In a social media update shared at 23:44 GMT on Saturday, Trump stated: “Should Iran fail to COMPLETELY UNCLOG, WITHOUT THREAT, the Strait of Hormuz, within 48 HOURS from this precise moment, the United States of America will strike and destroy their various POWER PLANTS, COMMENCING WITH THE LARGEST ONE FIRST!”
“As the Democrats persist in jeopardizing the safety, reliability, and convenience of our air travel, President Trump is moving forward to send hundreds of ICE officers, presently funded by Congress, to airports that are facing negative impacts,” stated the DHS spokesperson on Sunday.
20th Century Fox
In 1980s New York, MacLeod confronts another Immortal.
20th Century Fox
20th Century Fox
A victorious MacLeod draws the energy from his vanquished foe
20th Century Fox
20th Century Fox
Forensic metallurgist Brenda (Roxanne Hart) discovers MacLeod’s antique sword
20th Century Fox
A victorious MacLeod draws the energy from his vanquished foe
20th Century Fox
Forensic metallurgist Brenda (Roxanne Hart) discovers MacLeod’s antique sword
20th Century Fox
20th Century Fox
20th Century Fox
At the time Lambert was still relatively unknown, but Mulcahy chose him for the lead after spotting a still from Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan (1984) and deciding Lambert (who had played Tarzan) matched the look he wanted for MacLeod. The French actor arrived unable to speak English but learned it quickly; that partly explains Lambert’s unusual accent in the film—Brenda even comments on it—and some of his somewhat awkward delivery, though clunky dialogue can limit an actor’s options. Even so, Lambert injected a dry wit into the role and a persistent optimism despite his character’s ordeals, which represented a notable shift from the original script.
The Kurgan was altered considerably, effectively turned into a one-dimensional “cackling psychopath,” as Widen once described him. Both Brown and Widen had aimed for a more layered antagonist. “I envisaged him as a guy who loses everything over time,” Widen told The Daily Telegraph in 2016. “The only thing he could hold onto, to give him a reason to get up in the morning, was to finish this thing with our guy [MacLeod]. Otherwise, what is the point? Everything is impermanent, everything is lost. That made him much more serious—in a weird way, a sympathetic bad guy.”
Than observed that, as often happens when a box-office disappointment becomes a cult favorite, the positives tend to outweigh the negatives. The sword-fighting choreography is strong, there are striking visual moments, and Mulcahy skillfully adapted the quick-cut approach of music videos to the film. And then there’s the remarkable soundtrack by Queen, especially “Princes of the Universe” and the haunting “Who Wants To Live Forever” (which accompanies the scene of MacLeod beside the now-elderly Heather’s deathbed). Even Connery’s scenery-chewing costume and exaggerated Scottish accent—he’s meant to be a Spaniard, although Ramirez implies he’s much older—lean more toward entertaining than irritating.
Most importantly, Highlander has an intriguing mythology that fires the imagination and offsets the cheesier elements. “I think its appeal is the uniqueness of how the story was told and the fact it had a heart and a point of view about immortality,” Widen said in a 2006 interview. That theme is enduring and continues to resonate with audiences across generations.
Saleem Ali, an environmental systems scientist at the University of Delaware who also advises the United Nations on critical metals, argues that deep-sea mining should be included in conversations about the green transition. He coauthored a 2022 analysis, funded by The Metals Company, that compared waste from land-based mines with that from seabed resources. (Ali states he has never received direct funding from The Metals Company.) For instance, the paper examined how terrestrial mine tailings affect water quality and local biodiversity, and considered expected pollution from nodule extraction, such as seabed sediment stirred into the water column by harvesting equipment. It finds that both terrestrial and deep-sea mining will impact biodiversity, but suggests deep-sea mining could generate less waste and pose fewer community risks than land-based mining. The authors caution, however, that their findings are constrained by “substantial uncertainty” about the effects of sediment plumes.
Ali also notes that the International Seabed Authority has been gathering data for at least three decades, which he believes should be enough to craft rules and regulations for seabed mining even if long-term impacts remain unclear and it is uncertain whether environmental outcomes would be better or worse than those from terrestrial mining.
“I’m not saying that we should go ahead with it. I’m saying that it deserves to be considered in this broad context of very difficult choices we have to make,” he says.
But critics pushing for moratoriums or bans point out that the same study cited by The Metals Company as showing rapid recovery ultimately drew more cautious conclusions from its full dataset. “The effects of polymetallic nodule mining are likely to be long term,” the authors wrote, and their analyses “show considerable negative biological effects of seafloor nodule mining, even at the small scale of test mining experiments.” Scientists worry that deep-sea species, adapted to a dark, quiet, and sparsely populated environment, will struggle with mining-related noise and light. These organisms could also be exposed to toxic metals and sediment plumes that disrupt feeding and respiration. The Metals Company did not reply to multiple requests for comment.
Credit:
ROV TEAM / GEOMAR (CC-BY 4.0)
The seafloor of Clarion-Clipperton Zone hosts a variety of animals, some visible here: an anemone (top left), a sea cucumber, Psychropotes longicauda (top right), a sea urchin Plesiodiadema sp (bottom right), and a starfish (bottom left). Because the biology and ecology of these depths are still poorly known, predicting the ecological consequences of deep-sea mining is difficult.
Credit:
ROV TEAM / GEOMAR (CC-BY 4.0)
Given these uncertainties, mining regulations should not be hurried, says Anna Metaxas, a deep-sea ecologist at Dalhousie University in Canada who coauthored a 2025 review of the possible impacts of mining on the deep-ocean ecosystem in the Annual Review of Environment and Resources. Metaxas is active in the Deep-Ocean Stewardship Initiative, an international nonprofit network of specialists that advises on deep-sea policy and governance. She notes that she previously led a project bringing together experts in terrestrial and deep-sea mining to create a framework for comparing environmental impacts across land and seabed mining. Yet in 2024, she and her coauthors found that current data remain too limited to make those comparisons.
“Our knowledge gaps are really large,” concurs Matthias Haeckel, a marine biogeochemist at the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research in Kiel, Germany. He is among 30 researchers and technical specialists appointed by the International Seabed Authority in 2024 to establish values for monitoring and evaluating mining impacts. The team examined issues such as toxicity from heavy metals, turbidity from sediment disturbed by harvesting machines, and underwater noise and light pollution. They are expected to deliver an initial draft of standards and guidelines later this year.
The International Seabed Authority Council—its executive arm—met in Jamaica in early March and will meet again in July to discuss, and possibly approve, mining regulations. The Metals Company is still awaiting U.S. approval to begin commercial operations in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone. It says it expects to obtain a permit by year’s end and to commence mining soon after.
In the meantime, scientists such as Haeckel are rushing to organize more research cruises to collect essential data that will guide choices about seabed mining and the mining code. Haeckel leads a European project called MiningImpact that will revisit research sites later this year where, in 2021, it monitored parts of the mining tests conducted by Global Sea Mineral Resources, a subsidiary of the Belgian firm DEME. The third phase of MiningImpact aims to assess ecosystem condition five years on and to deepen knowledge of abyssal ecology.
“The Clarion-Clipperton Zone is a large area, and there are still many, many open questions,” Haeckel says. He questions how mining in the region could be effectively regulated when scientists still lack basic knowledge of the species that inhabit those depths and how they interact.
A new layer of essential infrastructure is rising above us.
Low Earth Orbit (LEO) — identified by NASA as the area of space at an altitude lower than 2,000 km — is swiftly transitioning from a specialized technical niche to one of the most strategically crucial settings of the 21st century.
It supports worldwide navigation, communication, defense, and global connectivity while attracting significant investment.
LEO satellites provide quicker responses, lower launch costs, and enhanced communication speeds due to their proximity to Earth. Unlike satellites in higher orbits, they don’t remain over a fixed location on Earth and frequently operate in constellations to optimize worldwide coverage.
Higher orbits, such as Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) and Geostationary Orbit (GEO), host established satellite infrastructure but face stricter operational constraints.
Investment in this sector exceeded $45 billion in 2025, a substantial rise from just under $25 billion in 2024, per Space IQ, a report monitoring startup activity and investment trends within the space economy.
“Orbital access is evolving into a strategic resource akin to ports, cables, or energy grids on Earth,” stated Carlos Moreira, CEO of Swiss cybersecurity firm Wisekey, in an interview with CNBC.
The most prominent illustration of this trend is Elon Musk‘s rapidly growing satellite network. His aerospace company, SpaceX, currently operates the Starlink constellation comprising over 9,500 satellites.
The firm aims to enhance this network by introducing thousands of additional satellites. SpaceX has also put forth a proposal for a much larger initiative, a solar-powered orbital data-center scheme that could eventually incorporate as many as one million satellites.
However, SpaceX is not the sole player. This week, tech innovator Nvidia launched a new platform aimed at integrating AI computing into space. This system is designed to back orbital data centers, geospatial intelligence, and autonomous space missions.
“Space computing, the ultimate frontier, is here,” proclaimed Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang at the company’s GTC conference 2026 in San Jose. This strategy could transform orbital data centers into discovery tools and spacecraft into self-guided systems, he noted.
Amazon LEO — previously known as Project Kuiper — anticipates deploying over 3,000 satellites into Low Earth Orbit. Earlier this year, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) greenlighted an additional 4,500 satellites for future launch. Simultaneously, Blue Origin, established by Jeff Bezos, is expected to launch over 5,000 satellites by the end of 2027.
In Europe, Eutelsat‘s OneWeb LEO satellite network presently consists of over 600 satellites. Operating on a smaller scale for now, France hopes the company will eventually compete with Musk’s Starlink and has committed 1.35 billion euros ($1.58 billion) in investments towards Eutelsat, becoming the company’s largest shareholder with approximately 30% ownership.
China has also submitted plans for over 200,000 satellites across 14 constellations.
The magnitude of these upcoming deployments signifies a fundamental change in the utilization, governance, and commercialization of space.
Since 2009, the space economy has seen over $400 billion in investments, with the U.S. contributing more than half, followed by China, according to Space Capital.
Chad Anderson, CEO of Space Capital, stated that the industry is still in the “early stages of a multi-decade infrastructure development.” He emphasized that while the sector remains in its infancy, it has progressed enough to provide significant public market prospects.
Around a dozen space firms are already publicly traded, with more expected to follow suit in the upcoming year, including the highly anticipated SpaceX IPO, which Anderson suggested could signify the space sector’s “Netscape moment” — a transformative event that alters investor perceptions and attracts wider capital into the market.
As the momentum gathers pace and commercial endeavors increase, Wisekey’s Moreira cautioned that this expansion must be “administered with the same level of seriousness as digital sovereignty on Earth.”
He contended that space should continue to be a realm that serves humanity — facilitating connectivity, scientific exploration, and economic advancement — rather than devolving into a battleground of unregulated competition and systemic threats.
A principal hurdle for market expansion is the fragmented governance of LEO and its intricate operational framework.
At the global level, the Outer Space Treaty asserts that states are accountable for all space activities conducted under their jurisdiction, while the UN’s space debris mitigation guidelines provide non-binding sustainability standards.
The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) oversees global spectrum allocation, assisting in the prevention of interference and ensuring dependable operations throughout communication networks. Alongside these formal mechanisms, industry bodies such as the Space Safety Coalition advocate for voluntary best-practice guidelines.
National authorities then oversee operational management. In the United States, for instance, the FCC licenses satellite constellations and spectrum usage, while the FAA handles launch and re-entry operations.
Nonetheless, numerous experts advocate that current frameworks are no longer adequate.
Raza Rizvi, a TMT attorney at Simmons & Simmons, asserts that much of the existing legal framework was crafted for the more stable conditions of GEO. “As we move into a more risky, intricate environment in LEO, we lack specific legal instruments to handle this new technology,” she noted.
Siamak Hesar, CEO of spaceflight intelligence company Kayhan Space, remarked that existing regulations were developed for slower-moving, government-driven space initiatives, adding, “Regulations must adapt to the scale at which the industry is progressing.”
He argues that regulation now necessitates a “fresh perspective,” given that commercial operators, rather than governments, are becoming the principal users of space.
This transition from state-led to commercially oriented activities is also reshaping how industry leaders perceive the prospects ahead. Martijn Rogier van Delden, Head of Europe Consumer for Amazon LEO, envisions “immense potential” for LEO satellites to link billions of users, calling it “a revolutionary factor to close the digital gap.”
“I didn’t always see eye to eye with every choice Robert Mueller made,” stated Andrew Weissmann, a member of Mueller’s team, in an interview with the BBC. “It’s crucial for people to understand the degree of integrity and thoughtfulness that influenced his decision-making, as well as the amount of faith he placed – perhaps even more than I did – in the American populace, in citizens, and in Congress.”
On Saturday, President Donald Trump threatened to dispatch federal immigration agents to U.S. airports unless congressional Democrats promptly agree to finance the Department of Homeland Security.
“I will deploy our exceptional and patriotic ICE Agents to the Airports where they will provide Security like no one has ever witnessed before,” Trump posted in a Truth Social post. The Trump administration has encountered significant backlash for its aggressive deportation policies executed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol agents.
Trump asserted that ICE agents overseeing airport security would detain immigrants illegally present in the U.S., with a focus on those from Somalia.
In another post later that day, Trump mentioned his intention to station ICE agents at airports starting Monday, instructing them to “GET READY.”
“I am eager to deploy ICE on Monday and have already advised them to, ‘GET READY.’ NO MORE WAITING, NO MORE GAMES!” he declared.
The White House directed inquiries for comments to Trump’s social media, and DHS did not immediately respond to CNBC’s requests.
A bipartisan group of senators met with DHS border czar Tom Homan on Friday evening to deliberate on extra immigration enforcement concessions put forth by the White House to resolve the ongoing partial government shutdown, as reported by POLITICO, citing lawmakers present.
The Senate is currently in session on Saturday and Sunday, addressing other legislative matters, yet it remains uncertain if further discussions or a vote on the new DHS funding plan will occur.
Democrats are insisting on alterations to the operational procedures of federal immigration enforcement in exchange for unlocking the funding. The White House and Democrats have been negotiating proposals for over a month without reaching a consensus.
The DHS shutdown has been considerably less disruptive than the unprecedented government shutdown experienced last year. However, since a large portion of DHS operations are deemed essential, staff are mandated to work without pay.
The ramifications of the funding interruption and payroll delays are observable at U.S. airports, where Transportation Security Administration agents are resigning or calling in sick. DHS personnel missed their initial full paychecks last week.
The agent shortage has led to excessively long lines at security checkpoints, particularly in Atlanta and Houston, during the spring break travel boom.
“If a resolution is not achieved, you’re going to see today’s situation appear as child’s play,” Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy informed CNN on Friday. Earlier that week, Duffy cautioned that smaller airports may face full closure soon due to staffing shortages.
In another post earlier that day, Tesla CEO and former Trump advisor Elon Musk expressed his desire to cover the salaries of TSA officers amid the ongoing shutdown.
“I would like to propose to cover the wages of TSA workers during this funding stalemate that is adversely impacting the lives of numerous Americans at airports nationwide,” Musk, the world’s wealthiest individual, stated in a post on X.
Musk did not immediately provide a response to a request for comment.
According to a recent Associated Press report, the average income for TSA agents ranges from about $46,000 to $55,000.
The logistics of such an offer remain unclear.
Last year, Trump disclosed that a wealthy, unnamed contributor had supplied $130 million to assist with military pay shortages caused by the administration’s previous government shutdown, the longest on record. That anonymous donor was later identified as Timothy Mellon, a descendant of a prominent Gilded Age banking family, as reported by The New York Times.
However, Mellon’s contribution equated to merely about $100 per service member. Paying U.S. troops every two weeks costs roughly $6.4 billion. Moreover, such donations may have conflicted with the Antideficiency Act, which prohibits federal agencies from utilizing funds that haven’t been appropriated by Congress, according to the Times.
— Annie Nova and Dan Mangan contributed reporting
Sebastiaan de With was reportedly dismissed due to financial impropriety prior to his employment with Apple.
Sebastiaan de With was reportedly dismissed due to financial impropriety prior to his employment with Apple.
Lux Optics co-founder Sebastiaan de With grabbed attention when he came on board with Apple in late January. The firm was associated with Halide, a highly regarded photography application for the iPhone, renowned for its comprehensive professional-grade controls.
Apple seemed to be such an admirer that it attempted to acquire the developer during the previous summer. Those discussions did not yield results, and ultimately, the company opted to hire de With instead. At the time, it was commonly thought that Apple had taken him from Lux. However, fresh allegations from a lawsuit instituted by co-founder Ben Sandofsky in the California Superior Court of Santa Cruz assert that de With was terminated for financial misconduct in December 2025.
According to The Information, the lawsuit “accuses de With of inappropriately utilizing over $150,000 in Lux corporate funds for personal expenditures,” and “removing Lux source code and confidential information when he transitioned to Apple.”
A lawyer representing de With refuted these accusations, stating that “The effort to involve Apple in this conflict seems intended to gain leverage and draw attention.”
The BBC interviewed Australian youth regarding the social media restriction for those under 16, three months after the legislation was enacted on 10 December 2025.
As per the law, social media platforms are required to implement “reasonable measures” to prevent minors from accessing their services, with potential penalties of up to A$49.5m (£24.5m) for non-compliance.
There are no penalties for children or parents regarding violations of the restriction.
The Australian authorities reported that 4.7 million accounts belonging to individuals under 16 were deactivated, deleted, or limited shortly after the ban was initiated.
Ghost in the Machine filmmaker Valerie Veatch aims to illuminate the impact of race science on today’s technological landscape.
Ghost in the Machine filmmaker Valerie Veatch aims to illuminate the impact of race science on today’s technological landscape.
Similar to many individuals, director Valerie Veatch found herself captivated when OpenAI unveiled its Sora text-to-video generative AI model to the public in 2024. While she didn’t grasp the technology in its entirety, her curiosity about its capabilities led her to discover other artists forming online networks to showcase their novel AI works. The prospect of engaging with others enticed Veatch into the realm of AI, yet upon her arrival, she was taken aback by the prevalence of images generated that were rife with racism and sexism.
Veatch became increasingly disturbed by the lack of concern from her fellow AI-enthusiast peers regarding the machine they championed, which produced hateful and prejudiced content without explicit instructions. This peculiar reality distanced Veatch from her initial engagement with generative AI. Nonetheless, it motivated her to create Ghost in the Machine, a fresh documentary examining the technologies and ideologies that set the stage for generative AI’s reality.
Rather than concentrating on the possible (if unlikely) advantages to society that generative AI advocates insist are imminent, Ghost in the Machine delves into the technology’s past to elucidate why it functions as it does today. In a recent conversation with Veatch about the documentary, she expressed her desire to document the origins of generative AI to provide clarity on the intense cycle of industry promotion we are currently experiencing. First, however, she needed to cut through the intentional vagueness from AI companies regarding the entire idea.
“To use the term ‘artificial intelligence,’ we must grasp what the fuck that term signifies,” Veatch told me during a video conference. “The reality is, it conveys nothing; it’s a term used for marketing and has always been. It’s a completely misleading, foolish phrase that has developed its own cultural interpretation, and I believe it’s crucial to be explicit about the language we employ and the significance of those terms.”
As Ghost in the Machine consistently highlights, the term “artificial intelligence” was first introduced in 1956 by computer scientist John McCarthy in his effort to secure increased funding for his initiatives. However, the documentary presents the inception of the term as just one of numerous significant milestones on a timeline that genuinely begins in Victorian-era England with the emergence of eugenics. Besides being Charles Darwin’s relative, Francis Galton was the pioneer of eugenics — the racist and discredited notion that human beings can be enhanced through the systematic eradication of “inferior” (interpreted as non-white) races.
While Galton certainly made some valuable contributions to academia, Veatch pointed out during our interview that it’s vital not to downplay the reality that his deeply held racist views significantly influenced the social sciences of his time. Galton and his protégé Karl Pearson were not directly involved in the creation of early computational devices. Nevertheless, Galton’s foundational research on multidimensional modeling — a method he employed to assess the appeal of African and European women — influenced Pearson’s thinking as he developed statistical methodologies like logistic regression, a fundamental element of contemporary machine learning.
Galton Pearson contributed to the normalization of the notion that individuals of different races held inherently divergent and measurable traits. This type of racist ideology led Galton and his contemporaries to believe that human intelligence could be quantified and that human brains operated similarly to machines. That leap, according to Veatch, played a notable role in persuading the public of the fantastical concept of artificial intelligence.
“What genuinely took me by surprise during my initial exploration of all of this was how swiftly, when analyzing the issue of superintelligence as a documentarian or journalist, one collides with the diminishing doorframe of race science because it’s interwoven into this technology,” Veatch explained, emphasizing that these notions are “infused” with eugenic ideologies.
Instead of attempting to refute the concept that generative AI models yield hateful ideologies because they have been trained on such material (a notion commonly referred to as “GIGO” — garbage in, garbage out), Ghost in the Machine employs its historical critique to elucidate why the entities developing this technology appear so indifferent to dealing with its contemporary challenges. This historical backdrop aided Veatch in comprehending some of her own disturbing encounters with generative AI when she was experimenting with an early version of Sora in an artists’ Slack group. Veatch recalls the community being friendly and inviting until another participant — a woman of color — began expressing concerns about the manner in which the model consistently whitewashed her whenever she asked it to produce images influenced by photographs of herself.
“It preserved her braids and her attire, but she was framing herself in an art gallery, which the program perceived to be a ‘white space,’” Veatch clarified. “My response was ‘what the hell,’ and I attempted to explain to the community why this was a significant flaw within the software itself.” No one else in the group responded to her post. “This was a Slack channel where, typically, there are always numerous screaming koala emoji reactions attached to every message. Yet this time, it was silent.”
Veatch took the initiative to reach out to OpenAI directly to notify the company about “how racist, sexist, and misogynistic the outputs [she] was witnessing — outputs where women would begin developing extra breasts and twerking after just a couple of rounds of generating a scene.” Veatch expected OpenAI to consider this a significant flaw that needed rectification before promoting Sora for broader usage; however, the company dismissed her concerns.
“The response I received was essentially, ‘This is quite cringe-worthy to bring up; we can’t do anything to change it,’” Veatch recounted.
That experience ignited a desire in Veatch to explore why various forms of generative intelligence consistently exhibit such distasteful, problematic behaviors. Initially, she didn’t believe that discussions with authors of research papers on the technology could lead to an engaging documentary, but her perspective shifted as she began to draw a direct connection from Galton’s eugenic statistic work to modern generative AI companies.
The individuals featured in Ghost in the Machine — a combination of AI researchers, historians, and critical theorists — present a compelling argument that virtually every aspect of the AI industry has been deeply affected by its historical ties to scientific fields designed to uphold discriminatory perspectives. When I inquired whether Veatch had ever been interested in directly speaking with the leaders of the companies criticized in Ghost in the Machine , she chuckled. Securing that kind of access, she remarked, would necessitate her to engage in various ideological contortions and make compromises that would implicate her film in the harms caused by generative AI.
“There’s this idea, you know, that these individuals wouldn’t trust just anyone,” Veatch stated. “Yeah, no kidding, and I genuinely hope they wouldn’t trust me. I’m not seeking to include them in the film, and they already speak to the media extensively. Am I going to embrace Sam Altman on camera? Is that a truthful depiction of this technology? That’s propagandistic.”
Ghost in the Machine will be available for streaming via Kinema from March 26th to March 28th before airing on PBS at some point this autumn.
Correction, March 21st: An earlier version of this article incorrectly referred to “logical regression” when the correct term is “logistic regression.”
