Author: The Conversation

Netflix knows we’re on our phones while we watch TV. Recent articles discuss Netflix’s or streamers’ requests for creatives to produce content optimized for casual viewing, meaning intentionally scripted for distracted viewers. I’ve spent the last few years researching how Netflix shapes European screen production, a region where the streaming giant has invested billions in original content. I first encountered the concept of “second-screen shows” — created with distracted viewing in mind — in 2022. At the time, I was doing interviews with producers, showrunners, screenwriters and directors who had worked on European Netflix originals (due to confidentiality, they have been given pseudonyms here). Two of my interviewees…

Thirty-four artworks created with artificial intelligence (AI) have gone up for sale at Christie’s in New York, in the famed auction house’s first collection dedicated to AI art. Christie’s says the collection aims to explore “human agency in the age of AI within fine art”, prompting viewers to question the evolving role of the artist and of creativity. Questions are not all the collection has prompted: there has also been a backlash. At the time of writing, more than 6,000 artists have signed an open letter calling on Christie’s to cancel the auction. What’s in the collection? The Augmented Intelligence collection, up for auction from February…

Researchers at Microsoft have announced the creation of the first “topological qubits” in a device that stores information in an exotic state of matter, in what may be a significant breakthrough for quantum computing. At the same time, the researchers also published a paper in Nature and a “roadmap” for further work. The design of the Majorana 1 processor is supposed to fit up to a million qubits, which may be enough to realise many significant goals of quantum computing – such as cracking cryptographic codes and designing new drugs and materials faster. If Microsoft’s claims pan out, the company may have leapfrogged competitors…

From the bronze age to the Industrial Revolution and beyond, the discovery and development of new materials have been a driving force in human history. These novel materials have helped advance technology and shape civilisations. Today, we are at the beginning of a new era, where artificial intelligence (AI) seems to be in the perfect position to transform the search for useful materials. This looks set to completely change the approach to their investigation, creation and testing. In ancient times, human civilisations experimented with natural resources to create tools and artifacts. The bronze age, in the mid-4th millennium BC, was a significant milestone.…

The world’s biggest video-sharing platform, YouTube, has just turned 20. It was started inauspiciously in February 2005 by former PayPal employees Chad Hurley, Steve Chen and Jawed Karim – with a 19-second video of Karim exploring the San Diego Zoo. That year, YouTube’s disruption of the media timeline was minimal enough for there to be no mention of it in The Guardian’s coverage of TV’s Digital Revolution at the Edinburgh TV Festival. Twenty years on, it’s a different story. YouTube is a massive competitor to TV, an engagement beast, uploading as many new videos every five minutes as the 2,400 hours BBC Studios produces in a…

Last time you scrolled the “For You” page on TikTok, did you get a video about current events? Politics? Breaking news? If you’re one of the 63% of teens or 33% of adults in the U.S. who use TikTok, you probably have. But where did it come from? Who created it? And should you believe what it told you? As a communication researcher who has studied news content on social media for over a decade, I can share three crucial things to know about news you get on TikTok: What videos count as news, how they got to you, and what you should do when…

Imagine buying a flat sheet from a furniture store that changes into a sofa when you heat it with a hairdryer. Or consider the value of a stent that precisely expands inside a patient’s artery, adapting to their unique anatomy. Welcome to 4D printing, a frontier in material and manufacturing science that has been rapidly expanding over the past decade. While 3D printing has captured global attention for its ability to create objects layer by layer, 4D printing adds the element of time. It involves 3D-printing adaptable objects from materials such as polymers or alloys that can bend, twist or…

Three and a half kilometres beneath the Mediterranean Sea, around 80km off the coast of Sicily, lies half of a very unusual telescope called KM3NeT. The enormous device is still under construction, but today the telescope’s scientific team announced they have already detected a particle from outer space with a staggering amount of energy. In fact, as the team reports in Nature, they found the most energetic neutrino anyone has ever seen – and it represents a tremendous leap forward in exploring the uncharted waters of the extreme universe. To explain why it’s such a remarkable discovery, we need to understand what…

I teach a course on the relationship between social media and society at Durham College. As part of their assessments, I ask my students to reflect on their social media use. A recurring theme is that they cannot be separated from their smartphones. Many admit to spending significant time daily on social media watching short videos without a clear purpose and as a way to procrastinate on more productive activities. There is a term for this kind of behaviour and its impact on mental health, one that was recently named Oxford Word of the Year 2024: “brain rot” — the deterioration of a…

The world is fast transitioning towards renewable energy systems. However, in many African countries, this transition is not solving historical inequalities or socio-economic challenges. This is because moving away from fossil fuels is costly and governments have largely not involved historically disadvantaged communities in the transition. Instead, African countries are focusing on how much clean energy technology costs and how to get companies to invest in it. Government and policymakers are overlooking concerns about social equity, environmental protection and political inclusion. This can lead to human rights violations and protests by communities who oppose renewable energy projects because they fear a repeat of past injustices…