Philippa Kaur

The world’s most successful maker of gaming hardware has not released a new console for nearly eight years. Yet the fanfare around the Nintendo Switch 2, expected to launch in the next few months, has been relatively quiet. Last month Nintendo released a brief video introducing the machine, which looks much like its predecessor. Under the plastic casing things are no more exciting: analysts expect the console to pack about as much processing punch as Sony’s PlayStation 4 (PS4), which is more than 11 years old. More

“I am a woman of colour. I am a mom. I am a cis-gender millennial who has been diagnosed with generalised anxiety disorder. I am intersectional.” She was also a spook. Her mission: advertising a career at the CIA. The time? 2021. The place? President Joe Biden’s America. More

The flurry of executive orders issued by Donald Trump on his first day back as president showed the high priority he places on making America’s borders less porous. His efforts to “repel the disastrous invasion of our country” by migrants and drugs from Mexico and Canada may soon include stemming the passage of cars. A promise to impose sweeping tariffs on “day one”, including a 25% levy on goods from the two countries unless they do more to stop the flows of people and illegal drugs, was pushed back, but only to February 1st. Whether tariffs are imposed then or at a later date, the consequences for the car industry would be immense. More

DEATH DOESN’T make sense to Larry Ellison. Especially if it is premature like that of his doting adoptive mother, of kidney cancer when he was 20 years old. Even mere ageing is an irritant to the co-founder of Oracle. The 80-year-old tech billionaire simply has no time for it. He is too busy calling the shots at the business-software giant he started in 1977 and jostling for a spot in Silicon Valley’s race into the future, powered by daily workouts, fish, green tea and a fridgeful of self-belief. More

Among the whizzy gadgets unveiled in January at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas was the Elvie Rise, an automated baby bouncer that transforms seamlessly into a bassinet. The device, which costs $800, sold out even before it was formally released. Parents who missed out can instead opt for a SNOO, a rival bassinet that rocks its occupant back to sleep through the night while dispensing white noise—and which costs around $1,700. More

Billund is a small town in Denmark with a population that stands at a little over 7,000 people. It is also the birthplace and headquarters of the world’s largest toy company. If you live in Billund, there is a decent chance you or one of your family works for Lego. If you visit for work, you are probably going to Lego’s offices (passing a sign near the entrance that instructs “Play on the grass”). If you go there as a tourist, you are almost certainly going to a Lego-themed attraction. The noun you hear most often is “brick”. More

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With the release of its latest artificial-intelligence (AI) model, DeepSeek, an obscure Chinese firm, has laid waste to several years of American policy meant to hold back Chinese innovation—and, in the process, blown a hole in the valuations of companies from Nvidia, America’s AI chip champion, to Siemens Energy, a manufacturer of electrical equipment used in data centres. In demonstrating its ability to innovate around American export restrictions, DeepSeek has raised doubts as to whether access to piles of cutting-edge semiconductors and related equipment is as important as previously thought when it comes to training AI models. More