Escape from RTO Tech worker movements grow as threats of RTO, AI loom Advocates say tech workers movements got too big to ignore in 2024. Ashley Belanger Dec 28, 2024 7:00 am | 32 Credit: Aurich Lawson | Getty Images Credit: Aurich Lawson | Getty Images Story textSizeSmallStandardLargeWidth *StandardWideLinksStandardOrange* Subscribers only Learn moreIt feels like tech workers have caught very few breaks over the past several years, between ongoing mass layoffs, stagnating wages amid inflation, AI supposedly coming for jobs, and unpopular orders to return to office that, for many, threaten to disrupt work-life balance.But in 2024, a potentially critical mass of tech workers seemed to reach a breaking point. As labor rights groups advocating for tech workers told Ars, these workers are banding together in sustained strong numbers and are either winning or appear tantalizingly close to winning better worker conditions at major tech companies, including Amazon, Apple, Google, and Microsoft.In February, the industry-wide Tech Workers Coalition (TWC) noted that "the tech workers movement is far more expansive and impactful" than even labor rights advocates realized, noting that unionized tech workers have gone beyond early stories about Googlers marching in the streets and now "make the headlines on a daily basis."Ike McCreery, a TWC volunteer and ex-Googler who helped found the Alphabet Workers Union, told Ars that although "it's hard to gauge numerically" how much movements have grown, "our sense is definitely that the momentum continues to build.""It's been an exciting year," McCreery told Ars, while expressing particular enthusiasm that even "highly compensated tech workersare really seeing themselves more as workers" in these fightswhich TWC "has been pushing for a long time."In 2024, TWC broadened efforts to help workers organize industry-wide, helping everyone from gig workers to project managers build both union and non-union efforts to push for change in the workplace.Such widespread organizing "would have been unthinkable only five years ago," TWC noted in February, and it's clear from some of 2024's biggest wins that some movements are making gains that could further propel that momentum in 2025.Workers could also gain the upper hand if unpopular policies increase what one November study called "brain drain." That's a trend where tech companies adopting potentially alienating workplace tactics risk losing top talent at a time when key industries like AI and cybersecurity are facing severe talent shortages.Advocates told Ars that unpopular policies have always fueled workers movements, and RTO and AI are just the latest adding fuel to the fire. As many workers prepare to head back to offices in 2025 where worker surveillance is only expected to intensify, they told Ars why they expect to see workers' momentum continue at some of the world's biggest tech firms.Tech worker movements growingIn August, Apple ratified a labor contract at America's first unionized Apple Storeagreeing to a modest increase in wages, about 10 percent over three years. While small, that win came just a few weeks before the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) determined that Amazon was a joint employer of unionized contract-based delivery drivers. And Google lost a similar fight last January when the NLRB ruled it must bargain with a union representing YouTube Music contract workers, Reuters reported.For many workers, joining these movements helped raise wages. In September, facing mounting pressure, Amazonraised warehouse worker wagesinvesting $2.2 billion, its "biggest investment yet," to broadly raise base salaries for workers. And more recently, Amazon was hit with a strikeduring the busy holiday season, as warehouse workers hoped to furtherhobble the company during a clutch financial quarter to force more bargaining. (Last year, Amazon posted record-breaking $170 billion holiday quarter revenues and has said the current strike won't hurt revenues.)Even typically union-friendly Microsoft drew worker backlash and criticism in 2024 following layoffs of 650 video game workers in September.These mass layoffs are driving some workers to join movements. A senior director for organizing with Communications Workers of America (CWA), Tom Smith, told Ars that shortly after the 600-member Tech Guild"the largest single certified group of tech workers" to organize at the New York Timesreached a tentative deal to increase wages "up to 8.25 percent over the length of the contract," about "460 software engineers at a video game company owned by Microsoft successfully unionized."Smith told Ars that while workers for years have pushed for better conditions, "these large units of tech workers achieving formal recognition, building lasting organization, and winning contracts" at "a more mass scale" are maturing, following in the footsteps of unionizing Googlers and today influencing a broader swath of tech industry workers nationwide. From CWA's viewpoint, workers in the video game industry seem best positioned to seek major wins next, Smith suggested, likely starting with Microsoft-owned companies and eventually affecting indie game companies.CWA, TWC, and Tech Workers Union 1010 (a group run by tech workers that's part of the Office and Professional Employees International Union) all now serve as dedicated groups supporting workers movements long-term, and that stability has helped these movements mature, McCreery told Ars. Each group plans to continue meeting workers where they are to support and help expand organizing in 2025.Cost of RTOs may be significant, researchers warnWhile layoffs likely remain the most extreme threat to tech workers broadly, a return-to-office (RTO) mandate can be just as jarring for remote tech workers who are either unable to comply or else unwilling to give up the better work-life balance that comes with no commute. Advocates told Ars that RTO policies have pushed workers to join movements, while limited research suggests that companies risk losing top talents by implementing RTO policies.In perhaps the biggest example from 2024, when Amazon announced that it was requiring workers in-office five days a week next year, a poll on the anonymous platform where workers discuss employers, Blind, found an overwhelming majority of more than 2,000 Amazon employees were "dissatisfied.""My morale for this job is gone..." one worker said on Blind.Workers criticized the "non-data-driven logic" of the RTO mandate, prompting an Amazon executive to remind them that they could take their talents elsewhere if they didn't like it. Many confirmed that's exactly what they planned to do. (Amazon later announced it would be delaying RTO for many office workers after belatedly realizing there was a lack of office space.)Other companies mandating RTO faced similar backlash from workers, who continued to question the logic driving the decision. One February study showed that RTO mandates don't make companies any more valuable but do make workers more miserable. And last month, Brian Elliott, an executive advisor who wrote a book about the benefits of flexible teams, noted that only one in three executives thinks RTO had "even a slight positive impact on productivity."But not every company drew a hard line the way that Amazon did. For example, Dell gave workers a choice to remain remote and accept they can never be eligible for promotions, or mark themselves as hybrid. Workers who refused the RTO said they valued their free time and admitted to looking for other job opportunities.Very few studies have been done analyzing the true costs and benefits of RTO, a November academic study titled "Return to Office and Brain Drain" said, and so far companies aren't necessarily backing the limited findings. The researchers behind that study noted that "the only existing study" measuring how RTO impacts employee turnover showed this year that senior employees left for other companies after Microsofts RTO mandate, but Microsoft disputed that finding.Seeking to build on this research, the November study tracked "over 3 million tech and finance workers employment histories reported on LinkedIn" and analyzed "the effect of S&P 500 firms return-to-office (RTO) mandates on employee turnover and hiring."Choosing to only analyze the firms requiring five days in office, the final sample covered 54 RTO firms, including big tech companies like Amazon, Apple, and Microsoft. From that sample, researchers concluded that average employee turnover increased by 14 percent after RTO mandates at bigger firms. And since big firms typically have lower turnover, the increase in turnover is likely larger at smaller firms, the study's authors concluded.The study also supported the conclusion that "employees with the highest skill level are more likely to leave" and found that "RTO firms take significantly longer time to fill their job vacancies after RTO mandates.""Together, our evidence suggests that RTO mandates are costly to firms and have serious negative effects on the workforce," the study concluded, echoing some remote workers' complaints about the seemingly non-data-driven logic of RTO, while urging that further research is needed."These turnovers could potentially have short-term and long-term effects on operation, innovation, employee morale, and organizational culture," the study concluded.A co-author of the "brain drain" study, Mark Ma, told Ars that by contrast, Glassdoor going fully remote at least anecdotally seemed to "significantly" increase the number and quality of applicationspossibly also improving retention by offering the remote flexibility that many top talents today require.Ma said that next his team hopes to track where people who leave firms over RTO policies go next."Do they become self-employed, or do they go to a competitor, or do they fund their own firm?" Ma speculated, hoping to trace these patterns more definitively over the next several years.Additionally, Ma plans to investigate individual firms' RTO impacts, as well as impacts on niche classes of workers with highly sought-after skillssuch as in areas like AI, machine learning, or cybersecurityto see if it's easier for them to find other jobs. In the long-term, Ma also wants to monitor for potentially less-foreseeable outcomes, such as RTO mandates possibly increasing firms' number of challengers in their industry.Will RTO mandates continue in 2025?Many tech workers may be wondering if there will be a spike in return-to-office mandates in 2025, especially since one of the most politically influential figures in tech, Elon Musk, recently reiterated that he thinks remote work is "poison."Musk, of course, banned remote work at Tesla, as well as when he took over Twitter. And as co-lead of the US Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Musk reportedly plans to ban remote work for government employees, as well. If other tech firms are influenced by Musk's moves and join executives who seem to be mandating RTO based on intuition, it's possible that more tech workers could be forced to return to office or else seek other employment.But Ma told Ars that he doesn't expect to see "a big spike in the number of firms announcing return to office mandates" in 2025.His team only found eight major firms in tech and finance that issued five-day return-to-office mandates in 2024, which was the same number of firms flagged in 2023, suggesting no major increase in RTOs from year to year. Ma told Ars that while big firms like Amazon ordering employees to return to the office made headlines, many firms seem to be continuing to embrace hybrid models, sometimes allowing employees to choose when or if they come into the office.That seeming preference for hybrid work models seems to align with "future of work" surveys outlining workplace trends and employee preferences that the Consumer Technology Association (CTA) conducted for years but has seemingly since discontinued. In 2021, CTA reported that "89 percent of tech executives say flexible work arrangements are the most important employee benefit and 65 percent say theyll hire more employees to work remotely." The next year, which apparently was the last time CTA published the survey, the CTA suggested hybrid models could help attract talents in a competitive market hit with "an unprecedented demand for workers with high-tech skills."The CTA did not respond to Ars' requests to comment on whether it expects hybrid work arrangements to remain preferred over five-day return-to-office policies next year.CWA's Smith told Ars that workers movements are growing partly because "folks are engaged in this big fight around surveillance and workplace control," as well as anything "having to do with to what extent will people return to offices and what does that look like if and when people do return to offices?"Without data backing RTO mandates, Ma's study suggests that firms will struggle to retain highly skilled workers at a time when tech innovation remains a top priority for the US. As workers appear increasingly put off by policieslike RTO or AI-driven workplace monitoring or efficiency efforts threatening to replace workers with AISmith's experience seems to show that disgruntled workers could find themselves drawn to unions that could help them claw back control over work-life balance. And the cost of the ensuing shuffle to some of the largest tech firms in the world could be "significant," Ma's study warned.TWC's McCreery told Ars that on top of unpopular RTO policies driving workers to join movements, workers have also become more active in protesting unpopular politics, frustrated to see their talents apparently used to further controversial conflicts and military efforts globally. Some workers think workplace organizing could be more powerful than voting to oppose political actions their companies take."The workplace really remains an important site of power for a lot of people where maybe they don't feel like they can enact their values just by voting or in other ways," McCreery said.While unpopular policies "have always been a reason workers have joined unions and joined movements," McCreery said that "the development of more of these unpopular policies" like RTO and AI-enhanced surveillance "really targeted" at workers has increased "the political consciousness and the sense" that tech workers are "just like any other workers."Layoffs at companies like Microsoft and Amazon during periods when revenue is increasing in the double-digits also unify workers, advocates told Ars. Forbes noted Microsoft laid off 1,000 workers "just five days before reporting a 17.6 percent increase in revenue to $62 billion," while Amazon's 1,000-worker layoffs followed a 14 percent rise in revenue to $170 billion. And demand for AI led to the highest profit margins Amazon's seen for its cloud business in a decade, CNBC reported in October.CWA's Smith told Ars as companies continue to rake in profits and workers feel their work-life balance slipping away while their efforts in the office are potentially "used to increase control and cause broader suffering," some of the biggest fights workers raised in 2024 may intensify next year."It's like a shock to employees, these industries pushing people to lower your expectations because we're going to lay off hundreds of thousands of you just because we can while wemake more profits than we ever have," Smith said. "I think workers are going to step into really broad campaigns to assert a different worldview on employment security."Ashley BelangerSenior Policy ReporterAshley BelangerSenior Policy Reporter Ashley is a senior policy reporter for Ars Technica, dedicated to tracking social impacts of emerging policies and new technologies. She is a Chicago-based journalist with 20 years of experience. 32 Comments

Image: Damien McFerran / Nintendo LifeOver the holiday season, we're republishing some of the best articles from Nintendo Life writers and contributors as part of our Best of 2024 series. This article was originally published in July. Enjoy!Unless youre a dedicated Famicom collector, its unlikely that youve heard of Metal Slader Glory. Released right at the tail end of the Famicoms life in 1991, the year after the release of the Super Famicom, Metal Slader Glory never made it out of Japan, and it proved to be a massive flop for HAL Laboratory. But the very magnitude of its failure helps to explain the close relationship that exists between Nintendo and HAL today, with the latter producing games like the first two Super Smash Bros. entries and the Kirby series exclusively for Nintendo consoles.Subscribe to Nintendo Life on YouTube790kWatch on YouTube Its famous for being one of the most expensive Famicom games of its time, said Satoru Iwata of Metal Slader Glory in a 1999 interview with Used Games magazine (translated by Shmuplations). Iwata, who became president of HAL in 1993 and then president of Nintendo in 2002, worked as a producer on the game, which took four years to finish in a time when game development was often measured in months, not years. Its actually kind of amazing that we stuck to it, persevered, and eventually released it, he continued, but from a management perspective it was a mistake.Before we get into Metal Slader Glory and its legacy, lets do a quick recap of the history of HAL Laboratory. Formed in 1980, HAL initially created games for computers like the MSX and Commodore VIC-20, and the first president was Mitsuhiro Ikeda, who had previously managed a Seibu computer store visited by Iwata and his friends.The gang of us that used the computers at the store spontaneously formed a user group, Iwata recalled in the book Ask Iwata, and when HAL was formed, he landed a part-time job with the company. Iwata was still at university in 1980, but when he graduated in 1982, he immediately began working full-time at HAL. (The name, incidentally, was chosen because each letter put us one step ahead of IBM, explained Iwata in 2012.)A year later, the Nintendo Famicom was released, which changed HALs focus. The Famicom gave us a totally new platform, changing forever the way that games would be made, recalled Iwata [Ask Iwata, p. 7]. At the time, a PC in Japan would cost you a small fortune, but the Famicom was only 15,000 yen, making it the obvious choice as a platform for playing games.HAL produced a slew of successful titles for the Famicom, including PINBALL, Golf, F1 Race, Balloon Fight, and Joust, and HAL even began publishing Famicom titles made by other developers, such as Kabuki: Quantum Fighter from Human Entertainment. Iwata had a direct hand in programming several of HALs Famicom hits, but he was soon promoted to head of development and took on a more managerial role.It was as director of development that he noticed some exceptional pixel art being produced by Yoshimiru Hoshi (who goes by the name of Yoshimiru, or simply Yoshimiru). He had been working as a freelancer for HAL, creating art and animation for games like Gall Force and Fire Bam, but in 1987 he was putting together a pitch for what would become Metal Slader Glory. He recalled the moment it was given the green light in another interview translated by Shmuplations:When I was getting ready to present the game well, I suppose you couldnt really call it a presentation. It was an attempt at a design doc, a screen mock-up and a couple of example animations. But, while I was waiting to show what Id made, I was testing it on the monitor and Iwata happened to walk past. He saw the graphics, and the game was given the go-ahead without the presentation.It was the exceptional art and animation that piqued Iwatas interest. My colleagues told me later that he said the graphics looked more advanced than something a Famicom should be able to produce... He wanted to see what would happen if my initial animations were made into a full game, I think. Yoshimiru had cleverly manipulated the Famicoms limited tile-set graphics in order to create large, colourful, detailed character portraits with blinking eyes and moving mouths, visuals that seemed almost unbelievable at the time.But Iwatas move was a gamble. Yoshimirus background wasnt in game design, but rather in illustration and model making. After a brief stint as an animator, he had worked for model-kit magazines like Fan Road and Hobby Boy, the latter published by Work House. Then in 1984, he produced a manga called Akuutensou Fixallia, about a mechanic who is transported to an alien world after finding the remains of a mysterious robot, but it was cancelled before the run was completed.His experience with video games and computers was limited: he only used a computer for the first time when he started at Work House in around 1982/1983. I loved anime and models but until then I really wasnt interested in games, he said. Its only when I started working on game-related books at Work House that I gave them any attention.He quickly taught himself how to do pixel art by watching others. But now, he suddenly found himself as the director of an entire game. He was to provide the art, animation, script, sound effects, and overall vision, but he would rely on others at HAL to do the music and programming.Yoshimiru loosely based the story of Metal Slader Glory on his cancelled manga. Set in 2062, the game takes place after a war between space colonies, and the player takes on the role of Tadashi, who buys what he thinks is a worker mech. But he and his girlfriend Elina soon discover that it has a cloaking device, and is actually a combat mech called a Metal Slader. When they boot it up, it plays a message, warning: Earth is in danger, seek the creator. The merchant who sold it to them says it came from one of the space colonies, so the pair, along with Tadashis younger sister Azusa, set out to an orbital station to find out more about the Metal Sladers and investigate the meaning of the message.The game takes the form of a visual novel, and along with featuring some of the best graphics ever seen on the Famicom, it boasted some impressive sound effects, not least the way that each of the characters was given a different sound when they were talking.Typically, visual novels of the time played the same da-da-da-da noise as dialogue appeared on the screen. I think most game developers simply accepted that was the way it was, and fans didnt mind, but I always thought it was strange, Yoshimiru commented. So he modulated the pitch to make each character sound unique. When the male and female characters speech makes different sounds it ends up sounding like a conversation, right? Not only that, he changed the speed of the text and sound to reflect characters talking slowly or quickly. These two innovations are something we take for granted in games like the Ace Attorney series today, but they were highly novel at the time.Although the game was never officially localised for the West, a fan translation is available to downloadThe development of Metal Slader Glory was interminably slow. It took the best part of a year to lay the foundations of the game. I spent the first six months talking with the programmers about what kind of game I wanted to make and what kind of systems were needed, said Yoshimiru. After that, it took them a further three months to create the basic systems.Finding workarounds to allow the ageing Famicom to display huge, detailed images was the main blocker to progress from then on. Yoshimiru gave an example:When creating the background and sprites for a scene, a single bank (the Famicom was capable of holding one 128128 image for backgrounds) was only enough to fill a quarter of the screen. So, when making the scene where the space shuttle leaves earth, for example, that isnt enough space. No matter how much of the screen you fill with black space you still have to draw the ship and the earth on the background. So, I drew the right half of the earth and the left half is just made up of repeating tiles like a mosaic. Coming up with solutions like this were the main reason the game took four years to make.The sheer size of the resulting game was another problem. It was only once Id completed around 80% of the documentation that we started talking about if everything would fit or not, recalled Yoshimiru. Then, a little later on I had to start cutting things. In the end, not even half of the script I wrote made it into the game. One of the cuts involved the back story leading up to the start of the game, which begins abruptly with Takashi climbing into the cockpit of the Metal Slader and seeing the cryptic message. Instead, Yoshimiru created a manga included in the games manual that explains the story leading up to this moment.Even with the cuts, the game weighed in at 1MB, making it one of the biggest Famicom games ever made. It also required an expensive MMC5 chip, Nintendos most advanced Famicom cartridge chip, which was only used in a handful of games, including Castlevania III: Draculas Curse. But apparently Nintendo only sold HAL a limited number of these chips.Yoshimiru's contract stipulated, astonishingly, that he would only make money from royaltiesThe story gets a little murky here, and its unclear whether HAL simply couldnt source enough chips for Metal Slader Glory or whether the company was unwilling or unable to buy more. Whatever the reason, Very few copies were produced and put in circulation, noted Iwata, making the Famicom game a highly sought-after rarity these days, with boxed copies selling for upwards of $300.On its release in August 1991, the reviews for Metal Slader Glory were middling. Famitsu scored it 23/40, praising the movie-style graphics, but criticising the linear story and the lack of an option to speed up the text. According to this Waypoint article (which links to a now-removed YouTube video), the sales of the game werent even enough to cover its advertising budget, let alone development costs.Not that Yoshimiru was being paid during those four years of development, since he wasnt an official employee of HAL. My contract was such that I would only make money from the royalties, so I didnt make any money until the game was released. But back then I was still living with my parents, so even if I didnt have any money I was never in danger of starving.By 1992, HAL Laboratory was facing bankruptcy. The protracted development and poor sales of Metal Slader Glory undoubtedly contributed to the companys dire situation, although this wasnt the only cause.We were caught in a vicious circle, said Iwata. It went like this: we didnt have enough time, so we released games before they were really finished and ready for release, then those games wouldnt sell very well because they werent very good which put us in an even more desperate position for our next development.And this is where Nintendo stepped in. Shigesato Itoi, EarthBound creator and friend of Iwata, apparently suggested that Nintendo president Hiroshi Yamauchi agreed to rescue the developer on the condition that Satoru Iwata was made president. Iwata himself avoided talking about the exact circumstances of the deal: Im afraid Im not at liberty to go into the details [...] but many people at Nintendo had faith in us: if they can just unleash their true potential, theyll be a great developer. People like Miyamoto, who had known firsthand about our contribution to Nintendo since the early Famicom days, were saying stuff like that, and so were several other key people at Nintendo. In the past we had applied ourselves and made solid, quality games that were profitable.Nintendo didnt acquire HAL Laboratory outright, but the two companies became inextricably intertwined. Accordingly we left the marketing and sales side up to Nintendo after that, and returned to our original focus of making good games.On Iwatas first day as president in 1993, HAL faced debts of 1.5 billion yen. In the end, we paid it off over six years, shelling out 250,000,000 yen annually, he wrote, as chronicled in Ask Iwata. Of course, we had to cover all our operating costs, so in order to compensate our employees and keep the lights on, we took on a separate line of debt. Eventually we paid everything off, but the process was a burden on a lot of people, so I cant exactly say Im proud of the experience.If you haven't gotten around to reading this, you really should Image: Zion Grassl / Nintendo LifeIwatas first step was to talk to every person who worked at HAL, starting a tradition where he would interview every employee twice a year to find out their strengths and weaknesses, and get a handle on what was going on at the company. And he put a renewed focus on quality.I turned to everyone at HAL and said, OK, from here on out, every game we create is going to sell a million copies! he recalled. I think everyone thought, hes lost his mind. (laughs) But after that we released Kirbys Adventure, and then Kirbys Dream Course and Mother 2 (Earthbound) on the [Super Famicom]. Thanks to those successes, everyones attitude changed, and they started saying things during development like, if we dont change this it wont sell a million copies!It was those leadership qualities, and the trust and respect he earned from guiding HAL through its darkest hour, that helped to take Iwata to the top job at Nintendo in 2002, ushering in one of the companys most successful eras with the Nintendo DS and Wii.Meanwhile, Metal Slader Glory returned in 2000, when Metal Slader Glory: Directors Cut became the last title to be officially released for the Super Famicom. It was made available through the Japan-exclusive Nintendo Power game distribution service, whereby customers could take a flash cart to an in-store kiosk to download the game, similar to the service provided for the Famicom Disk System years earlier. Originally there was talk of making a direct Metal Slader Glory sequel/prequel for the Nintendo 64DD, but this was cancelled in favour of the Super Famicom Directors Cut.Since then, Yoshimiru has produced various books and manga based on Metal Slader Glory, and there was even a Metal Slader gashapon toy. But perhaps the games most significant legacy is the way it inadvertently helped to push Nintendo and HAL into a long-lasting, mutually beneficial partnership that has endured to this day.

As the year comes to an end, it's time to think about my personal smartphone of the year. 2024 has seen the rise of generative AI as a key selling point in the smartphone space, but it has also seen a realignment in form factors. The foldable form factor is maturing, there is a renewed focus on physical size, both going large and going small, and manufacturers are facing smaller gains while still needing to stand out.All these have a bearing on my choice, but there is something else that isn't listed on the spec sheets or the press releases: my own judgment. This is not sitting down with all the contributors and staff to find a combined aggregate answer... this is my choice of the smartphones that speak to 2024 as a whole, the phone that has made an impact and highlights the future.That's as much about emotion as it is about benchmarks.Before we come to my choice, let's review the alternatives and at least one out-of-left-field option.Apple iPhone 16 ProThe new iPhone 16 Pr oduring an Apple special event at Apple headquarters on September 09, 2024 ... [+] (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)Getty ImagesAs always at this time of year, I come up against the closed nature of iOS and the iPhone. How much of an impact does that have on my personal choice? I do believe that a healthy ecosystem requires competition and innovation across the stack. Apple's iPhone has no competition in hardware, no competition on the firmware, and consumers have no option but to embrace both Apple's capriciousness and viewpoint.Case in point, you still can't change the time that snoozing an alarm can be... the nine minutes demanded by clockwork timepieces in the 1950s is a fixed and immutable period on iOS.As Apple upgrades the iPhone, so do countless Android manufacturers. With specifications broadly similar across the board, the emotion and safety a device can create becomes vital to its success.MORE FOR YOUApple's general approach makes me wary. Yet it's the appraoch to generative AI and the awkwardly backronymed Apple Intelligence that defines the iPhone 16 Pro. And that definition is"'late and lacking."Google announced generative AI for the Pixel series in October 2023 and launched the Pixel 8 family simultaneously. Samsung announced and launched Galaxy AI and the Galaxy S24 in January 2024. Apple announced its plans in June 2024, launched the iPhone 16 Pro in September, and released the first tentative generative AI software in October. It's not expected to match the Google and Samsung offerings until March 2025.Apple CEO Tim Cook delivers remarks at the start of the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) ... [+] on June 10, 2024 (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)Getty ImagesLate and lacking. Apple is one of the world's biggest companies. The bar is incredibly high... when it makes a misstep that has a huge impact.Apple isn't behind the curve of artificial intelligence in general; iOS places significant emphasis on flavors of AI other than generative AI. Machine Learning can be found in the predictive keyboard to offer options for the next word, in the interactions with Siri, in searching thorough photos, and more. Neural nets boost the ML routines, allowing for faster processing on some camera functions and recognition routines for FaceID.Plus, this is all taking place on-device, allowing Apple to continue its push to maximising user data protection.Yet, with a constantly moving target of what consumers expect in their smartphones, Apple missed the moment to be in control of its own story around software.The iPhone 16 Pro has the cards to match the functionality of other flagships, but Apple played its hand badly and didn't offer the best iPhone 16 Pro it could. When your size demands perfection, missing by an inch is as good as missing by a mile.Samsung Galaxy S24 UltraThis picture taken on January 15, 2024 shows a woman looking at a Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra (Photo by ... [+] JUNG YEON-JE/AFP via Getty Images)AFP via Getty ImagesThanks to a January launch, Samsung has both a year to establish itself as the phone of the year but also has a year to be forgotten. With the Galaxy S25 launch just around the corner, it's worth remembering how much the Galaxy S24 family set the tone for the rest of 2024 with the launch of Galaxy AI.It was undoubtedly the most popular AI-powered handset. Counterpoint Research in May reported Samsung as holding a 58 per cent market share of generative AI-enabled smartphones. It debuted a raft of generative AI tools across the platform, including an exclusive period with Circle To Seach before that expanded to the entire Android platform.Samsung also had an exclusive with Qualcomm, allowing the Galaxy S24 Ultra to ship with an overclocked 8 Gen 3 chipset, which in turn supported faster AI processing. Everything stepped up as you would expect, but stepping up to support the introduction of AI allowed for a handset that felt more focused on new technology and pushing the envelope than most.Samsung's focus on the S24 Ultra to carry all the specced hardware meant it could sell the Ultra as the ultimate phone, with the S24 and S24+ in supporting roles rather than 'the same role but a bit smaller than the top of the portfolio.Yet the Galaxy S24 Ultra's success is an iterative one. Strip away the AI, and you have a smartphone where everything is a bit better than the year before but without any significant changes in the package.Google Pixel 9 ProThe new Google Pixel 9, Pixel 9 Pro and Pixel 9 Pro XL phones (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty ... [+] Images)Getty ImagesIn contrast to Samsung, Google spread the power and potential across several 9 Pro devices. You had the regular Pixel 9 Pro, the larger form factor of the Pixel 9 Pro XL and the innovative design of the Pixel 9 Pro Fold (as well as the vanilla Pixel 9, which just misses out on a few top specs).The 9 Pro XL is a shade too large and is not helped by the move to a more boxy design that maximises internal volume and the perceived bulk, while the Pixel 9 Pro Fold is a touch ungainly in regular use. That is why Im picking the Pixel 9 Pro here.Much of that comes down to Google's presentation of generative AI through Gemini. While there are many AI-driven features that are more technology demonstrations than day-to-day game changers, the conversational tone of Gemini AI and the different approach to search and research it offers is AI at its most flexible.I'm in no doubt that the Gemini AI capabilities will show up across the broader Android platform during 2025 - allowing Samsung to debut Circle to Search on the Galaxy S24 instead of the Pixel 8 shows that Google is not completely precious with the crown jewels, but for now, the best practical implementation of generative AI is the vocal interface with Gemini, and that means the Pixel family can challenge for the crown.If AI were the only measure, the Pixel 9 Pro could take the crown. But one other phone feels a better choice than the odds-on favorite.Before I get to that, I want to address a semantic considerationRetroid Pocket 4 ProRetroid Pocket 4 ProEwan SpenceThe title is "Smartphone of the Year" not "Mobile Tech Of The Year,"Trying to justify the Retroid Pocket 4 Pro as a smartphone is a tough sell. It lacks either a physical or embedded SIM card, does not support 5G connectivity, and demands a Bluetooth headset or earbuds to make a comfortable call. Yet there's a spirited defence that you have audio and video calling through software, running over the internet, and that's a far more prevalent way of making "calls" in 2024.The Pocket 4 Pro is a portable gaming device with the requisite analogue sticks, face buttons, d-pads, shoulder buttons and triggers. Thanks to the use of Android as the operating system, it has the Android gaming ecosystem to call on, from popular titles such as Fortnite and Genshin Impact down to more esoteric titles such as Sky: Children of Light. Except rather than the touchscreen most must rely on, you have a fully integrated controller.The Pocket 4 Pro builds on Retroid's experience in the retro gaming space. Previously, retro consoles required custom OS builds and a solid knowledge in Linux to get up and running. The industry, including Retroid, has been toying with Android as an option for some years, but in 2024, the capabilities of Android and the needs of gamers were met at an attractive price point that balanced cost and specs. Retroid launched the Pocket 5 Pro in time for the holidays, but the Pocket 4 Pro finally proved the retro market was mature and ready for Android.The Retroid Pocket 4 Pro isn't going to be called the Smartphone Of The Year... just remember that it's one good argument away from the trophy.Honor Magic V3Honor Magic V3Ewan SpenceSince the Samsung Galaxy Fold launch in 2019, the idea of a foldable has been more appealing than reality. That has benefitted smartphone designs across the board, not just in the foldables. The upcoming push into "thin phones" during 2025 partially benefits from the technology required to thin out the two sides of a foldable device.Which is where Honor appears. The Honor Magic V3, its third-generation foldable, was a home run for the form factor. It ships in the open state, so when you lift it out, the insane thickness of just 4.4 mm is evident. Closing it, you get a 9.2 mm smartphone with a 20:9 ratio outer display comparable to Honor's then-flagship Magic6 Pro (which comes in at 8.9 mm). The bevelled edges make it comfortable to get a grip of a single side to help open the phone, and the design allows for an IPX8 protection rating... the Magic V3 is good to a depth of 1.5m.Software-wise magicOS offers both 'side-by-side' apps or 'floating window over a full-screen app' for multitasking on the unfolded Magic V3. Still, it's the option to lock an app to a specific Aspect Ratio if it is not designed for a foldable that I found usefulthere's no need for a very wide when you can lock it to a 3:4 view with some bars on the left and right.Is it going to be the best-selling smartphone of 2024? Far from it. Will it be the most influential smartphone? Certainly, it will be in the foldables space, and arguably it demonstrates what 2025's thin smartphones need to aim for.The Honor Magic V3 takes all the potential of the foldable space and brings it to a single smartphone. It sits on the cutting edge of hardware and shines a light for every phone and manufacturer to aim for in 2025.That's why it's my smartphone of the year.Disclaimer: During 2024, various smartphones, including the Pixel 9 Pro and Honor Magic V3, were supplied for review purposes.

UNITED KINGDOM - DECEMBER 23: Raindrops on glass (Photo by Tim Graham/Getty Images)Tim Graham/Getty ImagesIt seems ridiculous to think that you could reduce something like amino acid interactions and resulting proteins to the level of something like Minecraft.In fact, I wouldnt think most of us have even considered how generative AI could be applied to life science.But a few people behind the scenes are working diligently on figuring this out.Geoff von Maltzahn is at Flagship Pioneering, a company thats working on the vanguard of high-tech life science. This venture capital firm has an incubator and teams of scientists and entrepreneurs working on things like mRNA and antibody therapeutics, as well as broader genomic projects. Flagship Pioneering works with companies like Seres Therapeutics and Indigo Agriculture, to innovate in places where breakthrough scientific progress can help with the biggest challenges that we as humans face.In a compelling TED talk, Maltzahn illustrates how all of this can work.He starts with a basic explanation of protein folding, where individual proteins emerge through a process of evolution that biologists tend to understand fairly well, while the rest of us have dont have much of a clue.The World of ProteinsPart of what I thought was so great about this talk was that Maltzahn really breaks down formidable scientific ideas into words that many people can easily understand.For example, in showing how a protein structure evolves, he notes that each protein starts out as a noodle and then folds itself into useful forms.This is the equivalent of, if your car, your refrigerator, your house, arrived as a noodle and folded itself into the form that you enjoy it in, he says.MORE FOR YOUAfter explaining protein folding, he explains that new systems are able to generate models of proteins that fold in very precise ways. Maltzahn talks the prospect of about pursuing a Shakespearean mastery of protein writing.His metaphor on precision and archery, again, boils down this type of innovation into a sort of visual reference in explaining how systems can center on the creation of precise antibodies:Its kind of like Robin Hood splitting the first arrow by firing an arrow right down the center of it, 50 times in a row, he says. And the reason that it has the potential to be valuable is: every time an antibody shows that it can provide a benefit to patients, humanity has a benefit, the ability to access the very best antibody.In aid of talking about the best antibodies, he also goes over specifically how to react against the Covid virus that created the universal pandemic we all suffered through. He explains that to keep viruses from entering the cells, the technology can build antibodies that go after that portion thats attaching to receptors.This may be important to the next pandemic, Maltzahn says.More New ScienceIn addition, Maltzahn talks about creating new enzymes and analyzing things like the tree of life of SARS viruses and how that will lead to very profound discoveries.Maybe generative AI isn't just going to create beautiful cartoons and limericks to entertain ourselves and one another, and access knowledge that is already resident within humanity, he posits. It may just expand our access to new knowledge and new technologies in important ways.How big will this be?The space of unexplored biology he explains is vast. Mentioning an analogy to the great age of exploration with ships, he says we have worlds of knowledge to discover.Even with generous assumptions around everything Mother Nature has ever had the chance to build and test throughout the entire history of evolution, all of her lab has tested less than the expanse of one drop of water relative to all of the Earth's oceans of possible protein sequences, he says. Think about that for just a second. Everybody in this room, every protein that makes our lives possible, every one of our ancestors and everything else in the living world that has ever been, fits into that one drop of water. if everything we know is in that one drop of water, if we find one more drop of water, that'll be a really big deal. But there really isn't a reason to believe that it's going to be limited to that, just imagine what could be.Ive seen and heard a lot about AI in the past year, but this is something fairly unique that really deserves a close look. Were just beginning to understand how AI can create digital worlds that are vibrant, unique, and compelling, and how it can think like humans. But being able to create in a godlike way, using the building blocks of all life well, to put it simply, that thats something else.

The Grandland is Vauxhall's first larger electric SUVVauxhallVauxhall (known as Opel in the EU) is a UK brand primarily known for its keenly priced smaller cars. But as part of the huge Stellantis group, it has access to the latters next-generation EV platforms. Peugeot was first to arrive with the companys STLA Medium platform for its e-3008 and e-5008. Now its Vauxhalls turn with the Grandland, the first larger electric SUV from the brand. I took it for a UK test drive.Vauxhall Grandland: One Powertrain, Plenty Of Space InsideThe initial Grandland comes with just one powertrain, combining a 213PS motor driving the front wheels with a 73kWh (net) battery. A more powerful motor and bigger 98kWh battery are planned for a future release. There are three trim levels Design, GS and Ultimate. The Design trim comes with a 10in infotainment screen with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto but no built-in satnav. It still has LED headlights, rain-sensing wipers, and 19in wheels, however.Upgrading to the GS trim brings a lot more kit, including a larger 16in infotainment screen with satnav and wireless phone charging, which sits behind opaque glass so you cant see the screen while driving and get distracted. Theres an illuminated strip along the front of the car, and this also includes an upgrade to Vauxhalls Pixel 3D lights, which is the companys version of matrix LEDs. These are an evolution of automatically dipping headlights that use an array of LEDs where just the ones actually pointing at oncoming traffic are dipped so you still get as much illumination of the road ahead as possible. Theres lit 3D Vauxhall branding at the rear, too. The Ultimate trim adds a premium Focal sound system, head-up display, panoramic sunroof, powered tailgate and heated windscreen, alongside 20in wheels.The Grandland is a regular SUV, not a slopey-backed "coupe".VauxhallThe Grandland is more stylish on the outside than the usual Vauxhall, and with the Impact Copper paint of the vehicle I drove, quite striking. The light bar on the front and lack of air intake grille provide a clean appearance without being overly futuristic. The side profile doesnt follow the slanty-roofed coupe trend this is a regular-shaped SUV. Thats better for practicality than a coupe anyway. This is meant to be a useful family car.MORE FROMFORBES VETTEDWhile the Grandland isnt class-leading in terms of space, it offers a good balance between passenger and cargo capacity. A six-foot passenger could comfortably sit behind a six-foot driver. The front seats have a special feature theyre AGR certified (AGR is a German acronym that translates as Campaign for Healthier Backs). This means theyre scientifically designed for comfort, including a depression in the middle of the bottom cushion for your tailbone, so you dont get so tired sitting for hours on end. During my test driving, I found this worked. The front seats are very comfortable.You wouldnt want to have three sizeable adults in the back for a very long trip, but two adults and a smaller adult or child will be fine. The rear space is accentuated in the Ultimate version by its panoramic sunroof. Rear passengers get their own air vents and USB connectivity, too.Plenty of rear luggage space with the rear seats down.VauxhallCargo space is also generous. There is 550 liters of capacity including a sizeable amount beneath the main rear floor with the back seats up. Drop these forward and the room grows to a healthy 1,645 liters, which isnt the biggest Ive seen (the Tesla Model Y and Skoda Enyaq iV offer more) but it will certainly be enough for the odd shopping trip to Ikea. If you need to lug more, the Grandland can tow 1,200kg braked.Vauxhall has improved its infotainment offering with the Grandland. The dashboard still has discrete buttons for key climate control functions, including demisting, temperature and fans peed. But the screen has a more modern interface than previous Vauxhalls and feels better integrated with other car systems, including the safety features. Where the latter are concerned, you do get the usual intrusive audible notifications when you exceed speed limits or stray across lane lines. Its now a Euro NCAP safety requirement for these to be enabled by default, but you can disable the most annoying ones with a couple of button and screen presses.Vauxhall Grandland: Driving, Range and PricingAlthough 213Ps (and 345Nm of torque) isnt exactly lacking in power, the electric Grandland weighs 2,120kg so takes 9 seconds to hit 62mph, which is relatively lugubrious for an EV. You still get a decent sense of immediacy from the throttle, although not the punch you get from some EVs. Handling is distinctly uninvolving, however, and steering soggy at low speeds. The Nevertheless, the Grandland sits confidently on highways and doesnt feel that huge in urban environments, despite its SUV format.Although we dont have the version of the Grandland with the larger battery yet, even the 73kWh pack provides a respectable range. The Design trim is WLTP rated at 324 miles, the GS at 323 miles, and the Ultimate at 318 miles, thanks to its larger 20in wheels. Theres a heat pump as standard, too, so you wont lose so much range in the winter. With a reasonable 160kW DC charging speed, the Grandland can replenish from 0 to 80% in 26 minutes, which will make longer-distance driving possible. If youre charging with AC, up to 11kW is available, although on a more widespread 7.4kW home charger, going from 0-100% will take just under 10 hours.The Grandland is not that fast or engaging to drive.VauxhallVauxhall has sensibly priced the Grandland, taking into account the soon-to-arrive 590 ($740) Expensive Car Supplement tax band for electric vehicles costing over 40,000 ($50,000). The Design car costs 37,345 ($47,000) and the GS is 38,495 ($48,000), so come in underneath this. However, the Ultimate trim creeps over the boundary at 40,495 ($51,000). This undercuts the Ford Explorer, although that has more motor power and range. Peugeots e-3008 is also quite a bit more expensive, despite having the same powertrain.In other words, the Vauxhall Grandland isnt bad value for an EV in its class. However, the hybrid version is cheaper showing that, unlike the Frontera, were not quite at price parity with internal combustion engine cars yet. With the Expensive Car Supplement coming into force for EVs in April 2025, the GS trim is probably the sweet spot for most UK buyers, despite the welcome extras included with the Ultimate trim. Even then, there is increasing competition in this format, particularly from Chinese brands, with XPENG launching its G6 in the UK, and MG promising an update to its keenly price ZS EV in early 2025 too. So while the Vauxhall Grandland is a decent car and a step in the right direction for the European brand, its success is far from guaranteed.

Earlier this week, Warner Bros. officially pushed The Batman Part II out of its October 2026 release date and delayed the sequel for another year. Now, DC Studios co-CEO James Gunn has weighed in on the delay and explained why it happened.The only reason for the delay is there isnt a full script, wrote Gunn on his Threads account. [Director] Matt [Reeves] is committed to making the best film he possibly can, and no one can accurately guess exactly how long a script will take to write. Once there is a finished script, there is around two years for pre-production, shooting, and post-production on big films.Recommended VideosGunn has previously indicated that under his regime, DC wont send movies into production without a finished script. In order to make the films 2026 release date, The Batman Part II would have had to begun casting by now, in addition to setting up dates to shoot the film. But because of the delay, there will now be a five-year gap between the release of The Batmanin March 2022 and its sequel.Please enable Javascript to view this contentHBOs The Penguin kept The Batmans shared universe going when it debuted in September to largely positive reviews. Colin Farrell reprised his role as Oswald Cobb aka The Penguin, and the season finale had implications for his characters future in The Batman Part II. During a recent feature with Variety, Reeves acknowledged that hes been in discussions about a second season of The Penguin.RelatedWere talking to [showrunner] Lauren [LeFranc] about doing another season, said Reeves. That was a special experience. I just feel really fortunate. These characters dont belong to me; they belong to the world. It comes down to whether you can approach them in a way that expresses something personal.The Batman Part II will be released on October 1, 2027.Editors Recommendations

Just over two years ago, Peacock officially ordered a Community movie based upon the fan-favorite sitcom that ran for six seasons between 2009 and 2015. Since then, theres been frustratingly little movement on the project. However, former cast member Ken Jeong who played Ben Chang for the shows entire run has seen the script for the film, and he loved it.It made me emotional and just brought me right back, and thats all Im legally allowed to say, said Jeong during an interview with TV Insider. There is a script, there is a plan. We just dont know when [it will happen]. Once thats agreed upon, itll be magical and real emotional I think being on set experiencing that again [will be] so gratifying. Words cant even express.Recommended VideosRick and Mortys Dan Harmon created Community as a comedy centered on Joel McHales Jeff Winger, a disbarred lawyer who attended Greendale Community College alongside his study group classmates as played by Gillian Jacobs, Donald Glover, Alison Brie, Danny Pudi, Yvette Nicole Brown, and Chevy Chase. Jim Rash played Dean Craig Pelton, while Jeongs Chang was a teacher-turned-frenemy for the study group. Of the original cast, only Chase is expected to be skipping the film after he left the series at the conclusion of season 4. Chases character, Pierce Hawthorne, was also used to explain the subsequent departure of Glovers Troy Barnes as he accepted a provision in Pierces will to sail around the world. Glover didnt return to the show after that, but he has signed on for the movie.Please enable Javascript to view this contentGlover, who is also an accomplished rapper under the Childish Gambino stage name, recently canceled his world tour to recover from an unspecified surgery. At the time, Glover wrote, My path to recovery is something I need to confront seriously, before adding that he needed time out to heal.RelatedLast summer, McHale took the blame for the Community movies delay, which he attributed to his busy schedule, including his commitment to Foxs Animal Control. The Community movie will still likely fulfill the six seasons and a movie pledge if for no other reason than it was awarded a lucrative tax credit from the state of California in September. For now, it doesnt have a premiere window scheduled by Peacock.Editors Recommendations

Andrew Jernigan, 51, has moved with his family between the US and Brazil multiple times.The last time he lived in Brazil, his children were teenagers and found the move difficult.He says that when moving with kids older than 12, parents need to think about safety and college.This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Andrew Jernigan, CEO of Insured Nomads. It has been edited for length and clarity.The first time I moved to Brazil was in 2000 to marry a Brazilian woman I had been introduced to by a friend and had been writing to for quite some time. We were engaged on my first visit and married the following year after I moved there.My family has moved four times between the US and Brazil. We learned that there are more things to consider when moving with teenagersthan when moving with little kids. We moved to Brazil, so our kids could connect with their mom's cultureAfter getting married, my wife and I moved back to the US and then to Ghana for a time for her work. In 2008, we decided to take some time to live back in Brazil with our three young children. We wanted our children, who were half Brazilian, to learn Portuguese and be exposed to different cultures. We also wanted to live somewhere for a while with a low cost of living to enjoy the benefits of the dollar's value.We moved back to the US when I had a job opportunity in Northern California. It was an adventure with fun times in the Bay Area, hiking in the mountains, and a community of diverse nationalities that the kids thrived in as well. My wife pursued further education while there, then her MBA and MPH at the University of Alabama. A company in Brazil hired her, so we made another move to Brazil in 2019.When we lived in Brazil without children or with young children, there was nothing but good about living abroad. The cost of living was cheaper, and the children could attend local schools, pick up the language, and experience Brazilian culture. As a family, we'd escape to the mountains and seaside for days out. We felt that we could have lived there forever.During the last stint of living in Brazil, from 2019 to 2021, our children were all over the age of 12, and we had to consider their futures and their safety.We had to budget for private schoolsMy kids wanted the opportunity to attend universities outside Brazil. This meant that we couldn't put them in the local Brazilian schools because they wouldn't allow them to work toward SATs or A-levels to get into American or British universities.Instead, we budgeted to place them in the American School of Rio de Janeiro. They got a great education and were exposed to expats from all around the world, but it was very expensive.The school didn't have the same level of sports clubs as in the US. My daughter had played lacrosse, and my son wanted to row for the crew neither of those sports was available to them in Brazil.We moved back to the US for many reasonsAs teenagers, they wanted to be independent of us, but we had to be very watchful of them due to safety concerns. They could be targets of theft and even kidnapping. We know it happens, and were very protective of them going around the city on their own.Whereas in the US, we wouldn't think twice about leaving them at parties or going to a friend's house, we were always on alert for their whereabouts and who they were with if they were out of the house while we were in Brazil.There were little things they missed, too. They missed comfort foods like peanut butter and American candy. And we all missed our extended family.But the main reason we came back to the US in 2021 was my kids' trajectory in school. Reintegrating back into American schools as teenagers had its challenges. Their friends had been in school together, going to birthday parties together, and attending summer camps together for three years. My kids had missed all of it and had to figure out how to insert themselves back into their old world.We miss life in BrazilEven though we knew moving back to the US was the right thing to do while our children were still teens, we still remember the incredible beaches, forests, and mountains of Brazil. We all miss being able to quickly access the rugged, wild outdoors. There were always cultural activities we could go to as a family, and we spent hours eating together at restaurants with some of the best food I've ever tasted.Even though we haven't ruled out living in Brazil in the future, we'll wait to move back until our kids are out of the house. But we'll be sure to visit often until we return to live again.

North Korean forces are being sent forward in "human waves" against Ukraine, the White House said.A spokesperson said the tactic has resulted in heavy casualties, with more than 1,000 killed or wounded in the past week.The North Korean troops are treated as expendable and sent on "hopeless" assaults, they said.North Korean forces are suffering heavy casualties as they carry out "human wave" attacks against Ukrainian troops, a White House spokesperson has said.White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby said on Friday that the US now assesses North Korean soldiers are carrying out "massed, dismounted assaults" against Ukrainian forces in Russia's Kursk region."And these human wave tactics that we're seeing haven't really been all that effective," Kirby said. "We assess that they've resulted in heavy casualties for these North Korean forces.""Our estimate is that, to date, they have suffered more than 1,000 killed or wounded in this particular fighting in just the past week of them fighting on the front lines."Kirby said it was "clear" that Russian and North Korean military leaders saw the troops as "expendable" and were "ordering them on hopeless assaults against Ukrainian defenses."He added that the soldiers "appear to be highly indoctrinated, pushing attacks even when it is clear that those attacks are futile."North Korean troops first arrived in Russia in October. Ukraine said in November that it had for the first time attacked North Korean forces in Kursk, where Ukraine advanced into in August as part of its fightback against Russia's invasion.Pyongyang's losses have since mounted, according to South Korean and Western intelligence.Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said this week that preliminary estimates suggested that over 3,000 North Korean soldiers had been killed or wounded in Kursk.North Korea's military is one of the biggest in the world, but it has little battle experience. South Korea's National Intelligence Service (NIS) reportedly said that some of Pyongyang's troops are ill-prepared for drone attacks and the terrain in Kursk.Ukrainian officials and soldiers have said some North Korean troops have been killed by drones that they did not realize were dangerous, while Ukrainian intelligence said others accidentally killed eight Russian soldiers in Kursk in a "friendly fire" incident caused by a language barrier.Warfare experts told Business Insider that North Korean troops appeared to be suffering high casualties as they were not given much training but that the troops could learn to adapt to the battlefield.The NIS warned that North Korea nevertheless appeared to be preparing to put more troops in Russia, The New York Times reported.Kirby also said on Friday that the US has reports "of North Korean soldiers taking their own lives rather than surrendering to Ukrainian forces, likely out of fear of reprisal against their families in North Korea in the event that they're captured."The alleged treatment of North Korean soldiers is not dissimilar to how Moscow has treated some of its own forces Russian troops have also frequently attempted to overwhelm Ukrainian positions with "meat wave" attacks.Moving forward, Kirby said the US would remain "absolutely committed" to bolstering Ukrainian air defenses, citing Russia's Christmas attacks on Ukraine's energy infrastructure."No doubt this was all about weaponizing winter and weaponizing energy, making it harder for the Ukrainian people to get the heat that they need simply to subsist," Kirby said.He added that the US would soon have another security assistance package for Ukraine, including air defense systems and gear "to help them in fighting in and around Kursk to beat back these North Korean waves, as well as continue their defensive operations against the Russians in the east."It comes at a crucial moment for Kyiv as it gears up for the return of Donald Trump to the White House.

It was only a month ago that Wicked started taking the world by storm, and not that long since we learned its second half would now go byWicked: ForGood. Universals not ready to reveal anything from the sequel, but that hasnt stopped co-lead Cynthia Erivo from hyping up some of the next films changes, particularly in the music. At a recent appearance on Varietys Awards Circuit Podcast, Erivo talked about her approach to playing Elphaba, who eventually becomes the famous Wicked Witch. One thing she mentioned was working closely with the play and films composer, Stephen Schwartz, to develop a brand new song for her character. Without giving anything away, she teased even the title will move you. I dont know if youre ready for it. When we filmed it, the cast and crew were crying. [] I hope audiences are readyits a song that speaks to the heart of who Elphaba is. You mightve forgotten, but Schwartz said in 2022 thered be a pair of new songs forWickedssecond half to meet the [storytellings] demands. The first movies music changes mainly concerned the characters or setting to account for it no longer being a stage musical, but those songs were otherwise the same. Giving Elphaba and Glinda some new tunes keeps things fresh for movie and OG fans, and makes Wicked: For Good feel like even more like an event. And itll also make those new songs enticing to belt out when the film eventually gets its own sing-along version. But Wicked: For Goodneeds to come out firstand itll do so on November 21, 2025. If you were waiting to watch the first film at home, good news: its hitting digital on New Years Eve. Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, whats next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.