MERNIZ

quishy, fruity, sweet-tasting, chewable treats in adorable shapes, such as teddy bears, stars and berries. They’re not in plastic packets, but colourful tubs or beautifully designed subscription boxes. We’re not talking about children’s sweeties, but gummy supplements. We’re told these little morsels can give us thicker hair, healthier skin and stronger nails, they can improve our sleep and mood, and ease our digestion. Taken daily, they’ll even help us cope with the demands of modern life. And they are very big business. The UK vitamins and supplements market is currently worth £520m, with nearly one in four Brits popping vitamins, minerals or supplements daily and, increasingly, we are chewing rather than swallowing our way to healthier versions of ourselves. Gummies are the star of the industry. The global market in cute, chewable gummy vitamins is worth an estimated $7.3bn, displacing pills which, according to the Nutrition Business Journal, officially slipped behind non-pill format supplements in 2019. The appeal of gummies ties into a high demand for personalised supplements, according to market research agency Mintel, and “beauty from within”. Powerful marketing tells us that smearing creams on our faces is no longer enough – we need to ingest ingredients that are said to defy ageing as well. Beauty sites now sell tubs of gummies alongside makeup and cosmetics. Chewy supplement makers have jumped on the hyaluronic acid and collagen bandwagons – with gummies containing these wrinkle-reducing ingredients widespread. No wonder global demand for collagen supplements is now soaring, while the hyaluronic acid market is booming. In pharmaceuticals, or, in this case, “candyceuticals”, looks matter. Boots’s bestselling ibuprofen is Nurofen Express – a bright red liquid capsule, despite the fact it costs £4.20 and contains the same active ingredient as Boots’s own-brand ibuprofen for 55p. “Research shows that various pharmaceuticals work better when taken in colourful tablet, or multi-coloured capsule than when in standard white tablet form,” says Charles Spence, a professor of experimental psychology who specialises in sensory marketing. “Generally speaking, more/stronger colour is associated with stronger taste/greater efficacy.” We associate white, says Spence, with an absence of taste. “Ever wondered why Pepto-Bismol is pink?” he asks of the indigestion medicine. The owner’s intuition was that children would be more likely to drink it if it looked pink and thus sweet.” The texture is also key. “By explicitly selling supplements in gummy/chewy form, there is both a link to sweets, which people like, and also a very strong cue that this will not taste bad.” Looks may matter but, as far as nutritional benefits go, it’s what’s inside that counts. Dietitian Sophie Medlin says most gummies fail to offer any benefits beyond traditional pills. She adds that “it’s hard to get a meaningful amount of anything into a gummy because of all the other stuff you have to put in there to make it taste OK, to make the mouth feel OK, and to make it look cool.” According to Dr Federica Amati, a postdoctoral medical scientist and nutritionist: “Gummies are often high in sugar. There isn’t a particular benefit to this, unless you find traditional supplements difficult to take.” Valerie Stark, a neuroscientist and director at Novomins, a gummy company that prides itself on being founded by doctors, scientists and nutritionists, raises the use of the pigment, titanium dioxide. “Some gummy companies use it because it’s a convenient and cheap ingredient that creates a specific structure and taste, and adds this pastel coating on pills. But in 2022, the EU banned it. The UK was supposed to follow, but Brexit cancelled all those decisions. We’ve looked at the research, and it isn’t something we want to have in our gummies.” Medlin agrees on this point. “It’s considered too high risk to be added to anything for human consumption, but until we get our act together in terms of regulation, people will exploit these legal loopholes.” Sweetness is the gummy’s secret weapon. While traditional pills, washed down with a glass of water, are sugar-free, many multivitamin gummies list sugar as the first ingredient, followed by glucose syrup (another word for sugar). One particular pregnancy gummy lists the first two ingredients as glucose syrup and sucrose (sugar and sugar), while a hair, skin and nails gummy lists glucose syrup, sugar and glucose as the first three ingredients. It’s no wonder we like them. “If the first listed ingredient is sugar, that’s the main thing you’re getting,” says Medlin. “These companies use multiple forms of sugar to capitalise on the fact that consumers don’t know the names of all the different types.” The fact that some sugary gummies are promoted as a supplement for weight management is particularly galling. As a nation, we have one hell of a sweet tooth; candy sales in the UK increased by 6.9% just last year, with Haribo, the world’s first gummy candy, invented in 1922 in Germany, selling an extra 13m packs. Meanwhile, M&S says they shift 271 bags of Percy Pigs every minute. Gummy sweets don’t only appeal to kids, either. More than half a century ago the advertising slogan “Haribo macht Kinder froh” (Haribo makes children happy) was changed to include “und Erwachsene ebenso” (and adults, too). Gummy makers might argue that we’d be better off chewing a candyceutical or two than scoffing a packet of sweets. But public health tsars would counter we need to get a grip on our sugar cravings, not add more sugary offerings to the market, regardless of whether they purportedly provide a vitamin kicker. Stark argues that, in their gummies, at least, “The total sugar in a serving is less than in half a cherry.” Of course, cherries also provide fibre, potassium, vitamin C, phytochemicals and antioxidants – and 14 of them would count as one of your five-a-day. Sweeteners such as maltitol syrup, isomalt, xylitol, sorbitol and steviol glycosides frequently top gummy ingredients lists but, cautions Amati, “as recently outlined by the World Health Organization, artificial (non-nutritive) sweeteners are not healthy and should not be considered better than sugar.” Medlin adds that sweeteners are “not great for our microbiome and for our digestion overall”. Yet probiotic gummies that contain high levels of artificial sweeteners and/or sugar also claim they can “restore the balance of bacteria in your gut”. Amati points out that “sweeteners, thickeners and gelling agents are disruptive for the gut microbiome”. Gummies don’t simply supplement nutrients, they have entered three lucrative industries at the same time: beauty, health and wellness. There’s plenty of glossy hair being swished around on social media, promoting hair, skin and nail gummies that contain biotin, or vitamin B7. I ask Amati if there’s good evidence behind it. “Not that I’m aware of,” she replies. Indeed government regulation states that you can only claim that biotin “contributes to the maintenance of normal hair”. What about CBD? Can gummies deliver anything meaningful for anxiety or pain and the other strains and stressors of modern life? “Effective dose cannabidiol is not typically found in gummies,” says Amati. Though she adds, “we mustn’t negate the powerful impact of the placebo effect for pain reduction and mental health. There is lots of evidence to support that, so if a CBD gummy is helpful, then that’s what matters.” The act of chewing, according to Stark, is one gummy superpower. While a traditional pill is washed straight down to make its way to your gut, with gummies, Stark says, absorption starts in your mouth as you chew. “Vitamin sprays use intra-oral absorption and they can work, but they don’t always taste great. Gummies make use of both intra-oral absorption and the digestive tract for delivery.” For Medlin, though, this is a niche benefit. “For the vast majority of nutrients,” she says, “there isn’t an oral absorption mechanism.” Arguably, some in the gummy industry are using similar tactics to food manufacturers who overstate health claims (like “low fat” or “low calorie”), to give their products a “health halo”. On some gummy websites, we’re led to believe medics are “prescribing” the perfect options for us. Smiling doctors in lab coats invite us to fill out an online questionnaire, which generally includes your age bracket, gender, fertility status and main health goals, and you’re served up a customised suggestion. But it takes more than a lab coat to convince Medlin. “There are probably a handful of options [of suitable gummies]. You may just be funnelled down into those, when in reality [prescribing vitamins] is much more nuanced than that,” she says. The problem is that these supplement quizzes “are not regulated, so no one’s checking that [the recommendations are being made] in a way that’s evidence-based or medically sound.” Amati agrees, pointing out that the only company she knows of that creates truly personalised supplements is Bioniq, a business that provides customers with a blood test that is analysed by a GP or nutritionist, and from which supplements that address your personal needs are prescribed. But they then use capsules, not gummies. None of this deters influencers from cashing in on the gummy boom. US big players like the Kardashians promote gummies with impunity, though Kourtney Kardashian was recently slammed for producing her Lemme Purr range to improve vaginal health. Here in the UK, Love Island alumni clock up 30,000-plus likes per paid Instagram post. For gummy marketeers, pleasure is a major selling point. Trad supplements, they are at pains to tell us, are unenjoyable and a well-meant habit that we quickly ditch. Stark is on-message when it comes to gummies being both healthy and fun. “When you work long hours,” she tells me, “you have to be very health-conscious, almost a bit obsessed to plan [a healthy diet]. We offer a delicious and effective mechanism not only for achieving daily nutritional intake, but enjoying the process.” It is the same time-saving, feelgood message peddled by food delivery companies who tell us to stop faffing about cooking and embrace doing less. Stark points out that you can get all your daily iron in “two delicious gummies”, adding that “to obtain the equivalent from food you’d have to sit and eat a whole bag of spinach – not many people would do that.” Perhaps not, except you wouldn’t expect to get all your daily iron intake from one source, in one sitting. You also wouldn’t sprinkle sugar on your spinach. “There’s a market for almost demedicalising supplements and making them feel less like a pill and more fun, mainstream and Instagrammable,” says Medlin, “when we need to be taking this seriously because supplements aren’t benign – you can take too much and they can cause harm.” Research has found links between excess beta-carotene supplementation and increased risk of lung cancer, excess vitamin E and higher risk of prostate cancer, and high dose vitamin D has been found to reduce bone density. On Mumsnet, panicked mums regularly take to forums asking for advice when their kids have eaten entire tubs of gummies, and there’s been a reported rise in vitamin D overdoses among adults, which can cause symptoms ranging from drowsiness to high blood pressure and kidney abnormalities. Scientists are still grappling with whether taking supplements at all provides any significant health benefits. “There isn’t a huge amount of evidence to support supplementing,” says Amati, “unless we are addressing specific deficiencies. Pregnancy and supplementing a vegan diet are the biggest exceptions. Making sure we have a good diet and healthy lifestyle should be much more evidence-based than any gummy or pill.” Trends come and go, but this wellness craze shows no signs of slowing any time soon, despite health experts bemoaning the proliferation of ultra-processed foods (UPF). Gummies, often laden with sugar, sweeteners, glazing agents and colourings, are another, more insidious form of UPF. We’re being urged to read food labels more carefully and avoid lengthy lists of chemical-sounding words. We should perhaps apply the same logic to supplements. https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2023/jun/25/lets-chew-it-over-a-look-at-gummy-supplements

Troops from Russia's Wagner mercenary group have reportedly started leaving the city of Rostov-on-Don, less than 24 hours after attempting a rebellion. Earlier, the group's chief said he had told his fighters to return to Ukraine to avoid bloodshed. Yevgeny Prigozhin will now move to neighbouring Belarus and charges against him and his troops will be dropped, Russian state media reports. It signals the end of a chaotic and extraordinary day in Russia. The Wagner Group is a private army of mercenaries that has been fighting alongside the regular Russian army in Ukraine. Tension had been growing between them over how the war has been fought, with Prigozhin launching vocal criticisms of Russia's military leadership in recent months. It came to a head on Saturday morning, when Wagner mercenaries crossed the border from their field camps in Ukraine and entered the southern city of Rostov-on-Don. In developments that were breathlessly fast, they reportedly took over the regional military command and seized military facilities in Voronezh, another city further north, towards Moscow. The fighters started to march toward the capital, prompting the Kremlin to introduced tighter security in many regions, including Moscow, where the mayor of the capital city had told residents to avoid travelling. There were also warnings that thousands of elite Chechen troops were heading to Moscow to fight off the Wagner soldiers, if needed. In response, President Vladimir Putin had pledged to punish those who had "betrayed" Russia. The agreement to suddenly de-escalate the situation came on Saturday evening, after Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko held talks with Prigozhin, according to Russian TV channel Rossiya 24. Hours later, video emerged purportedly showing Wagner troops leaving Rostov, and their leader being driven away to the cheers and handshakes of supporters. Commenting on the day's events, Ukraine's President, Volodymyr Zelensky said the situation was "complete chaos". "The man from the Kremlin is obviously very afraid and probably hiding somewhere, not showing himself. I am sure that he is no longer in Moscow," he said in a statement. "He knows what he is afraid of, because he himself created this threat. All evil, all losses, all hatred - it is he who spreads it." There were rumours that Mr Putin had fled Moscow, after flight tracking showed that two presidential planes had left the city on Saturday. However his press secretary, Dmitry Peskov, said the president was still in the Kremlin. Mr Peskov added that the arrest warrant for Prigozhin would be dropped and criminal case against him and his troops would be closed. Wagner mercenaries who wish to sign a contract with the Russian Ministry of Defence can still do so, the press secretary said. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66006860

Ford Performance is set to enter the famed Dakar Rally for the first time ever, which takes place in Saudi Arabia in January 2024. Ford will join with partners M-Sport and Neil Woolridge Motorsport (NWM) to field a T1+-class modified Ford Ranger for 2024. According to Mark Rushbrook, global director of Ford Performance, Ford will use 2024 as a learning experience before bringing a Ranger Raptor–based truck and going for a win in 2025. The Ford Motor Company is going racing, and no, this time it isn't in response to a recent Ferrari victory at Le Mans. Instead, Ford Performance will be taking on the famous and physically demanding Dakar Rally. The Blue Oval will team up with longtime partners M-Sport and Neil Woolridge Motorsport (NWM) to field the required T1+-class truck for the competition. Mark Rushbrook, global director of Ford Performance, told Car and Driver some details about Ford's entry into the famed rally. When it enters the race for the first time in 2024, Ford will run a modified version of the fourth-generation Ranger, built to the Dakar's T1+ specifications. According to Rushbrook, the 2024 race will be a "finish and learn effort" for Ford, because racing the Dakar Rally is grueling on the truck and team alike. He plans to use the race as an opportunity for the team to learn the necessary logistics to mount a strong competition at the race. The team also plans to compete at Spain’s Baja España Aragón and Morocco’s Rally du Maroc rallies in July and October, using both races as a testbed before the Dakar Rally in January. Currently, the NWM-built competition trucks use the same twin-turbocharged 3.5-liter V-6 EcoBoost engine as the F-150 Raptor. The harsh terrain of Saudi Arabia makes suspension a vital part of the truck. On the NWM Ranger, that means suspension making use of 3.0-inch-diameter single dampers on each corner, which provide up to 13.8 inches of wheel travel to cushion the landing when cresting desert dunes. Stopping power is handled through a set of 13.9-inch Brembo disc brakes, complete with water-cooled calipers to handle extreme heat. All-New Truck for the January 2025 Rally Using what they learn in the 2024 event, Ford and Rushbrook plan to mount the offensive in the following year. "We will prepare and build and test and develop an all new truck through 2024. That we will take back to race in January of 2025, with the intent of competing for the win," he told C/D. Not only will they be armed with the knowledge and experience of having actually competed in the event, but they also plan to bring a completely new truck. While the fourth-generation Ranger underpins the current NWM T1+ Ranger, the 2025 entry will be built on the newer Ranger Raptor platform. When we asked Rushbrook if that meant the new truck would utilize the Raptor's twin-turbo 3.0-liter V-6 rather than the current 3.5-liter, he instead pointed out that the FIA regulations allow for use of any engine from within the Ford family, but wouldn't give specifics yet. All this talk of M-Sport–developed vehicles and Ford Performance has us thinking of the 5.4-liter V-8 in the Mustang GT3 that was just revealed . . . perhaps that's a conversation for next time. https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a44189198/ford-ranger-truck-dakar-rally-race-announced/

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel to Beijing this weekend, the State Department announced on Wednesday – a significant trip that comes as the Biden administration navigates its complicated relationship with China. The top US diplomat will travel to the Chinese capital as the United States works to rectify normal channels of communications amid ongoing tensions between the two nations, including two military-related incidents in recent weeks. Blinken was originally set to travel to Beijing in early February, but postponed his trip due to a Chinese spy balloon transiting the US. A top State Department official said Wednesday both the United States and China came “to the shared conclusion that now is the right time to engage at this level.” “When the Secretary postponed his travel in February, we made very clear the reasons why we were doing so and why the trip at that time simply would not have been productive and we said that we would look to reschedule the trip when conditions permitted,” said Daniel Kritenbrink, Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs. There have been a number of engagements between US and Chinese officials in the subsequent months, including National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and Kritenbrink himself, and based on those interactions, “I think there’s a realization on both sides that it is important to have these channels of communication,” the assistant secretary said. “Now is the precisely the time for intense diplomacy,” said Kurt Campbell, Deputy Assistant to the President and Coordinator for Indo-Pacific Affairs, who noted that this was “not a strategic shift or something new to American statecraft.” “We have decades of experience talking to an agent working with competitors when our interests call for it,” he said. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said that Blinken would meet with “senior PRC officials” while in Beijing. The US officials did not give details about who those officials are or whether that would include a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping. Campbell noted that “we expect a series of visits in both directions in the period ahead” following Blinken’s visit. Kritenbrink said he would not expect “a long list of deliverables” to come out of the visit, but described it as “a really critical series of engagements that we’ll have in Beijing at a crucial time in the relationship that we again hope will, at a minimum, reduce the risk of miscalculation so that we do not veer into potential conflict.” He said the agenda would focus on three main goals: establishing communication channels “that are open and empowered to discuss important challenges, address misperceptions and prevent miscalculation,” discussing US concerns “on a range of issues” as well as on “a host of regional and global security matters,” and “exploring potential cooperation on transnational challenges when it is in our interest in areas such as climate and global macroeconomic stability.” Blinken is also expected to raise concerns about China’s role in the fentanyl crisis, Taiwan and cross-Strait issues and the war in Ukraine. “I think it is undeniable that there are elements of China’s policy towards Ukraine and its engagement with Russia that we watch it carefully and that we have concerns over and that this will be a topic of conversation,” Campbell said. Campbell told reporters that Blinken will “advocate strongly” for the need for appropriate military to military communications. Beijing has rebuffed high-level military dialogue and turned down a formal meeting between China’s Minister of National Defense Li Shangfu and US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin while both were in Singapore. “We’ve advocated for these discussions consistently, and China has resisted some of those efforts,” Campbell said. “I believe Secretary Blinken will advocate strongly that these lines of communication are necessary, they’re how mature, strong militaries interact, and the stakes are just too high to avoid these critical lines of communication.” According to Kritenbrink, the top US diplomat is also expected to bring up the cases of wrongfully detained Americans in China. There are three Americans publicly known to be wrongfully detained there: Mark Swidan, Kai Li, and David Lin. https://edition.cnn.com/2023/06/14/politics/blinken-china-announcement/index.html

Name: Desk yoga. Age: Yoga is at least 5,000 years old. Desks are comparative youngsters; they’re probably medieval. Appearance: Stretchy. You’ve been hunched over that screen for hours. Fancy a coffee? No thanks. Vape down the alleyway? Trip to the vending machine? Therapeutic gossip about Alan’s shirt? No, I’m going to take my Y-break. Your what? I’m taking inspiration from India’s civil service, which is encouraging staff to take a “Y-break”, incorporating desk yoga into their day to “de-stress, refresh and refocus”. What would de-stress, refresh and refocus me is not being at work. Shhh … close your eyes, take a deep breath and exhale. This just sounds like another way for competitive office exercisers to show off. As if it wasn’t bad enough them parading around in sweaty Lycra and talking about CrossFit, now we’re endorsing crow poses on the photocopier? This isn’t for yoga show-offs. The Y-break protocol suggests four six-minute routines and they’re pretty sensible and low-key. Mostly it’s sitting or standing stretches, twists and breathing exercises, not one-legged planks. One of the breathing exercises does involve making a “steady humming sound”, though. Rachel already does that when she’s writing emails – it drives me mad. Sounds like you both need the “Yoga for Workaholics 2” video, which, sweetly, has two colleagues doing stretches and heel raises together. Absolutely not. Although it would also feel weird doing yoga while everyone else was beavering away. Are there ways of secretly exercising while you work? Personally, I favour the traditional “walking around while carrying some papers” approach: get your steps in and no one bothers you. But if you’re deskbound, try leg raises and ankle circles. How about cardio? You can buy under-the-desk bikes, treadmills and elliptical trainers, but the best way to raise your heart rate at work is still to press “reply” instead of “forward” when you’re making a sarky comment about your boss’s latest motivational email. Beats CrossFit any day. Do other employers support office arm-waving and alternate nostril breathing? Some go further: there are US companies that pay employees to attend exercise classes, or offer on-site workouts. Brrrr. Is there not an argument that employer-endorsed health and fitness initiatives are just about maintaining productivity? What, ensuring our broken bodies and spirits remain profit centres until we can be replaced by robots? Surely not. Namaste! Do say: “Join us for 6am energising flow with the CEO in conference room 3!” Don’t say: “Sorry, we can’t accommodate your flexible working request, but why not try two minutes of nourishing cat-cow stretches?” You've read 26 articles in the last year Article count on … there is a good reason why NOT to support the Guardian Not everyone can afford to pay for news right now. That is why we keep our journalism open for everyone to read, including in Algeria. If this is you, please continue to read for free. But if you are able to, then there are THREE good reasons to support us today. 1. Our quality, investigative journalism is a scrutinising force at a time when the rich and powerful are getting away with more and more 2. We are independent and have no billionaire owner pulling the strings, so your money directly powers our reporting 3. It doesn’t cost much, and takes less time than it took to read this message Help power the Guardian’s journalism for the years to come, whether with a small sum or a larger one. If you can, please support us on a monthly basis from just £2. It takes less than a minute to set up, and you can rest assured that you’re making a big impact every single month in support of open, independent journalism. https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2023/jun/14/desk-yoga-de-stress-office-india-y-break

James Milner will join Brighton on a one-year contract when the midfielder's Liverpool deal expires at the end of June. The 37-year-old won six major honours including the Premier League, FA Cup and Champions League during his eight years at Anfield. Brighton also completed the club record signing of Brazil forward Joao Pedro from Watford earlier on Wednesday. "I'm very glad to welcome James to Brighton," said coach Roberto De Zerbi. "He's an excellent addition for us and I'm sure he will help to bring us to an even higher level." The Seagulls will play in Europe for the first time next season after a sixth-placed league finish secured a Europa League spot. Brighton see Milner's experience as being potentially invaluable in their attempt to cement another finish in the top 10 of the Premier League after two superb seasons. Technical director David Weir said: "His experience speaks for itself with the amount of games he has played and the trophies he has won throughout a decorated career. "These games include European competition, which will be of huge value to us as we embark on our first season in Europe." Milner joined Liverpool in 2015, when the Reds were managed by Brendan Rodgers, and went on to help the club win their first Premier League title in 2020. After beginning his career at Leeds United, he went on to play for Newcastle United, Aston Villa and Manchester City. During his five years at City he helped the club land their first top-flight title for 44 years, in addition to winning the FA Cup, League Cup and Community Shield. Milner has made the third most appearances in Premier League history, with 619 in all, behind only Gareth Barry (652) and Ryan Giggs (632). He also won 61 caps for England, representing his country at the 2010 and 2014 World Cups. https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/65906011

Florida beachgoers have long been accustomed to the threats from sharks in their warm waters, but bathers at Destin recently got a surreal shock when they saw a black bear emerge from the surf and amble on to the beach. Local TV station WMBB reported that stunned onlookers saw the bear, which appeared to be a youngster, swimming in the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico and heading to shore. Pastel-coloured cupcakes Black bear takes 60 cupcakes from US bakery, scaring staff Read more The bear navigated the surf and hit the beach before running off – apparently spooked by the large crowd of onlookers that had gathered to watch it make landfall. The bear did not hurt anyone – or appear injured itself – and its fate is unknown as video posted on Facebook showed it running off into the sand dunes and buildings lining the beach. It is not known why the bear was in the Gulf of Mexico or how long it had been swimming at sea. Bears generally are good swimmers and polar bears especially so as they can swim many miles out to sea to hunt seals. But the frozen Arctic is a long way from the sunny tourist-packed sands of Florida. You've read 25 articles in the last year Article count on … there is a good reason why NOT to support the Guardian Not everyone can afford to pay for news right now. That is why we keep our journalism open for everyone to read, including in Algeria. If this is you, please continue to read for free. But if you are able to, then there are THREE good reasons to support us today. 1. Our quality, investigative journalism is a scrutinising force at a time when the rich and powerful are getting away with more and more 2. We are independent and have no billionaire owner pulling the strings, so your money directly powers our reporting 3. It doesn’t cost much, and takes less time than it took to read this message Help power the Guardian’s journalism for the years to come, whether with a small sum or a larger one. If you can, please support us on a monthly basis from just £2. It takes less than a minute to set up, and you can rest assured that you’re making a big impact every single month in support of open, independent journalism. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jun/11/beach-bum-no-bear-florida-sunbathers-shocked-by-ursine-ocean-goer

At least three people have been killed in a relatively rare Russian strike on the Black Sea port city of Odesa, Ukrainian officials have said. Another 13 people were injured in the early morning attacks, which targeted a warehouse and damaged shops. The south-western city is vital to Ukraine's grain exports through the Black Sea and has come under infrequent missile fire during the war. The strikes come as Ukraine's counter-offensive continues to gain ground. Kyiv's much-anticipated advance has been long in the making, and Ukrainian officials have accused Russia of stepping up missile strikes in recent weeks to deflect attention from the offensive. Military commanders said Russia fired 10 missiles and 10 drones overnight, most of which were shot down by air defences. They added that three of four KH-22 missiles launched from a Russian warship in the Black Sea were shot down, with the final one managing to hit Odesa. Oleg Kiper, the head of the region's military administration, said the three dead were workers in the warehouse, which was being used as a food storage centre. "There may be people under the rubble," he added. More civilians were injured after the blast and "air combat" damaged shops, restaurants - including a McDonald's - and residential areas, Mr Kiper wrote on Telegram. As well as being one of Ukraine's biggest ports, Odesa is also known as the pearl of the Black Sea an isd home to a number of historical buildings. In January, the United Nations cultural agency Unesco designated the city centre as an endangered World Heritage site in light of Russian attacks. And the city has long been a prize target for Russian forces. Valery Zaluzhny, the man behind Ukraine's counter-offensive Inside one of the villages freed from Russian forces What will it take for military push to succeed? Elsewhere, strikes on the eastern cities of Kramatorsk and Kostiantynivka killed a further three people and destroyed dozens of residential houses, Ukrainian authorities said. And six people - including four forestry workers - were killed after Russia shelled a a van in north-eastern Ukraine on Tuesday. Ukrainian prosecutors said the attack occurred near the village of Seredyna-Buda, close to the Russian border. Russia has stepped up its bombing campaign in recent weeks, despite President Vladimir Putin admitting that his forces are suffering from a shortage of missiles and drones. The attacks - which have killed dozens of civilians this week - come as Ukraine's counter-offensive in the south and east gains momentum. The Ukrainians say their troops have recaptured seven settlements and at least 90 sq km (35 sq miles) since starting their counter-offensive. Deputy Defence Minister Hanna Maliar wrote on Telegram that Ukrainian forces had also advanced around the city of Bakhmut, long the centre of a grinding and bloody street-by-street battle with Russian forces. Ms Maliar said soldiers advanced by some 200m to 500m towards Bakhmut, and 300m to 500m in the southern Zaporizhzhia province. The BBC cannot independently verify these claims. But she conceded that the counter-offensive had already led to some "extremely fierce battles", as Ukrainian forces try to break through Russian defensive lines. Fresh reports have also emerged of casualties among senior Russian commanders. In Kherson, the Russian-installed governor, Vladimir Saldo, wrote on Telegram that Maj Gen Sergei Goryachev was killed in action by Ukrainian forces. And pro-Russian military bloggers have also suggested that one of the top commanders of Russia's Chechen paramilitary forces fighting in Ukraine has been injured. Russia has lost a number of senior generals since the war began, a relatively unusual feature of modern warfare, where top commanders normally remain far behind their own lines. Some analysts have suggested Moscow's commanders have been forced further forward because of junior officers' reluctance to take serious operational decisions. But the story of the advance is not as clear-cut as the triumphant claims of liberation that came from Kyiv earlier this week. On Tuesday, the BBC was granted access to some of the first settlements in eastern Donetsk, where the Ukrainian flag is now flying. Many are deserted, and in some areas Russian forces are pushing back. Meanwhile, the director of the UN's nuclear watchdog has postponed a planned trip the the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant. Senior Ukrainian officials said Rafael Grossi had agreed to delay his trip until it was safer to travel. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief said on Tuesday that he was "very concerned" that the plant could be caught in the crossfire of Ukraine's counter-offensive. His officials have also stressed their need to access a site near the plant to check water levels, after the nearby reservoir supplying cooling pools for the plant was hit by the destruction of the Kakhovka dam. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-65905021

The number of people globally who initially access news through a website or app has dropped by 10 points since 2018, and younger groups prefer to access news through social media, search or mobile aggregators, according to a report released on Tuesday. Audiences pay more attention to celebrities, influencers, and social media personalities than journalists on platforms such as TikTok, Instagram, and Snapchat, the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism said in its annual Digital News Report. TikTok is the fastest growing social network in the report, used by 20 percent of 18- to 24-year-olds for news, up five percentage points from last year. Fewer than half the survey respondents expressed much interest in news at all, down sharply from 6 out of 10 in 2017. “There are no reasonable grounds for expecting that those born in the 2000s will suddenly come to prefer old-fashioned websites, let alone broadcast and print, simply because they grow older,” Reuters Institute Director Rasmus Nielsen said in the report, which is based on an online survey of roughly 94,000 adults, conducted in 46 markets including the U.S. Less than a third of the survey's respondents said that having stories selected for them based on their previous consumption is a good way to get news, a 6-point decline from 2016, when the survey last asked the question. Yet people still slightly prefer to have their news chosen by algorithms than by editors or journalists. Trust in the news has fallen by 2 percentage points in the last year, reversing gains made in many countries at the peak of the coronavirus pandemic. On average, 40 percent of people say they trust most news most of the time. The United States has seen a 6-point increase in trust in news, to 32 percent, but remains among the lowest in the survey. Across markets, 56 percent of people say they worry about identifying the difference between real and fake news on the internet – up 2 percentage points from last year. The survey found that 48 percent of people say they are very or extremely interested in news, down from 63 percent in 2017. The Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism is funded by the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Thomson Reuters. https://www.gadgets360.com/internet/news/tiktok-trust-traditional-news-social-media-misinformation-influencers-4121330

Amazon has renewed its war on fake reviews by developing new AI-powered tools to help tackle the problem, but the retail giant admits they aren't enough to solve the issue on their own. In a new blog post, Dharmesh Mehta, who's Amazon's VP of Worldwide Selling Partner Services, writes "we must work together to stop the fake review brokers that are the source of most fake reviews", calling on "private sector, consumer groups, and governments" to work together to stop the brokers. What are these so-called 'fake review brokers'? Amazon says the brokers have become an industry in recent years, and have "evolved in an attempt to evade detection". They work by approaching average consumers though websites, social media or encrypted messaging services and getting to them write fake reviews "in exchange for money, free products, or other incentives". Amazon says it's using increasingly sophisticated AI tools and machine learning to stem the tide. These fraud-detection programs apparently analyze thousands of data points, including sign-in activity and review history, to help spot fake reviews. The figures involved are pretty staggering; Amazon says that last year it blocked over 200 million suspected fake reviews in 2022, and sued over 10,000 Facebook group administrators. But Amazon's financial might and its increasingly sophisticated AI tools seemingly aren't enough to stop fake reviews. The retail giant says that because much of the misconduct happens outside of Amazon’s store "it can be more challenging to detect, prevent, and enforce these bad actors if we are acting alone". So Amazon has made a three-point plan to get some extra help. Firstly, it wants there to be more cross-industry sharing about fake review brokers and their various tactics and techniques. Secondly, it wants governments and regulators to use their authority more to take action against bad actors. And lastly, in a veiled nudge at Meta and other social media giants, it's asked that "all sites that could be used to facilitate this illicit activity should have robust notice and takedown processes". Amazon wants to work with "these companies" (read Facebook, WhatsApp, Signal and more) to help improve their detection methods. Whether or not these three steps are realistic remains to be seen, but the message from Amazon is clear – it doesn't think it can stem the tide of fake reviews on its own, and that's a problem for all of us. Until that improves, it's more important than ever to follow advice on how to spot fake Amazon reviews during Prime Day and other big shopping events. We've been highlighting the problem of fake Amazon reviews for over a decade, and it's clear that the issue has become a game of whack-a-mole – while Amazon's tools have improved, the retail giant admits that the "tactics of fake review brokers have also evolved in an attempt to try to evade detection". This is a big problem for the average online shopper – in the UK, the consumer group Which? says that around one in seven reviews are fake. And that means you can be misled into buying poor-quality products. Mehta's blog post is a reminder than even the world's biggest tech giants, and the latest AI technology, aren't powerful enough to stop fake reviews. And that means we all need to be increasingly savvy when shopping online. As our in-depth guide to spotting fake Amazon reviews highlights, there are some simple red flags to look out for in product reviewers, including "overly promotional language, repeated reviews, and reviews for an entirely different product". But there are also handy third-party tools like ReviewMeta and FakeSpot (which was recently bought by the Firefox owner Mozilla) that can help you use AI to detect fake reviews and scams. These allow you paste in Amazon product URLs to get an analysis of the reviews or use Chrome extensions for a quick check. While Amazon's three-point call-out for outside help is understandable, recent history suggests that progress is going to be slow – which means we'll all need to remain on guard when doing our online shopping, particularly during big events like Amazon Prime Day 2023. https://www.techradar.com/news/amazon-says-even-ai-isnt-powerful-enough-to-stop-fake-reviews

When troubleshooting old computers, it helps to have the proper hardware. Mr. Green’s Workshop, a channel over at YouTube, recently delved into his experience troubleshooting an old X86 firewall motherboard. In the past, a POST code reader was used to help interpret BIOS POST codes that alert the user to errors when the machine first boots. In this case, he’s created a POST code reader using a Raspberry Pi Pico. This custom-made Pico-powered POST card doubles as an LPC (low pin count) bus sniffer. If you’re not familiar with what an LPC bus does, you can find more details about it in his Pico POST card video. In short, this communication bridge is necessary for the Pico to evaluate the BIOS Post codes produced when the machine first boots. The idea for the Pico POST card began when he got his hands on an old x86 firewall motherboard. He needed to troubleshoot the used board and saw this as a chance to create his own POST card and share details with his viewers about how I/O cycles operate and what the LPC bus is for. Recreating this project doesn’t take too much hardware, but you will need soldering experience. It also took a great deal of research on Mr. Green’s part to make sure he understood what pin was used for what on the x86 firewall motherboard. The Pico is attached to a breadboard and wired to the motherboard using jumper wires. If you decide to make this Raspberry Pi project at home, you’ll need to make adjustments to suit your hardware needs. However, you can look at the code he’s created on GitHub to get an idea of how the POST code output is read and processed by the Pico for LED output. Instead of listening for beeps, you can process the code into a string of LEDs for easy interpretation. We highly recommend checking out Mr. Green’s Workshop over on YouTube to watch the video of this Pico POST card reader in action. As always, we’re excited to see the Raspberry Pi bridge gaps between old and new hardware—especially when it’s well executed like this. https://www.tomshardware.com/news/raspberry-pi-pico-bios-post-card

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BERLIN – Volkswagen Group’s supervisory board will meet on Tuesday to discuss a planned savings program ahead of its capital markets day on June 21, two sources close to the company said. The board will discuss cost-cutting measures amounting to at least 3 billion euros ($3.22 billion) across brands including VW, Seat, Skoda and Cupra, said one source. Germany daily Handelsblatt, which first reported on the savings program, reported that CEO Oliver Blume wants to curb duplicate development work and to better use German plants, particularly at Audi and VW. "The focus of the Capital Markets Day is on the power of the brands and the Group management model," a VW spokesperson said in an emailed statement, declining to comment in further detail. VW Group finance chief Arno Antlitz told Reuters in May that investors can expect an update at the June capital markets day on the company's financial targets and capital allocation plans. Core brand chief Thomas Schaefer said in an internal memo in May that the brand was targeting a 6.5 percent return on sales, compared to 3 percent achieved in the first quarter of this year. "Pressure is mounting. The Volkswagen brand must act," he wrote at the time. https://www.autonews.com/automakers-suppliers/vw-supervisory-board-will-discuss-322-billion-savings

Katie Boulter has replaced Emma Raducanu as the British number one women's player following her run to the Surbiton Trophy semi-finals. Boulter, 26, will hold the top spot for the first time in her career when she plays at the Nottingham Open this week. Raducanu, 20, became British number one after her US Open triumph in 2021 but has been hampered by injuries since. "Naturally, I am very proud to join the women before me who have reached that historic spot," Boulter said. "However, my main goal remains on improving my ranking and continuing to work hard. "It's going to be an exciting summer as we are all very close in the rankings." Ranked 126 in the world following her three victories at Surbiton, Boulter is two places and 19 points above Raducanu in the latest standings, with Jodie Burrage (131), Katie Swan (134) and Harriet Dart (143) all close behind. Raducanu is set to miss the summer season - including Wimbledon - after undergoing hand and ankle surgery, which also kept her out of the French Open. At Wimbledon last year, Boulter recorded the biggest win of her career in beating former world number one and 2021 runner-up Karolina Pliskova to reach the third round of a Grand Slam for the first time. Leicester-born Boulter first picked up a racquet at the age of five before going on to represent Great Britain at eight. Her breakthrough year came in 2018, when she won her first ITF 25k and 60k titles, before reaching her first WTA quarter-final at the Nottingham Open as a wildcard. She reached a career-high ranking of 82 in 2019, however a stress fracture of the back kept her out for six months and disrupted her progress. Boulter has been drawn against compatriot Emily Appleton in her first match in Nottingham on Tuesday, with coverage of this week's tournament available on BBC iPlayer, the BBC Sport website and app and the BBC Red Button every day. https://www.bbc.com/sport/tennis/65845067

Donald Trump’s federal indictment represents far more than a battle between the government and an ex-president over national security secrets that he kept in a stunningly insecure fashion. When Trump appears in court in Miami on Tuesday to be arraigned, a new clash will unfold between a judicial system rooted in the core principle that no one is above the law and an ex-president who has vowed, if returned to the White House, to purge the system of the accountability he now faces. A 37-charge indictment alleges that Trump mishandled national defense documents after he left office and tried to conceal his possession of highly sensitive classified materials from government investigators. It teems with evidence including photos and details of audio tapes. While Trump is entitled to the presumption of innocence like any other American, the indictment appears to underscore his personal belief that the law does not apply to him and that he has the power to do exactly as he likes. That behavior defined his administration and post-White House life. This indictment really is a reflection of the former president’s arrogance, his disdain for the rule of law, which is so repugnant to people who have worked in law enforcement, who have worked for the Constitution, bipartisanly over the years,” said former Watergate special prosecutor Richard Ben-Veniste on CNN’s “The Lead with Jake Tapper” on Friday. Even Trump’s own former attorney general, William Barr, called the indictment “very damning” on “Fox News Sunday,” pushing back on the former president’s claims that he’s a “victim” of political persecution. “He had no right to maintain them and retain them,” Barr said of the documents. “And he kept them in a way in Mar-a-Lago, that anyone who really cares about national security – their stomach would churn at it.” Countering Trump’s belief in his own omnipotence is at the core of this case. As special counsel Jack Smith said in a rare public appearance on Friday: “We have one set of laws in this country, and they apply to everyone.” This case, however, is unfolding in the middle of a presidential campaign in which the twice-impeached and now twice-indicted Trump is running on a platform of gutting the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Justice Department, intelligence agencies and any other federal bureaucracy designed to ensure the powerful obey the law. Late last year, he called for the “termination” of the Constitution, including all “rules, regulations and articles.” And he’s pledged on day one of a new administration to direct the DOJ to “investigate every radical district attorney and attorney general in America” for what he claims is the illegal and racist enforcement of the law. Trump has already pleaded not guilty to falsifying business records – charges that arose from Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s investigation of a hush money scheme. And he’s waiting to hear whether he will be charged in another special counsel investigation into the run-up to January 6, 2021, and a separate investigation into his attempt to overturn President Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory in Georgia led by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis. Trump has called for a “truth and reconciliation” commission to eradicate “deep state” spying, corruption and censorship – a code for what he claims is the weaponization of the justice system against him by political opponents. And he has styled his entire 2024 campaign as a drive for “retribution” – previewing a second administration that would be certain to test the rules and conventions designed to restrain the president even more than in his first term. Trump’s quest for limitless personal power recalls his claim in office that the power of the president is “total” – a false contention that the Constitution was written specifically to prevent. Reflecting Trump’s influence on the Republican Party, other GOP presidential candidates have also promised to flush out the FBI. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, for instance, has pledged to fire the bureau’s director, Christopher Wray – a Trump-appointed Republican – on his first day in the Oval Office if he is elected next year. At the North Carolina State GOP Convention on Saturday, on his first campaign swing since news of the federal indictment, Trump escalated his assault on America’s system of justice. “I stand before you today as the only candidate who has what it takes to smash this corrupt system and to truly drain the swamp,” he said. A GOP attempt to discredit the Justice Department Trump, who’s set to deliver remarks and hold a fundraiser at his New Jersey golf club after Tuesday’s court appearance, is getting help from Republican allies in attempting to discredit the legal institutions that seek to hold him accountable. They’re trying to win the classified documents case in a court of public opinion – in a way that may influence a future jury – long before the ex-president faces a trial. House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, for instance, claimed on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday that Trump as president had simply declassified all documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort – despite a lack of evidence he had done so. “He decides. He alone decides. He said he declassified this material. He can put it wherever he wants. He can handle it however he wants. That’s the law,” Jordan told Dana Bash. In the indictment, however, Trump is shown as saying he did not declassify some secret information that he kept and that as an ex-president he no longer had the power to do so. Not to mention, the law does not require documents to be classified for a crime to have been committed. Setting the tone for the GOP’s attempt to subvert the legal process, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy accused the Biden administration last week of being guilty of a “brazen weaponization of power” by targeting the current president’s possible future general election opponent. There are genuine questions over whether the indictment of Trump is in the long-term national interests of the country, given the extraordinary strain it is likely to put on the political and judicial systems and the certainty that yet another election will be tainted in the eyes of millions of voters who believe that Trump is a victim of persecution. It should also be noted that an indictment is only a selective airing of evidence in the case that benefits the prosecution and has not yet faced the test of cross-examination in court. Yet GOP criticisms deliberately ignore the evidence in the indictment of a staggeringly lax treatment of critical secrets, including about nuclear weapons. They also distort the indictment as an example of the Justice Department targeting a political opponent of the current president, despite the fact that it followed long-established legal procedures and was handed down by a grand jury in Trump’s home state of Florida, which found probable cause that a crime had been committed. Barr – whom Democrats contend shielded Trump by misrepresenting the findings of the Mueller report into his 2016 campaign’s links with Russia – said Sunday that the ex-president’s complaints about his treatment were not merited. “This idea of presenting Trump as a victim here, a victim of a witch hunt is ridiculous,” the former attorney general said on “Fox News Sunday.” “Yes, he’s been a victim in the past. Yes, his adversaries have obsessively pursued him with phony claims. And I’ve been at his side defending against them when he is a victim. But this is much different. He’s not a victim here,” Barr said. Why comparisons to Pence, Biden and Clinton cases do not apply Many Republicans argue that Trump is being unfairly singled out by the judicial system since Biden and Mike Pence were also discovered to have classified documents dating from their vice presidencies. But the cases are distinct because the two former vice presidents cooperated with authorities and returned the material. The Trump indictment allegedly shows the former president concealing evidence of documents in his possession that belonged to the government and that represented a risk to national security given their haphazard storage at his Florida resort. The DOJ has closed its investigation into Pence, but a special counsel probe into Biden’s handling of documents is ongoing. Others have pointed out that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was not prosecuted over classified material found on her personal email server. While the FBI found that she had been careless with the material, it said there was no evidence that she committed a crime. And many Democrats blamed ex-FBI Chief James Comey’s public statements in the case days before the 2016 election for helping to elect Trump. The latest Republican attacks on the judicial system threaten to undermine one of the pillars of American democracy, which worries many legal observers, including former Bush administration Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. “It is disappointing, quite honestly, because an attack on the Department of Justice is an attack on the rule of law. And that’s not good for this country,” Gonzales told Tapper on Friday. Trump tries to win the political battle, but the legal one will determine his fate Given that Trump is an ex-president running for president, this case will play out in two separate arenas – the courts and the campaign trail. The fact that the matter will be heard in Republican-run Florida could represent a risk for Smith given the need to secure unanimous jury verdicts. On the political front, it’s too early to say how this new case will impact the election. More than 60% of Americans say the federal charges Trump faces are very or somewhat serious, according to an ABC News/Ipsos poll fielded after news of the indictment, although about half say they see the charges against Trump as politically motivated. Similarly, in a CBS News/YouGov poll, 69% of Americans feel it would be a security risk if Trump “did have documents regarding U.S. nuclear systems or military plans in his home after leaving office,” yet the public splits over whether the national security risk (38%) or political motivations behind the indictment (38%) are a bigger concern. But most immediately for the GOP primary, neither poll suggests much movement in overall views of the former president, particularly among Republicans. After his first indictment in the Manhattan case earlier this spring, Trump’s polling numbers in the GOP race appeared to rise – underscoring how Republican voters have bought into his narrative about being politically persecuted. At a DeSantis campaign event in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on Sunday, attendees appeared to be convinced of claims by Trump and conservative media figures that he is being unfairly singled out. Kim Bielenberg, for instance, told CNN’s Kit Maher that while she liked Trump and thought it was time for a new candidate, the former president was being maligned. “(What) the Democrats are doing to Trump, it’s just too – it has nothing to do with running the country,” she said. “It just doesn’t seem like it’s a very fair playing field.” At the same time, however, photos of classified documents strewn carelessly around the ex-president’s home – in bathrooms, showers and on stage in a ballroom – could help Democrats drive home their argument that Trump, if he’s the eventual GOP nominee, is deeply unfit to protect the nation’s security as commander in chief. This week, however, Trump will be given his first chance to defend himself in a court of law using the right to a speedy and fair trial that is guaranteed by the Constitution that he wants terminated. https://edition.cnn.com/2023/06/12/politics/trump-documents-case-justice-system/index.html

he Hooden Horse is a utilitarian new-ish build pub located in a retail park on the fringes of Margate. It can’t be many people’s idea of a destination boozer but this changes around 8pm every Wednesday, when the place is enveloped in quiz mania. Local radio presenter Mark Cridland has hosted proceedings for the past seven years. “Some weeks it’s 13 teams, or it might be 30,” he chuckles from a corner table as he runs through a last-minute checklist, tucked away from the rapidly filling room. “We have our regulars who are hardcore quizzers. They’re the ones who will let me know if I mispronounce a word.” Every week, thousands of broadly identical scenes can be observed across the country, from the south coast to the outer fringes of the Highlands; from A-road chain pubs to the most idiosyncratic locals. These offerings range from casual to rabidly competitive. Some, such as Cridland’s, are often both. My trip to Thanet was one of several night-time visitations around the country, trying to chart the future of a very British institution. What sort of health was the pub quiz in? How did it work? And what did the apparently inexorable rise of professionalised pub quiz companies mean for a pastime more traditionally associated with homespun volunteer spirit? The pub quiz occupies its own specific corner of the British psyche. It is, after all, almost universally regarded as an invention from these isles. Some of the most reliable pub historians trace things back to late-1950s Merseyside and Lancashire, when about 4,000 people became involved in the organised quiz leagues that sprang up from Bootle to Southport, although the Guinness Book of Records makes mention of a night in Yorkshire dating from 1946. The Liverpool Echo of 30 October 1963 carried an interview with a Mr Jack Robinson, “one of the men who has been on the Merseyside quiz scene since it started”. “It’s a jolly good way of enjoying yourself,” said Robinson, “and learning at the same time.” Burns and Porter, the first mass-market pub quiz company, was founded in 1976 and soon dominated the nascent industry, producing a string of successful books and providing their services to the BBC. This was, as pub historian and author of the reference book Played at the Pub, Arthur Taylor, has noted, also the tail end of the first era of wildly po[CENSORED]r quiz programmes on British TV. Sharon Burns and Tom Porter were savvy marketers who pitched their wares as an easy way to boost trade on the quieter nights of the week. It was, as it has remained, an easy sell. Cheap to host, quizzes attract a regular clientele of dedicated and often obsessive regulars. Dr Patrick Chaplin is the avuncular chairman of the Pub History Society. He explains some of this enduring appeal. “You get the really serious people, the anoraks, but it can just be something you enjoy as a team. There are so many different aspects to it. There’s the clever buggers who want to win and those who just want to have a good time and a few beers.” For a few months in late 2022, my Wednesday nights were taken up with the quiz at my south London local, as part of a small and quietly competitive regular team. What had started as a pleasantly noncommittal excuse for a midweek drink with friends had ratcheted up a few degrees of intensity. The quiz was perfectly pitched: hard enough to serve as a challenge, yet accessible to the point where victory was a realistic prospect (we won twice, in faintly dramatic fashion). But something changed, for me at least, with the departure of our regular host, the drag artist Kate Butch. It wasn’t that their replacement wasn’t any good, or that the content of the quiz had declined. But something had shifted, a slight tilting in the vibe that led to our visits becoming less frequent. There are, perhaps, no hard rules to what does and doesn’t make a good pub quiz. Much depends on personal preference, although most of the devoted quizzers I spoke with tended to run through the same list. Fairness is critical, as is a robust mixture of questions and the sense that a degree of passion and thoroughness had gone into its composition. The last point is particularly important. Whether they came from professional companies or lone quizmasters, lazy, cookie-cutter offerings were to be abhorred. And the host is a crucial factor. Jennifer Woodbridge runs the regular night at Vinoteq, a Dover wine bar. She is also the partner of Mark Cridland: “I want people to talk, to become mates. The whole point is getting people together.” Diplomacy can be just as important as any finer feelings. “I’ve seen Biros thrown [and] people threatening to throw pints in faces,” she laughs. “There can be a lot of gloating and sulking.” Every pub has its own specific level of intensity. Susan Edwards runs the monthly quiz at the White Horse in Brancaster Staithe, north Norfolk, with all proceeds going to local charities. “There’s no pattern to who wins. No team ever dominates but we do have a core of about a dozen people who come every month. It’s a lovely social thing [for] the local community.”The pub quiz is sitting at an awkward moment in its history. During lockdown, Zoom offerings allowed some thin pretence of sociability to thousands across the country and made minor celebrities out of some, such as Jay Flynn, the pub landlord turned online quizmaster who raised £1.3m for charity during the pandemic. The pub quiz remains crucial to thousands of landlords who have struggled through a series of overlapping disasters, from Covid to jacked-up energy bills. In 2020, it was thought that more than half of UK pubs had a regular quiz. A more recent survey suggested that Durham was the country’s pub quiz capital with 24 weekly offerings in a city of 50,000, with Chichester, Wakefield, Salisbury and Preston making up the rest of the top five. As with many things pub-related, there is a tendency to think in enjoyably hazy cliches. The image of the local quizmaster toiling away at their labour of love, recompensed with nothing more than a few rounds from the bar, is a romantic one. The reality, however, is of a discipline that has been increasingly professionalised. Derbyshire-based Redtooth is the country’s largest provider, with more than 3,000 pubs and clubs a week receiving their weekly quizzes, while a cursory search reveals boutique firms with often desperately corny names, websites groaning under the weight of glowing testimonials. For some, this increasing slickness is pure progress. Questions are usually fresh and well considered. Paired with a capable host, they work as well as anything else, even if some have bemoaned the slow fading of the enthusiastic amateur quizmaster. Alex Douglas is the founder of Inquizition, the company responsible for my local’s quiz night, as well as dozens of others across London and beyond. An avid quizzer growing up, the musician began writing, and hosting, his first night at the Regent in Balham, south London, back in January 2011. “[It started] as a side hustle,” he says. “It was an exciting time. Other pubs started to want them because they’d heard how good it was.” Despite their growth, the format has broadly remained the same. Word puzzles, picture and music rounds, as well as a high-stakes “wipeout round” to close the game. Writing the questions alongside his two business partners is a painstaking process, taking about 60 hours a week between them, before being fired across to in-house verifier Rob, “who we call ‘the robot’, he’s just incredible”. The more venues they’ve accumulated, the higher the stakes: “If there’s a medical question, for instance, you might have a doctor or a nurse in the room. You have to research things so thoroughly. Of course, it has to be perfect but you can’t get too bogged down. It has to be fun as well.” On a damp Tuesday night in mid-April, I made my way down to a pub about a mile from my local. My partner and I had been meaning to try out the quiz night for several weeks. If not quite a shock, it felt odd to be presented with the latest Inquizition offering. It was as good and evenly judged as ever, though it was hard to shake the slight feeling of deja vu and deflation. All the right questions were being asked, just in the wrong pub. The host felt unfamiliar, as did the setting. We got through it fine, though the cosiness and vaguely conspiratorial feeling of the best quizzes was missing. This evidently wasn’t the case in Margate. I had wanted to know what kept Mark Cridland coming back, year after year. It was the buzz, although there had been changes during his time in the hot seat. “I’ve seen quite a few places bringing in the online quizzes,” he explained. It wasn’t something he felt much enthusiasm over. “People have told me that it isn’t the same as having a quizmaster. For one thing, you can’t argue against the computer.” At heart, it was a simple format, with simple joys. “People love to argue the toss over anything. It’s a little community, isn’t it? And that’s what pubs are made for.” https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2023/jun/12/you-cant-argue-against-a-computer-has-the-pub-quiz-lost-its-soul

If you've ever passed by a field of horses at night, you've probably noticed that they rarely lie down to sleep. So why do these mammals sleep standing up? The answer is one of survival: Horses slumber while standing to balance their need for sleep against the ever-looming threat of predators. Horses come from a long line of prey animals in the family Equidae, and sleeping on their hooves is an adaptation against predation. "Standing gives them a literal jump on predators and a better chance of getting away than if they were [lying] down," Karen Waite, an equine specialist at Michigan State University, told Live Science in an email. Simply put, horses are big animals, and it takes time and energy for them to get off the ground. A standing horse is therefore much better able to run away when roused from sleep. According to BBC Science Focus, the same goes for other large prey herbivores, such as zebras, bison, elephants and giraffes, all of which are capable of sleeping on their feet. Related: Why do horses wear shoes? Horses have specialized anatomical features that enable them to stay on their hooves while catching some z's. These features, known as a "stay apparatus" include a series of tendons and ligaments — soft tissues that connect muscle to bone, and bone to bone, respectively — that run throughout both the forelegs and hind legs, according to Waite. When a horse relaxes its leg muscles, the stay apparatus ligaments and tendons act as tension bands that stabilize the shoulder, knee and ankle joints in the legs. This enables the horse to remain standing without having to maintain much tension in their muscles. But while horses do most of their sleeping while standing, they do need to lie down for more restorative sleep. "Horses will spend most of their time sleeping standing up, but they don't actually reach full REM sleep when they're standing," Sarah Matlock, a senior instructor of equine behavior at Colorado State University, told Live Science. During rapid eye movement (REM) sleep in humans — when a sleeping individual's eyes move rapidly under closed eyelids — dreaming can occur, and so muscles become temporarily paralyzed so we don't act out our dreams. During REM sleep,the brain also consolidates and processes new information for long-term memories. People who don't get enough REM sleep may experience problems with mental concentration and mood regulation, a weakened immune system and less cell growth. Adult horses are often able to get by on as little as 5 hours of sleep per day, and they can get most of it while standing up. And while standing horses can achieve "slow-wave," or deep, dreamless sleep, but an adequately rested horse requires at least 25 minutes of REM sleep per day, which can only happen while lying Because of this, horses must lie down every day. If they don't, they may experience sleep deprivation, which can be a serious health risk for a horse. For instance, putting it at risk of injury from falling, according to the American Association of Equine Practitioners. "Horses that don't get enough REM sleep can be misdiagnosed with narcolepsy," Matlock said. "Like, they might fall over while you're riding them." Because standing while sleeping is an adaptation to avoid predators, horses need to feel comfortable and safe before they are willing to lie down and sleep, Matlock said. In feral horse po[CENSORED]tions, if multiple horses lie down to get REM sleep at the same time, there will always be at least one horse that remains standing, likely to watch for potential predators. "If they don't feel safe in their environment, or they don't have other horses with them, or if they're isolated, then they're less likely to feel safe enough to lay down to sleep," Matlock said. https://www.livescience.com/animals/land-mammals/why-do-horses-sleep-standing-up

The western Indian state of Gujarat is on high alert as an extremely severe cyclone is due to hit parts of it on Thursday. Biparjoy - a cyclone over the Arabian Sea - is predicted to move towards the state's coastline in the next two days. Heavy rains and high tides have been forecast in several coastal districts in the state. People have been told to avoid visiting beaches and fishermen have been asked to not go out into the sea. The Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) said on Monday that the cyclonic storm was likely to move northwards until 14 June and then move "north-northeastwards and cross Saurashtra and Kutch and adjoining Pakistan coasts between Mandvi (Gujarat) and Karachi (Pakistan) by noon of 15 June". It added that the storm could have a "maximum sustained wind speed of 125 to 135kmph (77 to 84 mph)" and could go up to 150kmph. Biparjoy - which means disaster or calamity in Bengali language - has intensified into an "extremely severe cyclonic storm" - the second highest category used by the IMD to classify tropical storms. Until Saturday, the cyclone was expected to avoid Gujarat and move towards Pakistan's coastline. However, India's weather department has now issued warnings to local authorities in Gujarat and has asked them to make preparations to evacuate people if needed. People in coastal areas have been asked to stay indoors on the day the cyclone is likely to make landfall. The Gujarat government has deployed national and state disaster response teams in areas likely to be affected by the cyclone. The cyclone is expected to bring rains to a few other states along India's western and southern coast as well. The IMD has forecasted heavy rains in some regions in Maharashtra, Karnataka and Goa states in the coming days. BBC News India is now on YouTube. Click here to subscribe and watch our documentaries, explainers and features. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-65874966