"Grand Theft Auto VI" could start breaking records months ahead of the game's Nov. 19 release, as preorders open at midnight Thursday for the long-awaited new installment in the rollicking gangster saga.

Handful of gas plants paid £4m to generate electricity at half- and full-time in World Cup game

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A handful of Great Britain’s gas power plants were paid almost £4m to generate electricity for just a few hours on Tuesday evening as millions of sweltering viewers turned to air conditioning, electric fans and icy drinks during England’s second World Cup game.

The heatwave has caused electricity prices across Europe to surge this week amid higher demand for cooling and a string of power plant outages due to the record high temperatures.

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© Photograph: DeFodi Images/Shutterstock

© Photograph: DeFodi Images/Shutterstock

© Photograph: DeFodi Images/Shutterstock

As companies face increasing pressure to address climate change, many are choosing to publicly announce voluntary carbon-elimination goals.

The carbon-reduction benefits of electric vehicles vary across cities in China, as richer cities can transfer much of their carbon emissions from power generation to less developed cities, burdening them with additional costs, a new study led by UCL researchers has found.

Modular, one of the most promising chip software startups of the AI era, heads for a multibillion-dollar exit.

Modular, one of the most promising chip software startups of the AI era, heads for a multibillion-dollar exit.

New research reveals that many "green" claims are almost impossible to verify, often masking the full truth. University of Technology (UTS) professor of marketing Natalina Zlatevska said shoppers often rely on the labels as a shortcut when making quick decisions in supermarkets.

Bob Iger's tenure as CEO of Disney came to an end a few months ago, after two decades of leading the entertainment giant through some of its most pivotal transformations and acquisitions. Iger, in an exit interview with The Financial Times, has now confirmed some significant efforts that didn't pan out, such as walking away from buying Twitter, being snubbed by Apple, and losing out on the James Bond franchise.

According to Iger, Disney came close to buying Twitter from cofounder Jack Dorsey "at a very attractive price," sometime prior to Elon Musk buying the social media platform in 2022 and changing its name to X. Iger had plans to turn T …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Companies may only need to send an acknowledgment message to boost repeat customer participation in recycling and reuse programs for used goods like laptops and coffee pods, according to a new study led by Penn State researchers. The idea for the study arose over a cup of coffee—more specifically, the single-use pod used to make the coffee. Over a series of experiments, the researchers found that a simple "we received your item" email was all it took to encourage less-engaged customers to become repeat recyclers and to raise the company's sustainability profile.

Walmart is acquiring self-serve connected-TV ad platform Vibe.co for a reported $1.4 billion, adding it to an advertising ecosystem that already includes smart-TV maker Vizio. AdExchanger reports: On Tuesday, Walmart announced that it is buying Vibe.co, the French self-serve ad platform that specializes in helping small brands buy streaming commercials with similar ease and precision as they get from search and social. Vibe has been vying for a bigger share of the ad dollars moving to connected TV, especially in the US, as evidenced by the company's ubiquitous billboards in major cities including New York and San Francisco. Now, Vibe joins Walmart Connect's commerce ecosystem alongside the smart TV maker Vizio. And Vibe's tech is poised to help unify Walmart's growing CTV footprint with the closed-loop attribution provided by its retail sales data. [...] Together, Walmart and Vibe.co strive to "build the best ecosystem for the performance TV market," Vibe CEO and Co-Founder Arthur Querou told AdExchanger. Performance CTV has a high ceiling for growth. The performance budgets dedicated for streaming platforms are still small potatoes compared to search and social, Querou said. Only one-quarter of CTV ad campaigns have lower-funnel objectives, and that number has been static for years, according to data from Advertiser Perceptions. Now that Walmart owns both Vibe and Vizio, advertisers should have an easier time tying streaming campaigns to shopper data. That promise stands to win Walmart more marketing dollars earmarked for retail media and streaming behemoths -- including Amazon. Walmart is especially interested in attracting more small- and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) who lack the tools, budgets or teams to invest in streaming TV, a Walmart spokesperson told AdExchanger. Other ad platforms, including MNTN and Magnite, have likewise targeted SMB advertisers as a source for continued growth in the CTV market. By adding Vibe.co, Walmart can court SMBs with the pitch that its new self-serve tools will make it easier for them to execute CTV campaigns. Plus, SMBs tend to prioritize performance campaigns, since they are under more pressure to justify tighter ad budgets and thus have to be more selective about which platforms they advertise on. And Walmart is better positioned than most platforms to prove its ads drove performance thanks to its retail data foundation.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

New Adelaide University research has identified which industries, workplace structures and employment policies are most strongly linked to gender pay gaps in Australian workplaces, with flexible work arrangements being a key indicator.

A study of funded AI startups provides a glimpse of which jobs may be most affected by AI. As AI tools are embraced by industry after industry, the impacts of these tools on jobs remain unclear. Previous analyses have focused on the theoretical capabilities of LLMs, but social factors are also likely to play a role in shaping what aspects of work see AI integration—or full automation.

Online advertisers and government agencies use algorithmic tools to tailor and target their campaigns to reach as many people as possible.

If public companies are increasingly focused on meeting quarterly earnings expectations, what happens to the innovations that require years of investment and patience to develop?

A new international study has found that venture debt is reshaping how capital moves through technology startup ecosystems around the world. Analyzing data from 59 countries between 2015 and 2024, the researchers show that greater venture debt availability is associated with lower early-stage equity funding, higher late-stage equity funding, and a positive overall effect on the total capital available to startups.

The EU believes a digital euro is the answer to cutting its addiction to U.S. payment systems like Visa and Mastercard, as well as Apple Pay and Google Pay, as the bloc seeks to favor European firms over others.

Energy secretary hails £100bn milestone in this parliament and says it is ‘only the start of what we want to achieve’

Ed Miliband has hailed a boost to UK jobs and growth as government data reveals that private sector companies have pledged more than £100bn in investment into the green economy so far in this parliament.

Offshore wind, solar power and the electricity grid make up the bulk of the planned investment, most of it between 2024 and 2031, which will go to all regions of the UK and comes from a mixture of UK companies and overseas sources including the EU and Japan.

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© Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images

© Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images

© Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images

Investment podcasts can prompt investors to take action. However, they do not provide a reliable return advantage. This is shown in a new working paper by Prof. Dr. Marten Laudi of Kühne Logistics University (KLU) and Janik Ole Wecks of the University of Bremen. Using more than 25,000 episodes, the study examines how podcast content about publicly traded companies and stocks correlates with trading activity, price movements and investment returns.

Conventional wisdom suggests that counterfeit luxury goods are primarily purchased by consumers who cannot afford authentic products. But recent research published in Marketing Science challenges that assumption, finding that both lower- and higher-income consumers are significantly more likely to purchase counterfeit goods than middle-income consumers.

Every day, billions of people rely on technologies from Google, Meta, Microsoft, Amazon and Apple to navigate the world. We use them to communicate, work, shop, find information and stay entertained. But, according to media researcher Bjorn Beijnon, these technologies are doing far more than helping us get things done: They are increasingly shaping how we understand ourselves and the world around us. Beijnon will defend his Ph.D. on the subject at the University of Amsterdam on June 19.