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A 1960s schools experiment that created a new alphabet

Throughout my life, my mum has always been a big reader. She was in three or four book clubs at the same time. She’d devour whatever texts my siblings and I were studying in school, handwrite notes for our lunchboxes and write in her diary every night. Our fridge door was a revolving display of word-of-the-day flashcards. Despite this, she also was and remains, by some margin, the worst speller I have met. By the time I was in primary school, she was already asking me to proofread her work emai

Archaeologists Discover Tomb of First King of Caracol

Caana, the central architectural complex at Caracol, Belize, uncovered by Diane and Arlen Chase in the 1980s Archaeologists from the University of Houston working at Caracol in Belize, Central America have uncovered the tomb of Te K’ab Chaak, the first ruler of this ancient Maya city and the founder of its royal dynasty. Now in ruins, this metropolis was a major political player in Maya history, dominating the southern part of the Yucatan Peninsula from 560 through 680 AD before its abandonment

A Top Engineer Reveals OpenAI’s Culture of Secrets and Chaos

Calvin French-Owen only worked at OpenAI for a year, but he saw more in twelve months than most engineers do in a lifetime. As a successful founder turned employee, he joined the world’s leading artificial intelligence company in May 2024 and left in June 2025. What he walked into was not a typical corporate tech job. It was a startup strapped to a rocket ship, powered by GPUs, Slack notifications, and a culture of secrecy that makes Apple look like an open book. “The first thing to know about

Everything we learned from a week with Apple CarPlay Ultra

For the 2025 model year, Aston Martin's user interface took a major step forward across the lineup, with improvements to the physical controls and digital infotainment, as well as updated gauge cluster layouts. However, the big news dropped in the spring, when Aston and Apple announced the launch of CarPlay Ultra, the next generation of Apple's nearly ubiquitous automotive operating system. Ultra extends beyond the strictly “phone” functions of traditional CarPlay to now encompass more robust v

This unique USB-C cable powers three devices at once, and it's my new favorite

ZDNET's key takeaways Perfect way to share 100W of power between three devices. This cable does exactly what it says it will on the box - something that a lot of cables can't claim. Some might find the 65W limit a bit restrictive for charging laptops. View now at Amazon View now at Futurizta more buying choices Over the past couple of years, I've tested a handful of multi-connector USB-C charging cables. You've probably seen them for sale on big-name e-commerce websites, and maybe on social m

These durable mounts made my AirTags twice as useful (and more secure)

ZDNET's key takeaways These are tough, water- and dirt-resistant AirTag holders that will last years. They go a long way to preventing bad guys from removing your AirTags from secured items. They work on everything from suitcases, camera bags, jackets, and even your cat or dog! View now at Amazon I've mentioned more than once my undying love for Apple AirTags. These devices have made my life so much less stressful, and I have them attached to pretty much everything I could possibly lose. How

I found a $129 blood pressure watch ideal for consistent monitoring (and it's accurate)

ZDNET's key takeaways The YHE BP Doctor Fit is available for $129. Blood pressure results are within 6-8 mmHG of a blood pressure cuff, the display is vibrant, the battery lasts a week, basic health tracking is available, and it's inexpensive. The band closure is the opposite of other watches; the charger connection can be finicky, and there are limited apps. $129.99 at Amazon In 2024, I reviewed another YHE blood pressure watch, but while its blood pressure monitoring was solid, the rest of

The 1960s schools experiment that created a whole new alphabet

Throughout my life, my mum has always been a big reader. She was in three or four book clubs at the same time. She’d devour whatever texts my siblings and I were studying in school, handwrite notes for our lunchboxes and write in her diary every night. Our fridge door was a revolving display of word-of-the-day flashcards. Despite this, she also was and remains, by some margin, the worst speller I have met. By the time I was in primary school, she was already asking me to proofread her work emai

Pro Chefs Call Out 20 Kitchen Tools They Find Absolutely Useless

Our kitchens are fantastic sources of technical innovations. From ultrapowerful air fryers to indoor smokers, wonderful new inventions are released for home chefs every year -- as well as other kitchen gadgets that should get thrown out with the compost. Instead of giving in to gimmicks, it's smarter to build your kitchen around dependable, multifunctional gear. We asked chefs and kitchen pros which gadgets they consider totally unnecessary -- and which tools actually pull their weight around t

Call of Duty cheaters complain after Activision launches new wave of mass-bans

Several players of the popular first-person shooter Call of Duty complained last week that they were permanently banned from the game for using a well-known cheat. Video game streamer ItsHapa wrote on X last week that Call of Duty players using ArtificialAiming, a cheat provider of more than 19 years, were the targets of a “massive wave of permabans,” referring to bans that cannot be reversed, which prevents cheaters from creating new accounts. The streamer also posted a series of screenshots f

JBL’s best portable speakers plummet to record-low prices

If you’re looking for a portable speaker, JBL makes some of the most popular ones. The best ones that are still easy to carry around are the JBL Charge 6 and JBL Flip 7, and both are hitting new record-low prices right now. Let’s tell you a bit about them. Buy the JBL Charge 6 for $149.95 ($50 off) Buy the JBL Flip 7 for $99.95 ($50 off) Both of these offers come from Woot, an Amazon-owned deals website. They are in new condition and come with a 90-day Woot warranty. The Charge 6 is available i

Signs of autism could be encoded in the way you walk

Autism is a neurodevelopmental condition that affects how people's brains develop and function, impacting behaviour, communication and socialising. It can also involve differences in the way you move and walk – known as your gait. Having an "odd gait" is now listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders as a supporting diagnostic feature of autism. What does this look like? The most noticeable gait differences among autistic people are: toe-walking, walking on the balls

Mattel’s New ‘Wicked: For Good’ Toys Give Us a Spoilery Glimpse at the ‘Wizard of Oz’ Crew

Let us be glad; let us be grateful for these first looks at one tornado-swept girl and her yellow brick road pals in Wicked: For Good. That’s right, Wicked merch drop Wednesdays return for us Ozian fans, and this time give us clues as to Dorothy Gale’s look in Jon M. Chu’s fall sequel to Wicked, which will incorporate the Wizard of Oz arc we’ve all been waiting for. Some spoilers ahead, as some major plot twists can’t be avoided once you see more of the Tin Man, Scarecrow, and outfit reveals fo

Beeper Relaunch Lets You Link Your Chat Apps Without the Cloud, but Still No iMessage

Beeper, which was once known for attempting to provide access to the iMessage network on non-Apple devices, is relaunching itself Wednesday with a continued focus on being a texting hub for bringing together conversations from many other services. This app first launched last year after the company was acquired by Automattic and was merged with the similar Texts.com service. The biggest difference with the new launch is that Beeper is adding the ability to link your chat apps together using jus

2026 Mercedes-Benz CLA feels like a real car, not a science experiment

Mercedes provided flights from Detroit to Copenhagen, Denmark, and accommodation so Ars could drive the CLA with EQ Technology. Ars does not accept paid editorial content. The Mercedes-Benz CLA is a marked departure from Mercedes' EV efforts. Instead of a dedicated line of EQ vehicles—like the EQB, EQC, and EQS—we're getting vehicles "with EQ Technology." It started with the electric G Wagon, but the CLA is the first mainstream product to make the change. The thing is that the change is signifi

Researchers announce babies born from a trial of three-person IVF

The study, which makes use of a technology called mitochondrial donation, has been described as a “tour de force” and “a remarkable accomplishment” by others in the field. In the team’s approach, patients’ eggs are fertilized with sperm, and the DNA-containing nuclei of those cells are transferred into donated fertilized eggs that have had their own nuclei removed. The new embryos contain the DNA of the intended parents along with a tiny fraction of mitochondrial DNA from the donor, floating in

Google Search’s new feature lets AI call businesses for you

TL;DR Google is bringing Gemini 2.5 Pro to AI Mode in Search. Deep Research is also coming to AI Mode. All Search users can now use AI to call businesses without picking up a phone. Following last month’s announcement of Gemini 2.5 Pro going stable, Google’s most intelligent AI model is heading to Search. It also looks like Search is getting a couple of new features to help out with research and obtaining information from businesses. In a blog post, Google revealed that it is rolling out Gem

Topics: ai gemini mode pro search

The FCC plans to ban Chinese technology in undersea cables

The Federal Communication Commission plans to vote on new rules that will ban the use of Chinese technology in undersea cables, according to a press release from FCC Chairman Brendan Carr. The proposed rules will apply to any company on the FCC's existing list of entities that pose "an unacceptable risk to the national security of the United States." Besides "prohibiting the use of 'covered' equipment," the FCC's new rules will also limit the ability for Chinese companies to receive a license t

Donkey Kong Bananza's creators reflect on the game's path to delightful destruction

On Tuesday, Nintendo published an interview with the creators of Donkey Kong Bananza. The second big Switch 2 tentpole title comes from the team that made Super Mario Odyssey. The developers explained how they laid the foundation for DK's first 3D adventure since the Nintendo 64 era. Destruction is at the heart of Donkey Kong Bananza. Everything in his environment can be smashed to bits. Not only is that a fun mechanic, but it also adds an element of verticality and freedom of exploration. That

Google expands AI Mode with extra features for search

Google is continuing to double down on its AI Mode, bringing more features to its dedicated Search chatbot. Today, the company is adding the Gemini 2.5 Pro model and the Deep Search capability to AI Mode. These features will be available to Google AI Pro and Google AI Ultra subscribers. Although both of these tools can still be accessed through other means, Google's move to incorporate them into the chatbot points to an end goal of AI Mode being the primary form of engagement with the company's

Topics: ai google mode pro search

Researchers Solve 130-Year-Old Literary Mystery Involving Elves, Wolves, and a Medieval Meme

In 1896, Cambridge scholar and author M. R. James found English verses within a 12th-century Latin sermon in a Peterhouse Cambridge collection. James and another colleague identified the verses as excerpts of a lost romantic poem, dubbing it The Song of Wade. Little did they know that the discovery would trigger almost 130 years of fierce debate over the meaning of the excerpts—a debate that two modern Cambridge scholars may have finally put to rest. In a study forthcoming in Oxford University

Smart Cameras Power a Robot Umpire at MLB All-Stars for the First Time. Here's How the Challenges Went

If umpires draw your ire for bad calls, you may soon have a new target: Major League Baseball used its ABS, or Automated Ball-Strike System, to call pitches at the July 15 All-Star Game for the first time. If trials this season go well, it will probably be adopted for the 2026 regular season. But challenges against the camera had an unusually high rate of success. The ABS uses Hawk-Eye cameras, a technology increasingly common in games with high-speed objects. The cameras judge how a ball trave

New Research Shows Data Breaches Keep Coming. Here's How to Protect Yourself

The personal data of Americans continues to be under threat from cybercriminals looking to steal it for their own financial gain, according to a new report from the Identity Theft Resource Center. The nonprofit group, which focuses on helping victims of identity theft, said Wednesday that 1,732 data compromises were reported for the first six months of this year, resulting in 165.7 million victim notifications. The number of reported compromises represents an 11% increase from the same period

Here's How to Watch All the 'Jurassic Park' and 'Jurassic World' Movies Streaming at Home

I first saw Jurassic Park one fateful day during middle school when my teacher rolled in a cart topped with a CRT television, popped in a VHS tape and pressed play. I was instantly hooked and I've since watched the film countless times, including on a 2013 trip to see it in 3D on the big screen at my AMC theater. Jurassic World: Rebirth hit cinemas on July 2, and I've been rewatching the entire series to get in the mood. With run times ranging from 1 hour and 32 minutes for Jurassic Park III to

The Download: Veo 3’s subtitles problem, and the future of our planet’s resources

Google’s generative video model Veo 3 has a subtitles problem As soon as Google launched its latest video-generating AI model at the end of May, creatives rushed to put it through its paces. Released just months after its predecessor, Veo 3 allows users to generate sounds and dialogue for the first time. It sparked a flurry of hyperrealistic eight-second clips stitched together into ads, ASMR videos, imagined film trailers, and humorous street interviews. But others quickly found that in som

ChatGPT for Mac rolls out Record Mode for Plus subscribers

Following its June debut for Team, Enterprise, and Edu users, OpenAI is now rolling out Record Mode to ChatGPT Plus subscribers on its macOS app. Here’s how it works and how to use it. In a post on X, the company announced: Plus users, the mic is yours. Record mode is now available to ChatGPT Plus users globally in the macOS desktop app. https://t.co/xmReUOx473 — OpenAI (@OpenAI) July 16, 2025 But what is Record Mode? Record Mode was first unveiled last month during a ChatGPT for business

Louis Vuitton says regional data breaches tied to same cyberattack

Luxury fashion giant Louis Vuitton confirmed that breaches impacting customers in the UK, South Korea, and Turkey stem from the same security incident, which is believed to be linked to the ShinyHunters extortion group. Since last week, the retailer has been notifying customers that their info was exposed in a data breach, first in South Korea, then in Turkey, and on Friday in the United Kingdom. "Despite all security measures in place, on July 2, 2025, we became aware of a personal data breac

OpenAI, Google, and Meta Researchers Warn We May Lose the Ability to Track AI Misbehavior

Over 40 scientists from the world’s leading AI institutions, including OpenAI, Google DeepMind, Anthropic, and Meta, have come together to call for more research in a particular type of safety monitoring that allows humans to analyze how AI models “think.” The scientists published a research paper on Tuesday that highlighted what is known as chain of thought (CoT) monitoring as a new yet fragile opportunity to boost AI safety. The paper was endorsed by prominent AI figures like OpenAI co-founde

The Big Beautiful Bill Is Bad for Americans’ Health and Wallets, Study Finds

The “Big Beautiful Bill” is now law, and it’s poised to wreak plenty of destruction. Research out today finds that the policy changes will lead to thousands more deaths annually, as well as harm the financial health of rural hospitals. Epidemiologists at the University of California, San Francisco, and elsewhere conducted the study. They found the Medicaid cuts caused by the Big Beautiful Bill will cause many avoidable hospitalizations and deaths, put dozens of rural hospitals at high risk of c