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‘To the Future’: Saudi Arabia Spends Big to Become an A.I. Superpower

On a Monday morning last month, tech executives, engineers and sales representatives from Amazon, Google, TikTok and other companies endured a three-hour traffic jam as their cars crawled toward a mammoth conference at an event space in the desert, 50 miles outside Riyadh. The lure: billions of dollars in Saudi money as the kingdom seeks

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Why curbing chatbots’ worst exploits is a game of whack-a-mole

It has become common for artificial intelligence companies to claim that the worst things their chatbots can be used for can be mitigated by adding “safety guardrails”. These can range from seemingly simple solutions, like warning the chatbots to look out for certain requests, to more complex software fixes – but none is foolproof. And

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Julian Assange’s mission was to change the world – but at what cost?

Julian Assange started his WikiLeaks whistleblowing website on a quest for “radical transparency and truth,” a mission that turned an already polarizing personality into a notorious character and earned him crusaders and critics in equal measure. The long-running battle for his extradition to the United States continued this month, with US lawyers providing the UK High Court with a series of assurances around the 52-year-old WikiLeaks

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rummy golds Metal Band in Hijabs, a Message of Girl Power

The rummy golds drummer crashed her cymbals. The bass player clawed at her guitar. The crowd raised index and pinkie fingers in approval. The lead singer and guitarist stepped up to the mic and screamed: “Our body is not public property!” And dozens of fans threw themselves into a frenzy for the hijab-wearing heavy metal

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A City Scarred by Terrorism Prepares an Olympic Opening Without Walls

A terrorist attack of 2015 that left her city angry and heartbroken persuaded Paris’s mayor, Anne Hidalgo, to campaign for the Olympic Games. “I said to myself, ‘We need to do something that is unifying,’” she said in an interview this month, remembering the horrifying afternoon when masked gunmen charged into the offices of the satirical newspaper

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Russia Bombs Power Plants and Ukraine Targets Refineries in Dueling Attacks

As Russian missiles streaked through the skies above Ukraine before dawn on Saturday, once again targeting the nation’s already battered energy grid in a broad and complex bombardment, Ukrainian drones were flying in the other direction, taking aim at vital oil and gas refineries and other targets inside Russia. The Ukrainian Air Force said its

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He Paid $13 for $13,000 Cartier Earrings, and Then the Jeweler Noticed

Rogelio Villarreal knew nothing about the French jeweler Cartier, he said, when an ad popped up on his Instagram feed last December. He clicked on it, perusing the pages of bling and other luxury items, including handbags, watches and necklaces, each listed for thousands of dollars. Then Mr. Villareal, who lives in Mexico, noticed a

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