Journalist Fahad Shah detained on Friday under terrorism and sedition laws in disputed Indian region
A prominent journalist has been arrested under terrorism and sedition laws, as a crackdown on the press in Indian-administered Kashmir continues to escalate.
Fahad Shah, the founder and editor of the widely read local news website The Kashmir Walla, was arrested on Friday evening when he was summoned to a police station in the southern district of Pulwama.
Continue reading...Format might not have romance of vinyl but its versatility and reliability will never be topped, say supporters
After languishing in his car boot for several years, Jordan Bassett’s CD collection – mostly dating back to his teenage years – will soon be on proud display in his newly converted home office space.
Bassett, a commissioning editor at the NME, has no means of playing the CDs and, in any case, his musical tastes have moved on. But the 100-150 thin, shiny 5in discs have sentimental value – and, who knows, one day they may be part of a revival similar to vinyl among music aficionados.
Continue reading...Streaming firm is facing a cocktail of crises, from culture wars to competition concerns
He was supposed to be Spotify’s biggest acquisition, one who would transform the music streaming company into a one-stop shop for all kinds of online audio.
But controversy over “misinformation” on Joe Rogan’s podcast precipitated a hellish week for the Swedish firm as high-profile boycotts, a social media backlash and a share price drop challenged the viability of its meteoric growth.
Continue reading...Cost of living crisis, departure of top aides and Rishi Sunak’s rebuke dominate the newspapers on another bad day for PM
Three big stories dominate Friday’s front pages – and none of them are good news for Boris Johnson. Editors were spoilt for choice with the “big squeeze” in living standards, the “bloodbath” of departing Downing Street aides and Rishi Sunak’s less-than-total backing for his leader.
Several papers combine the stories in what the Mail calls “Meltdown in Downing Street” above an image of a forlorn-looking prime minister and the subhead, “will the last one to leave please turn out the lights” evoking the Sun’s infamous 1992 election front page.
Continue reading...Deutsche Welle boss says retaliation by Moscow, including closure of its bureau, is ‘total overreaction’
Russia is to expel the German public broadcaster Deutsche Welle (DW) in retaliation for a German ban on broadcasts by Russia’s RT.
The foreign ministry said the press credentials of DW’s correspondents would be revoked, its bureau in Russia closed, and its German-language broadcasts would be banned from Russian satellite television in the near future. It said this was the first stage of its “retaliatory measures”.
Continue reading...Will the hit game imminently be locked behind a paywall or stay as it is? What about ads? The NYT’s head of games explains the plan
In a month of spectacular video game industry buyouts, symbolised by Microsoft’s incredible $68bn swoop for Activision Blizzard, there is one purchase that has sent paroxysms of fear across the planet. On Monday, the New York Times revealed that it had bought the viral megahit Wordle for a “low seven figure sum”. The web-based word puzzle, which launched in October, was originally intended as a gift from software engineer Josh Wardle to his partner. But it has become a viral sensation, amassing an audience of millions – and key to its appeal is the fact that it’s free, with no ads.
So what does a big newspaper like the New York Times want with a game like Wordle, and what happens next?
Continue reading...To avoid arrest, the staff of the 74 Media left their home city, only to face shellfire in their border refuge. The editor describes the risks faced by his media outlet
Shweeeee … Boooom. The noise of the exploding artillery shell startled me awake in the middle of a July night. Dazed, I stumbled out of bed and tried to check on the other journalists with whom I share a dormitory. As we ran outside, another shell flew overhead.
It was five months after the military takeover in Myanmar and three months since we had been forced to relocate from the Kachin state capital, Myitkyina, to territory held by a group known in Myanmar as an ethnic armed organisation (EAO), fighting for self-determination for an ethnic minority state near Myanmar’s border with China. Now this territory was being bombed. We were all terrified; some of my staff were crying as they looked to me for guidance and comfort.
Continue reading...The puzzle’s global success has turned Josh Wardle into a megastar in the gaming world and bemused his family
He is the toast of New York, of London – and of a small village called Llanddewi Rhydderch.
Just four months after Josh Wardle invented the wonderfully simple and soothing puzzle Wordle, he is a megastar in the world of games and is a great deal wealthier after the New York Times acquired his creation for a seven-figure sum.
Continue reading...In its second season, the hit HBO drama on drugged-out and love-crazed teens has finally tipped into too much style over substance
Euphoria, the slick, explicit, high-budget teen drama halfway through its second season on HBO, has from the start been a soap layered in heady seriousness. The show, adapted by Sam Levinson from an Israeli series of the same name and co-produced by Drake, took on a near encyclopedia of Today’s Teen Issues – sex shaming, drug addiction, body insecurity, web personas, revenge porn, pregnancy and abortion, emotional abuse, toxic masculinity, self-harm and depression, and more – with a bracing, revelatory frankness and thick lacquer of gloss (and full-frontal nudity).
By its first season finale in 2019, in which main character Rue (Zendaya, who won an Emmy for the role) nearly dies in a graphic drug overdose, Euphoria had drawn a legion of fans (the finale drew 1.2 million night-of viewers and became HBO’s most second-most tweeted-about series ever, behind Game of Thrones) and managed to balance shock with sensitivity. It established beloved characters – in particular the fragile, alchemical bond between Rue and Jules (Hunter Schafer), a trans character – as well as a distinctive visual palette: saturated color, shimmery beats, high-voltage fantasy, meta narration, a zeitgeist-aiming show with a small hint of irony and a large dollop of excess.
Continue reading...Creator Josh Wardle ‘thrilled’ that newspaper is taking over internet sensation
The New York Times has acquired the viral word game Wordle for an undisclosed seven-figure sum, the publisher announced on Monday.
Created by a Reddit engineer and launched in October, Wordle gives players just six guesses to determine a five-letter word that changes every day. The soothing daily puzzle has become a hit since its launch, quickly attracting hundreds of thousands, then millions, of players. Social media posts about its game of the day have become ubiquitous, along with screenshots of the game’s distinctive grid.
Continue reading...Roberto Toledo was shot dead by three gunmen in a carpark in Zitácuaro, where he reported for a local news outlet
Journalists in Mexico have responded with fury and despair at the murder of a fourth reporter in the country this year, cementing its reputation as the world’s most murderous country for media workers.
Roberto Toledo was shot dead by three gunmen on Monday afternoon in a carpark in the city of Zitácuaro, where he reported for a local news outlet, Monitor Michoacán. Zitácuaro is best known for the nearby monarch butterfly reserves, but the region is rife with violence as drug cartels and criminal groups fight to control illegal logging.
Continue reading...In DM exchange Tesla boss offers $5,000 for takedown but 19-year-old replies: ‘Any chance to up that to $50K?’
A row has broken out between the world’s richest person, Elon Musk, and a 19-year-old student and aviation enthusiast from Florida.
Jack Sweeney created the Twitter bot @ElonJet, which tracks Musk’s Gulfstream private jet and posts real-time updates of its location.
Continue reading...Podcast host apologises to streaming service, which has faced criticism over episodes featuring guests who shared Covid conspiracy theories
Joe Rogan has addressed controversy over his Spotify podcast, hours after the streaming service announced a plan to tackle the spread of Covid-19 misinformation.
In a 10-minute video posted to Instagram on Sunday night, the comedian and host pledged to “try harder to get people with differing opinions on” and “do my best to make sure I’ve researched these topics”.
Continue reading...Streaming platform publishes rules for creators and announces plan to tackle misinformation, including ‘content advisories’
Spotify is adding a message that will direct listeners to correct Covid-19 information as controversy over misinformation shared on Joe Rogan’s podcast continues to grow, with the streamer losing billions in market value and more musicians withdrawing their music.
On Sunday, the CEO of Spotify, Daniel Ek, released an official statement setting out the streaming platform’s plan to tackle misinformation. New content advisories will direct listeners of any podcast that discusses coronavirus to a dedicated website that “provides easy access to data-driven facts, up-to-date information as shared by scientists, physicians, academics and public health authorities around the world, as well as links to trusted sources”.
Continue reading...Report says heightened dangers have prompted at least six to leave and many others to develop emergency exit plans
The Chinese government is finding new ways to intimidate foreign journalists, their Chinese colleagues and their sources, and harassment has reached such a high level that at least six have left the country, according to a key report.
The methods include online trolling, physical assaults, hacking and visa denials, as well as what appears to be official encouragement of lawsuits or threats of legal action against journalists, “typically filed by sources long after they have explicitly agreed to be interviewed”.
Continue reading...The series incorrectly said the trailblazing player Nona Gaprindashvili had ‘never faced men’
Netflix will face a $5m defamation lawsuit by a Georgian chess master who alleges she was defamed in the hit series The Queen’s Gambit, after a judge refused to toss the suit on Thursday.
Nona Gaprindashvili, the first woman to be named a chess grandmaster, sued the streaming company in federal court in September. Gaprindashvili alleges that a line from The Queen’s Gambit, where a character incorrectly states that she had “never faced men”, is “grossly sexist and belittling”. Gaprindashvili had played against 59 male competitors by 1968, the year the show is set.
Continue reading...Center for Countering Digital Hate research calculates that anti-vaccine figures could be making $12.5m from the online platform
A group of vaccine-sceptic writers are generating revenues of at least $2.5m (£1.85m) a year from publishing newsletters for tens of thousands of followers on the online publishing platform Substack, according to new research.
Prominent figures in the anti-vaccine movement including Dr Joseph Mercola and Alex Berenson have large followings on Substack, which has more than 1 million paying subscribers who sign up for individual newsletters from an array of authors who include novelist Salman Rushdie, the writer musician Patti Smith and former Downing Street adviser Dominic Cummings.
Continue reading...He was the shellshocked genius who channelled his anarchic brilliance into The Goon Show. Ian Hislop and Nick Newman explain why they’ve written a play about Spike Milligan – while comedians remember a legend
The tortured lives of comedians form a biographical genre all of their own; there’s always an audience for the tears of a clown. No wonder Nick Newman and Ian Hislop chose Spike Milligan as the subject of their new play. Milligan, who died 20 years ago next month, is the troubled comedy genius to end them all. Shellshocked in the second world war, repeatedly admitted to hospital for mental ill health, subjected to electroconvulsive therapy, and increasingly embittered as his career failed to deliver on early promise – the Spike Milligan sad-clown drama writes itself.
“But we didn’t want to do that,” says Newman. “We wanted to ask: how did he come to create these brilliant things?” Their play – a cheerful act of ancestor-worship by by Private Eye’s editor and its eminent cartoonist – is about the first three years (1951-54) of The Goon Show, as its chief writer Milligan battles the BBC to get his vision on air. “It’s: will he survive the fallout from the war?,” says Newman, “and will he crack radio?” And, “spoiler alert!,” chimes in Hislop. “Milligan wins! We just wanted to have a play where he wins.”
Continue reading...Joe Biden has been caught on a hot mic apparently referring to a Fox News reporter as a 'stupid son of a bitch'. As journalists left a meeting, the Fox News White House reporter Peter Doocy asked whether Biden thought inflation was a political liability ahead of the midterms. 'No, it’s a great asset – more inflation,' Biden appeared to respond sarcastically over a din of reporters shouting questions, apparently not realizing his microphone was still on. 'What a stupid son of a bitch,' he added
Continue reading...President caught on mic seemingly swearing at Peter Doocy as journalists left a news conference
Joe Biden was caught on a hot mic appearing to insult the Fox News journalist Peter Doocy, seemingly calling him a “stupid son of a bitch” after Doocy posed a question about US inflation.
“Do you think inflation is a political liability in the midterms?” the reporter asked the president as journalists were leaving the room at the end of an event at the White House on Monday.
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