Author: Trendici
Betty Brown, the oldest living victim of the Post Office scandal, was awarded an OBE in the 2026 New Year Honours List. She has been made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for her services to justice by King Charles III. Brown, 92, ran the Annfield Plain Post Office in County Durham with her late husband Oswall from 1985. But the couple were forced out in 2003, after spending more than £50,000 of their savings to cover non-existent shortfalls. Brown told BBC Breakfast she accepted the recognition in the New Year Honours List on behalf…
Meta has acquired an AI startup called Manus — known for its custom research and website-building agents — in a deal valued at more than $2 billion, according toThe Wall Street Journal. It’s reportedly one of the largest acquisitions yet involving a startup nurtured in China’s AI ecosystem.Manus arrived in March 2025, shortly after another Chinese AI startup, DeepSeek appeared on the scene. The company (called Butterfly Effect at the time) originally described it as “the first general AI agent” to perform complex tasks autonomously, rather than just generating ideas. It draws from several third-party models, particularly Anthropic’s Claude 3.5…
Thomas MackintoshandNicky Schiller,at St Pancras stationKelly North and Bethany Massey-Chase tell the BBC how they’ve had to re-book their Eurostar service to ParisEurostar has cancelled all trains out of London towards Paris, Amsterdam and Brussels until further notice after a power outage in the Channel Tunnel caused a Le Shuttle train to fail.Staff at London St Pancras station have told Eurostar passengers to postpone their travel plans and re-book for a later date.By midday, at least a dozen Eurostar services between the UK, France, Belgium and the Netherlands had been cancelled – many more had also been delayed or altered.Elsewhere,…
As soon as Ousmane Dembele was awarded the 2025 Ballon d’Or, the speculation began about the 2026 iteration. We bring you the early odds, with 2025 runner-up Kylian Mbappe the early favourite. A couple of what we thought were left-field predictions are included. Who are the favourites to win the 2026 Ballon d’Or? 9=) Pedri (Barcelona/Spain) He seems unlikely to win it as long as the impossibly young and talented Lamine Yamal is his Barcelona teammate. 9=) Vinicius Jnr (Real Madrid/Brazil) After The Great Huff of 2024 came the 16th-place finish of 2025 and he could hardly complain…
The annual request from the editors: give us your ‘favourite’ car of the past 12 months. I dislike this task because choosing a favourite is too black-and-white an approach when the list includes everything from the madness of an S1 Elise with 300bhp to a purple Rolls Wraith, skulking through Clerkenwell at midnight, utterly in its film-noir element. A comparison framework just doesn’t exist. However, when pushed, my thoughts drifted to the summer. Summer, and seven or so miles of B-road in Lanarkshire plus one V12 Ferrari, resulting in a comprehensively blown mind. I really am loathe to give a Ferrari the nod because choosing the world’s most fetishised supercar maker is unimaginative. But whether or…
Artificial intelligence (AI), cloud computing and next-generation connectivity are rapidly transforming the Middle East’s telecoms, media and technology (TMT) landscape, positioning the region as one of the world’s fastest-emerging digital-first economies, according to a study by PwC. The research highlights how the convergence of AI, 5G, cloud, gaming and quantum technologies is redefining not only infrastructure investment, but also creativity, competitiveness and national digital sovereignty. Rather than acting solely as a consumer of global technology, the Middle East is increasingly shaping its own digital future through large-scale, state-backed initiatives and partnerships with hyperscalers and technology providers. At the centre…
CES 2026 is right around the corner, and the pre-show hype cycle/ early reveals suggest, yes, there’s going to be an awful lot of AI-powered insert-product-category-here alongside, thankfully, some major announcements from the likes of Intel, Sony and NVIDIA.Intel is finally unveiling its Panther Lake (Core Ultra Series 3) chips. The first chips built on Intel’s 2nm process could offer a 50 percent performance boost, which is sorely needed amid intense competition. NVIDIA’s Jensen Huang is taking the stage for a keynote expected to feature a lot of AI hype, while AMD’s Lisa Su will likely counter with new Ryzen…
EPAPresident Volodymyr Zelensky has denied allegations by Russia that Ukraine launched a drone attack on one of President Vladimir Putin’s residences, and accused Moscow of trying to derail peace talks. Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov claimed Kyiv had launched an attack over Sunday night using 91 long-range unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) on Putin’s state residence in Russia’s northwestern Novgorod region.Russia said it would now review its position in peace negotiations. It is not yet clear where Putin was at the time of the alleged attack.Zelensky dismissed the claim as “typical Russian lies”, intended to give the Kremlin an excuse to…
Crystal Palace have ‘reached an agreement’ to buy Brennan Johnson from Tottenham but the player must decide if he wants to move, according to reports. The Eagles are looking to improve their attack in the winter with Oliver Glasner’s side dropping down the table in recent weeks after three consecutive Premier League defeats. Johnson, who scored the winning goal for Tottenham as they won the Europa League final last season, is their top target with the Wales international out of favour under Thomas Frank. The winger has featured 22 times in all competitions but only ten of those appearances have…
Petty Gripes, The Guardian calls its series of light-hearted features on elements of modern life that involve minorly annoying things. Things like bands that name themselves after other bands or being irritated by somebody else’s coffee snobbery. You know, little quirks. In one recent article, a software update in a writer’s phone meant that his maps app would no longer talk to his car’s infotainment system. Automatic software updates duly went down as another petty gripe. I wish my patience and tolerance could mean that software updates – or software glitches in general, for that matter – could be deemed merely petty…