Tuesday.

Waves Turn review – the exhausting, joyful, boring, wondrous realities of new motherhood

Josephine Ahnelt’s gentle but truthful documentary has home-movie intimacy and some incredibly touching moments

As a piece of art depicting motherhood, Judith Rohrmoser’s self-portrait of breastfeeding sticks two fingers up at the tradition of the Madonna with child. In her painting, Rohrmoser’s baby feeds contentedly, chubby cheeked and sleepy under damp lashes. The artist is less serene, looking directly at us, headphones clamped over her ears, eyes filled with what might be a roar of grief, or possibly an overwhelming sense that everything has changed.

Rohrmoser is one of five women who agreed to be filmed at their most vulnerable in the first year of motherhood for this Austrian documentary. It’s a gentle but truthful look at new motherhood, making the point that – ignore the Renaissance artists – having a tiny baby does not put you in perpetual state of bliss. The reality is exhaustion, joy, boredom, wonder and a rush of other feelings. Director Josephine Ahnelt shoots in 16mm, her camera up close, filming with the intimacy of a home video, cutting off heads to at one point zero in on what interests her: a mother snipping her baby’s tiny fingernails.

Sunrise by Téa Obreht review – secrets and myths in the American west

Set across three interwoven timelines, this absorbing tale of an abandoned mining town explores courage, cowardice and how history is recorded

Téa Obreht’s novels teem with conflicting narratives, treacherous landscapes and speculative fictions. Her 2010 prizewinning debut, The Tiger’s Wife, examined themes of death, miracles and outsider status in the midst of a fictional Balkan war. Her fourth novel, Sunrise, returns to a western frontier haunted by ghosts and stalked by outlaws, a territory Obreht first explored in her second book, Inland.

It is August 2024. Nina Terzic has just jumped – or was she pushed? – from a crash-landing Cessna into a lake somewhere in the mountains of Wyoming. She manages to swim to shore. There is no sign of her boyfriend Ben, who was in the plane with her, and her phone – though miraculously intact – has no signal. Nina, a postgraduate student, was supposed to be on holiday from her job as a live-in nanny in New York. We get the feeling that her relationship with Ben might have a darker underside.

Interviewing José Mourinho: ego, charisma, talent and his ‘rucksack of pain’

Director Joe Pearlman says he expected Real Madrid manager to ‘try to manipulate us’ in making of Netflix series

Even in the hyperreal world of football, there are few characters more compelling, more polarising, or more everything than José Mourinho, the best and worst of public him on full display in a new three-part Netflix series. “It reminded me how good he was,” says Joe Pearlman, who directed Mourinho, and the actual Mourinho is, believe it or not, keen to communicate the same. As he puts it in the show: “I look, you look, I see more than you.”

Making documentaries, though, is often about taking people to the places they’re most skilled at avoiding. “I knew the interviews were going to be very intense,” says Pearlman, “and he was going to try and control the narrative and manipulate us. Everything bad is everyone else’s fault and everything he’s done is validated by winning. Because that’s all that’s important.”

US states take on Meta in pivotal trial over child social media addiction claims

State attorneys general allege tech company intentionally designed addictive products that harm young people

More than half of the states in the US have joined together in an unprecedented lawsuit against Meta that goes to trial on Tuesday, accusing the parent company of Instagram and Facebook of deliberately designing addictive products that lured in young people and caused them harm.

The jury trial is taking place in federal court in Oakland, California, and is expected to last between six and eight weeks. The jury is expected to hear from Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri and employee turned whistleblower Arturo Béjar.

Here is the news from the US: Woke 1.0 is over. But what did progressives do wrong? | Nesrine Malik

A movement with safety, dignity and equality at its heart may now be blamed for the rightwing backlash. But within it were principles worth carrying forwards

Every once in a while, the discourse gods send a tablet down to the people, announcing that a previous era is dead and a new age is upon us. Recently, it was the “vibe shift” – a post-pandemic change in culture that encompassed everything from fashion to politics. The vibe shift consolidated with Donald Trump’s second election, a harbinger of the end of fragility and of movements for racial and gender equality – a rejection of the long 2010s with their hashtags and pink pussy hats and women’s marches and protests. The vibe shift has recently been followed by a calling of time on what has come to be known as “Woke 1.0” – a term that represents what is now seen as a culture of hysterical overreach triggered by the momentary breakthrough of movements such as #MeToo and Black Lives Matter. “Woke 1 was crazy,” said Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez this month, quoting a New York City councilman. And there we have it, time to walk back some things said and done in the giddy heat of those moments. It was crazy!

This rush to the future away from what some perceive to be an embarrassing past groups together various disparate phenomena. But I’m afraid it’s not that simple. Woke 1.0 (or “peak wokeness” – I wish the gods would use less trivialising ways to refer to roiling social tides, but there we are) was about politics and culture and also about the behaviours and trends it triggered. It was about concrete problems: policing of minority communities, the right of women not to be sexually harassed or violated, the systemic racism and sexism that damaged both. And it was about reforming the cultural structures that created and perpetuated those systems; asking university curricula to expand and diversify intellectual sources, recognising the long shadow of glorified imperial histories, and updating institutions – from the media to the academy – in order to enfranchise change. None of this is “crazy”.

Nesrine Malik is a Guardian columnist

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Cricket great David Warner decries ‘media onslaught’ after drink-driving conviction

• Former Test opener fined $1,500 after failing a breath-test at Easter

• Future work opportunities will be affected, says barrister

The former Australian cricket great David Warner has lamented global media attention about his drink-driving offence, suggesting it cost him valuable overseas commercial opportunities.

The 39-year-old was convicted and fined $1,500AUD (£787) on Tuesday for mid-range drink-driving after he tried to switch seats with a passenger when approaching a random breath-testing site on Easter Sunday. The star batter’s barrister argued he should be spared conviction for the offence – when he tested more than twice the legal limit – because he had suffered extra punishment as a result of media coverage.

Transylvania beyond the spooky castles: a family adventure in Romania’s mountains

Forget the vampire tales – the Eastern Carpathians deliver dramatic peaks, roaming bears and deep solitude

As the sun disappears behind the high tree line, our campfire spits and crackles. Four plump trout are sizzling on a flame-heated slab of rock, a cooking technique used by people in the Gurghiu mountains, part of Transylvania’s Eastern Carpathians, for centuries. Apart from gentle birdsong, it’s the only sound up here, 1,550 metres above sea level and far from any town or village.

“This area is very wild,” says Samir Teslovan, who drove us up through the densely forested peaks from his guesthouse in Toplița. “When I come here to the mountains, I charge my battery, charge my soul. I feel free, like the wind.”

Ukrainian Lessons by Charlotte Higgins review – when art and war collide

A vivid and hopeful study of how culture endures in the midst of extreme violence

Towards the end of her subtly piercing book about art in wartime, Charlotte Higgins recounts an autumn visit to Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second city, in the north-east of the country, a short drive from the Russian border. In a tranquil park, she sees a man standing in a stream, making stones balance on top of each other in a teetering tower – “a metaphor of life in that city,” she writes, “that would have seemed too obvious for a novel”.

Still, as a good novelist would, Higgins doesn’t seem to beg telling details from a place so much as have them leap to her open eye and ear. The cartoons a boy is watching that fall silent in a power cut, allowing the distant boom of explosions on the frontline to be heard. A cityscape tattooed on a young poet’s arm that cuts off suddenly where skin from his leg was grafted after he was torn up by shrapnel. Cataracts of larkspur, as Higgins describes them, in a field in the frontline Donbas region, “pouring down the hill, pooling at the bottom into a great lake of blooms … Larkspur thrives on ground where there has been recent disturbance.”

A dispute about fact vs. fiction at the trial over Tupac Shakur's 1996 killing

A prosecutor said that while few have been willing to speak about the 1996 killing of Tupac Shakur, Duane "Keffe D" Davis is the "one person who has a hard time being silent."

Palestinian American returns to his West Bank home, under siege by Israeli settlers

The Palestinian American whose home in the occupied West Bank has been besieged by Israeli settlers traveled to his property on Monday to join other family members who have been defending it.

South Korea president calls for military independence in wake of Trump call to cut joint drills

Lee Jae Myung reiterates desire for full command back in Seoul’s hands after Donald Trump cuts joint exercises, citing warm ties with Kim Jong-un

• ‘Inane, haphazard decision’ by Trump to gut South Korea alliance

South Korea’s president ⁠has renewed his push to regain independent control of the military from the US in the event of war and urged faster progress in acquiring nuclear-powered submarines after Donald Trump’s order to cut joint drills.

On Sunday night, Trump instructed the Pentagon to “substantially reduce” this week’s joint military exercises with South Korea, saying the nuclear-armed North “has been unthreatening and respectful” and that the US president had a “very good relationship with Kim Jong-un”.

The Kuril Islands: how a visit from Putin reignited a 150-year-old dispute between Japan and Russia

The diplomatic spat continues to simmer as Moscow summons Tokyo’s ambassador after the Russian president’s trip to the disputed islands last week

The diplomatic spat between Japan and Russia following Vladimir Putin’s visit to an archipelago of disputed islands north of Hokkaido continues to escalate, after Moscow summoned the Japanese ambassador on Tuesday.

On Thursday Sanae Takaichi, Japan’s prime minister, called Putin’s actions “absolutely unacceptable” and Russia’s ambassador in Tokyo was immediately called in for a dressing down. Russia countered that it was Japan making unfounded claims on its territory.

‘I’ve always been fond of hairy creatures!’ Visual effects maestro Rick Baker on a monstrously good career

Rick Baker helped define Hollywood’s creature features with his wild makeup effects skills. From Locarno, he talks Gremlins, his love of simians– and why AI will never replace expert design

When Rick Baker was 22 years old and laying the first bricks of what would become one of the great Hollywood careers, he travelled to Hatra in Iraq with director William Friedkin to assist with Max von Sydow’s makeup on The Exorcist. “Oh, he was definitely a lunatic,” Baker recalls of Friedkin, his signature goatee and ponytail still intact, if a little more salt than pepper these days. “But he made a great movie.” Friedkin had been travelling with a fake passport, and the production was plagued by extreme heat and dust storms – but the show went on. “I did von Sydow’s hands,” Baker says. “I pretty much just held a glue bottle.”

We are speaking in Locarno, Switzerland, during the film festival, where Baker has accepted a lifetime achievement award and introduced screenings of An American Werewolf in London and The Nutty Professor – the first and fourth of his seven Oscar wins. When he completed his last big production, Maleficent, in 2014, it ended a more than 40-year career in which he made some huge contributions to popular culture. The monsters in Michael Jackson’s Thriller video? They were Baker’s handiwork. The Mos Eisley cantina band in Star Wars? That was him, too. In 1999, he leaked a story to the press to stop the studio from simply painting Jim Carrey green instead of using his designs for How the Grinch Stole Christmas; he won the argument and a sixth Oscar followed.

Max Rocha’s recipes for confit trout salad and grilled courgette with apricot, stracciatella and roasted almonds

Two Café Cecilia stalwarts that are just the thing for the summer heat

Five years after Café Cecilia opened, a handful of dishes have become permanent fixtures, returning to the menu time and again – and this confit trout salad is definitely one of them. During the recent heatwaves, we’ve naturally shifted towards dishes that are best served at room temperature or slightly warm, and both of these recipes reflect that approach. They’re designed to serve two, but can just as easily be scaled up for a larger group. And almost everything can be prepared in advance, making them ideal for entertaining at home.

Iraq’s ghost villages: Islamic State drove people away – now a new enemy is preventing their return

Nearly a decade after fighting ended in northern Iraq, the climate crisis has brought extreme heat and a water shortage, making life almost impossible

The first thing that strikes visitors arriving in Faka, a small village in Sinjar district, northern Iraq, is the silence. No children play in the streets. No shops are open. Roofless houses stretch across the hillside, their walls pockmarked by shellfire, while weeds and wild grasses grow through collapsed living rooms.

A decade after Islamic State (IS) swept across the region, war remains visible everywhere. But according to the people who returned, another enemy has quietly taken its place.

Rajab Mohammed says the problem in his village of Faka is no longer Islamic State but water and jobs

What legacy do we leave behind when we die? As Sam Neill taught me, it’s more about sweetness than ego | Clarke Gayford

As men we’re often taught to chase lives defined by vanity and hollow expressions. But genuine decency lasts far longer than any name on a building

Occasionally, in our lives, there are markers that arrive with enough strength to hop us off the treadmill just long enough to remind ourselves that everyone’s race has a finish line, and none of us are getting out of this jolly for free.

One of these blots is often when someone we know passes away.

‘We are defying the laws of physics!’ How pole dancing exploded into the Edinburgh fringe

With abs like Olympians and skin like hide, pole dancers are besieging the festival. We meet four high-flying, high-octane acts tackling everything from New York’s underbelly to neurodiversity

If you tell someone in Edinburgh you’re going to see a pole dancing show, they might direct you towards the so-called Pubic Triangle, where the city’s strip clubs are. But pole dance is actually a big part of the festival this year, popping up in sweaty, dazzling shows right across the fringe. Not only do these acts show off amazing physical feats, they also tell stories that range from one woman’s HIV diagnosis, to the relationship between a neurodivergent mother and son.

Since the boom of the 1990s, when Zoe Ball famously had a pole in her living room, pole has been taught at dance studios, has become a competition sport – there’s a campaign to get it into the Olympics – and made its way from cabaret stages to theatres. It’s an impressive and fiendishly difficult art.

Democracy v the machine: the birth of the digital age and the warnings that were ignored

Many hoped that the march of technology would usher in an egalitarian utopia – but some foresaw the threat it would pose to liberal society. Why did nobody listen?

One of the stranger things about this dizzying, headlong moment in time is that it doesn’t have much of a past. Everything is about the future of this, the future of that: the future of work, the future of humanity, the future of the planet. It’s as if everyone is screaming (some ecstatically, most terror-stricken): robots are taking over the world! Meanwhile, you can’t put down your phone, unplug, delete your AI apps, tell Zoom to piss off; it feels as if you are racing toward something, and can’t stop, or look back, or think straight.

But of course this weird moment in history does have a past. It comes from somewhere. It wasn’t inevitable. Things could have turned out differently. They still can. And if you look back, one thing you’ll see is that a lot of people saw this all coming. They foresaw our present when it was still the future. They thought it might turn out fabulously, a computer utopia. And they worried it might turn out disastrously. Above all, they issued warning after warning about the rise of what I call the artificial state, the replacement of the liberal democratic nation-state, the consent of the governed, with the rule of people by machines. They warned of a future in which democratic deliberation would be replaced by prediction by calculation, the public sphere would be supplanted by data-driven commerce, and drones would take the place of the demos. Why didn’t anyone listen?

The new underworld is made up of innocent and well-intentioned people who work with slide rules and calculating machines and computers which can retain an almost infinite number of bits of information as well as sort, categorise, and reproduce this information at the press of a button. Most of these people are highly educated, many of them are PhDs, and none that I have met have malignant political designs on the American public. They may, however, radically reconstruct the American political system, build a new politics, and even modify revered and venerable American institutions – facts of which they are blissfully innocent.

DOJ asks court to reinstate criminal charges against Abrego Garcia

In May, a federal judge dismissed a criminal indictment against Abrego Garcia, who had been accused of smuggling immigrants in the U.S. illegally.

Judge blocks plan to move FBI headquarters to Reagan Building

U.S. District Judge Theodore Chuang ruled that the Trump administration's move to divert funding and cancel a plan to move the FBI to Maryland was "arbitrary and capricious and not in accordance with law."

Hayden Panettiere, known for "Heroes" and "Remember the Titans," dies at 36

Hayden Panettiere, who starred in "Remember the Titans" as a child actor and rose to fame in the series "Heroes," has died at the age of 36. The coroner's office says she was found in cardiac arrest.