Technology

‘We are in a kind of war’: row over viral Amsterdam chip shop lands in court
Posted on Sunday October 04, 2026

Neighbours say crowds drawn by TikTok to Fabel Friet are clogging the picturesque canal street and attracting litter, gulls and rats

People living in one of Amsterdam’s most exclusive neighbourhoods have taken the city to court for licensing a chip shop that has gone viral on TikTok.

On busy days, the queue for Fabel Friet on Runstraat stretches across a bridge on the Keizersgracht – one of Amsterdam’s most famous canals – a court was told last week. The narrow street itself is crowded by tourists waiting for their orders seven days a week. And loitering with intent – on parked cars, on the street itself, and on steps and porches – gulls wait to swoop.

OpenAI safety leader quits, warning AI company’s culture is ‘broken’
Posted on Sunday October 04, 2026

David Robinson joins other insiders in urging industry to take more care over rapidly developing technology

A safety leader at OpenAI has quit the company, warning that its culture was broken and that AI firms were not “being nearly careful enough” about developing the technology.

David Robinson, who led the writing of safety reports that accompanied the ChatGPT developer’s product releases, explained his resignation in an essay headlined: “I quit OpenAI because its culture is broken.”

Recent lobbyist for Palantir had key role in helping Andy Burnham become PM
Posted on Friday October 02, 2026

Exclusive: Martha Dalton worked closely with Burnham’s team on byelection that secured his return to parliament

A recent lobbyist for the controversial $450bn US tech company Palantir played a senior role in helping Andy Burnham become prime minister, it has emerged.

Martha Dalton, whose company Lodestone worked for Palantir in 2024 and 2025, campaigned for Burnham in the Makerfield byelection that secured his return to parliament. She worked closely with his team on strategic communications and rebuttals, and was among supporters who clapped him into Downing Street in July.

Kinky dating app Feeld’s founders share in record £3.8m dividend after sales jump
Posted on Friday October 02, 2026

Platform ‘for the curious’ says users outside the UK account for nearly 90% of its revenues

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Feeld, a UK-based dating app aimed at non-monogamous, queer and kinky users, has reported strong sales growth and paid its largest-ever dividend as it attracts users from more “vanilla” rivals.

Revenues jumped by 32% to £64m following a surge in interest from what it called “open-minded people exploring love, desire, and alternative relationships in a safe, inclusive space”.

Google rolls out new Gemini AI model but restricts access over safety concerns
Posted on Thursday October 01, 2026

Tech company releases Gemini 4 Argon only to a vetted group of cybersecurity experts to avoid misuse by hackers

Google on Wednesday said it would withhold its most powerful artificial intelligence model from the public for now, releasing Gemini 4 Argon only to a vetted group of cybersecurity experts to avoid misuse by hackers.

“Safely releasing frontier capabilities at this level requires a phased approach,” wrote Koray Kavukcuoglu, Google’s chief AI architect, in a blogpost announcing the model.

SpaceX launches crew to ISS successfully: ‘Thanks for an amazing ride’
Posted on Thursday October 01, 2026

Jessica Watkins, the first Black woman to lead a crew to orbit, is making her second trip to the space station

Four astronauts rocketed into orbit on Thursday on a space station mission that will stretch until spring, among them a Canadian whose wife will give birth while he is away.

SpaceX launched commander Jessica Watkins and her crew for Nasa after a three-week delay to fix the capsule’s leaking fuel system. Thick clouds threatened all morning to halt the countdown but in the end, the skies cleared enough to allow for a safe liftoff.

AI chatbots remove hijabs from images of Muslim women when prompted
Posted on Thursday October 01, 2026

Guardian tested chatbots after French far-right politician stripped a Muslim woman of her hijab in a photo

When prompted, AI chatbots will edit images to remove the hijabs from Muslim women, a violation of one of the world’s most common and visible expressions of faith.

The Guardian asked ChatGPT, Grok, Gemini and Claude to take the veil off an AI-generated image of a woman wearing a hijab. Both OpenAI’s ChatGPT and xAI’s Grok bots complied with the prompt. Anthropic’s Claude responded that it does not have an image-editing or -generating feature but that it would not alter a photo to remove someone’s hijab.