Fifty years of sexing up tech: Apple’s epic hits – and misses

Remember the iPod? How about the Pippin? In the half-century since it launched its first PC, Apple has given us some amazing innovations. We round up its biggest triumphs and flopsThe Guardian’s journalism is independent. We will earn a commission if you buy something through an affiliate link. Learn more.Fifty years after Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak and Ronald Wayne founded the company in Jobs’ parents’ garage in Los Altos, California, Apple has become a behemoth, and billions of us use its products every day

Thousands of authors publish ‘empty’ book in protest over AI using their work

Thousands of authors including Kazuo Ishiguro, Philippa Gregory and Richard Osman have published an “empty” book to protest against AI firms using their work without permission.About 10,000 writers have contributed to Don’t Steal This Book, in which the only content is a list of their names. Copies of the work are being distributed to attenders at the London book fair on Tuesday, a week before the UK government is due to issue an assessment on the economic cost of proposed changes in copyright law.By 18 March ministers must deliver an economic impact assessment as well as a progress update on a consultation about the legal overhaul, against a backdrop of anger among creative professionals about how their work is being used by AI firms.The organiser of the book, Ed Newton-Rex, a composer and campaigner for protecting artists’ copyright, said the AI industry was “built on stolen work … taken without permission or payment”

X suspends 800m accounts in one year amid ‘massive’ scale of manipulation attempts

Elon Musk’s X said it had suspended 800m accounts over a 12-month period as it fights the “massive” scale of attempts to manipulate the platform.The social media company told MPs it was continually fighting state-backed attempts to hijack the agenda on its network, with Russia the most prolific state actor, followed by Iran and China.As part of the battle against such content, X suspended 800m accounts in 2024 for breaching its rules on platform manipulation and spam, although it did not reveal which of those suspensions related to foreign interference. X has approximately 300 million monthly users worldwide.Wifredo Fernández, a government affairs executive at the platform’s parent company, X Corp, said: “There are efforts every single day to create inauthentic networks of accounts

AI firm Anthropic sues US defense department over blacklisting

Anthropic filed two lawsuits against the Department of Defense on Monday, alleging that the government’s decision to label the artificial intelligence firm a “supply chain risk” was unlawful and violated its first amendment rights. The two sides have been locked in a monthslong heated feud over the company’s attempt to implement safeguards against the military’s potential use of its AI models for mass domestic surveillance or fully autonomous lethal weapons.The lawsuits, which Anthropic filed in the northern district court of California and the US court of appeals for the Washington DC Circuit, come after the Pentagon formally issued the supply chain risk designation last Thursday, the first time the blacklisting tool has been used against a US company. The AI firm previously vowed to challenge the designation and its demand that any company that does business with the government cut all ties with Anthropic, a serious threat to its business model.Anthropic’s lawsuit contends that the Trump administration is punishing the company for its refusal to comply with the ideological demands of the government, in a violation of its protected speech and an attempt to punish the company for not complying

From press release … to scrap metal site: the Essex ‘supercomputer’ that’s still a scaffolding yard

The press releases announcing a gleaming supercomputer on the outskirts of north London depict a glass and concrete building, rising from a tree-lined street. Accompanied by images of glowing blue robot faces, it looks like the centre of a technological revolution.By the end of this year, that artist’s impression is supposed to be a reality.But when the Guardian visited last month, there was no sign of it. Instead, the four-acre plot in Loughton was a depot stacked with pylons and scrap metal under a corrugated roof, while flatbed lorries drove in and out stacked with poles

Revealed: UK’s multibillion AI drive is built on ‘phantom investments’

Exclusive: Rented datacentres and ‘supercomputer’ site that’s still a scaffolding yard raise questions for Starmer’s push to ‘mainline AI into veins of economy’From press release … to scrap metal site: the Essex supercomputer that’s still a scaffolding yardA multibillion-pound drive to “mainline AI into the veins” of the British economy is riddled with “phantom investments” and shaky accounting, a Guardian investigation has found.Since 2024, successive Conservative and Labour governments have proclaimed massive deals to build new datacentres, create thousands of jobs and construct a supercomputer.The investments – led by two firms linked to AI giant Nvidia - have been touted as a cornerstone of the government’s promise to use tech to turbocharge the economy.On Monday, former UK deputy prime minister Sir Nick Clegg and former Meta chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg were announced as new board members at one of the firms, NScale. Nscale also said it had raised a $2bn funding round, sending its valuation soaring to $14