Premier League kick-off: Man Utd host Fulham, Man City face Chelsea
By EasternEyeAug 16, 2024
MANCHESTER United kick off the 2024/25 Premier League season at home to Fulham on Friday, while Manchester City begins its title defence at Chelsea on Sunday.
New Liverpool manager Arne Slot will have his first competitive match on Saturday against newly-promoted Ipswich. This will mark his first game since taking over from Jurgen Klopp.
Here's a preview of the opening weekend of the new season:
Ten Hag needs fast start
Manchester United's surprise FA Cup final win over Manchester City in May helped Erik ten Hag remain in charge at Old Trafford. The Dutch manager has received support from United's new football operations hierarchy, led by British billionaire Jim Ratcliffe, and has been given a contract extension until 2026.
To bolster Ten Hag's squad, Leny Yoro, Joshua Zirkzee, Matthijs de Ligt, and Noussair Mazraoui have been signed for around £150 million. After finishing eighth last season—United's worst-ever Premier League finish—Ten Hag needs a quick start to dispel doubts about his ability to lead the club.
Fulham won at Old Trafford for the first time in 20 years in February. A repeat performance on Friday would leave United fans concerned about another disappointing season.
Ipswich plans slot shock
Arne Slot faces a challenging start as Liverpool visits Ipswich, who are back in the top flight after a 22-year absence and have enjoyed successive promotions. Liverpool has not made any signings in the transfer window but has had a strong pre-season, with notable wins over Arsenal, United, and Sevilla.
A win at Portman Road would provide some relief to Liverpool fans adjusting to the end of Klopp's tenure. The Reds could gain momentum with an easier fixture schedule leading up to the October international break.
Ipswich defender Axel Tuanzebe remains optimistic about maintaining Ipswich's strong home record over the past two seasons. "We're going to empty the tank and give everything we've got," Tuanzebe told the BBC. "They're just humans. It is just 11 v 11 on the pitch. Not many teams win at Portman Road, and we intend to keep it that way."
Chelsea chaos vs City continuity
New Chelsea manager Enzo Maresca faces a challenging match against his former club. Maresca, who was part of Pep Guardiola's coaching staff at City, led Leicester to promotion from the Championship last season.
He takes over a chaotic situation at Stamford Bridge, where the first-team squad now has over 50 players, and there are uncertainties regarding many of them. Chelsea's struggles were evident in a difficult pre-season, which included a 4-2 loss to City in the USA.
In contrast, there have been few changes for Guardiola's champions. Brazilian winger Savinho is the only new addition, while Argentine forward Julian Alvarez has left for Atletico Madrid.
City's England players, Kyle Walker, John Stones, and Phil Foden, along with Spanish midfielder Rodri, returned to training only this week after competing in the Euro 2024 final and are unlikely to start against Chelsea.
Elon Musk was forced to step in on Sunday after his artificial intelligence chatbot, Grok, falsely claimed he had “taken” the wife of former Trump adviser Stephen Miller. The misleading statement came after a doctored screenshot circulated on X, formerly Twitter, appearing to show a personal exchange between Musk and Miller.
The fabricated post, supposedly from Miller, read: “We will take back America,” to which Musk allegedly replied, “Just like I took your wife.” The image was shared by a user on X, prompting them to ask Grok whether the exchange was real.
Grok misidentifies fake content
In response, Grok stated the post likely did exist but was deleted. It explained, “The engagement metrics and context align with Musk’s behaviour, but its deletion means direct verification is unavailable.” The chatbot concluded that while a fabricated screenshot was possible, “the evidence leans toward the post being real but removed, consistent with Musk’s pattern of deleting controversial posts.”
— (@)
Musk quickly responded to the thread to clarify the situation. “No, it’s fake ffs. I never posted this,” he wrote, dismissing Grok’s assessment.
Background on Katie Miller and DOGE
Katie Miller, who is married to Stephen Miller, previously served as a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security and worked as an aide to former Vice President Mike Pence. She also briefly held a position in Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), a now-defunct political advisory unit.
While in DOGE, Katie Miller was said to have played a significant role in shaping Musk’s political messaging and media strategy. Her appointment marked a rare overlap between the worlds of Silicon Valley and Washington politics. Reports suggest that the Millers and Musk had a close working relationship during that time and socialised outside of work as well.
However, the relationship appears to have cooled, particularly after Musk’s public rift with former US president Donald Trump.
Tensions between Musk and Trump
The feud between Musk and Trump began when Trump criticised Musk for opposing his legislative proposal, referred to as the “Big Beautiful Bill”, which aimed to cut subsidies for electric vehicles. Speaking from the Oval Office, Trump said he was “disappointed in Elon” and accused him of acting out due to the financial impact the bill would have on Tesla.
Musk retaliated by posting on X that Trump would have lost the last election without his support, claiming Democrats would control the House and Republicans would only have a 51–49 margin in the Senate. In a further post, Musk referenced the Epstein files, suggesting that Trump’s connections might be one reason why those documents have not been released publicly.
Musk unfollows Miller amid ongoing fallout
Amid the ongoing tension, Musk has reportedly unfollowed Stephen Miller on X. The incident involving Grok and the fabricated screenshot has only added fuel to the speculation that political alliances between Musk and former Trump allies are weakening.
This event has also raised concerns about the reliability of AI tools like Grok in verifying online information, especially when used by the public to assess political or personal claims involving high-profile individuals.
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A Post Office van parked outside the venue for the Post Office Horizon IT inquiry at Aldwych House on January 11, 2024 in London.
THE UK government said on Monday that more than £1 billion has been paid to self-employed managers of Post Office branches who were affected by faults in the Horizon accounting software.
The update comes a few weeks after Alan Bates, the former subpostmaster who led the campaign for justice, criticised the compensation process, calling it “quasi-kangaroo courts”.
The Department for Business and Trade (DBT) said it had received 11,208 claims in total. Of these, 7,569 have been settled, while 3,709 are still pending.
Between 1999 and 2015, the Post Office prosecuted over 900 subpostmasters based on errors in Horizon, a software developed by Fujitsu. The system incorrectly showed shortfalls in branch accounts.
Many subpostmasters were forced to repay the shortfalls and later went bankrupt. Some were imprisoned and faced social stigma.
At least four people took their own lives, and several others died before they were exonerated.
In 2019, the High Court ruled that computer errors, not criminal behaviour, had led to the missing funds.
Alan Bates, who was knighted by King Charles III for his efforts to expose the issue, has criticised how the DBT is handling the assessment of claims.
"The department sits in judgement of the claims and alters the goal posts as and when it chooses," he told The Sunday Times last month.
Public attention around the case grew in January 2024 following a television drama about the subpostmasters’ experiences, which sparked widespread public reaction.
Following that, Fujitsu’s European director Paul Patterson appeared before a parliamentary committee and apologised for the firm’s role in prosecutions based on incorrect data. He said the company was “truly sorry” for “this appalling miscarriage of justice”.
Post Office Minister Gareth Thomas said the government had prioritised faster payments since taking office in July 2024.
"We are settling cases every day and getting compensation out more quickly for the most complex cases, but the job isn't done until every postmaster has received fair and just redress," he said.
(With inputs from agencies)
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Apple researchers evaluated several prominent generative AI systems
A new research paper from Apple has exposed serious shortcomings in the reasoning abilities of some of today’s most advanced artificial intelligence (AI) systems. Despite being marketed as powerful tools capable of solving complex problems, the study shows that these models still struggle with basic logical tasks, raising questions about the real capabilities of large language and reasoning models.
AI models fail child-level logic tests
Apple researchers evaluated several prominent generative AI systems, including ChatGPT, Claude, and DeepSeek, using classic problem-solving tasks. One of the tests was the well-known Tower of Hanoi puzzle, which requires moving discs across pegs while following specific rules.
While the puzzle is simple enough for a bright child to solve, most AI models failed when asked to handle scenarios involving more than seven discs. Accuracy fell below 80% with seven discs, and performance dropped even further with eight. According to co-lead author Iman Mirzadeh, the issue wasn't just solving the puzzle — it was that the models couldn’t follow a logical thought process even when given the solution algorithm.
“They fail to reason in a step-by-step, structured way,” he said, noting that the models’ approach was neither logical nor intelligent.
The myth of scaling exposed
The results challenge one of the AI industry’s most commonly held beliefs: that simply scaling models — making them larger and feeding them more data — will lead to better performance. Apple’s research provides strong evidence that this is not always true.
Gary Marcus, a well-known AI researcher and commentator, called the findings a reality check. Venture capitalist Josh Wolfe even coined a new verb, “to GaryMarcus”, meaning to critically debunk exaggerated claims about AI. The Apple study, Wolfe argued, had done exactly that by revealing the real limits of model reasoning.
Marcus has long argued that AI systems, particularly those based on neural networks, can only generalise within the data they’ve seen before. Once asked to work beyond that training distribution, they often break down — a pattern clearly confirmed in Apple’s tests.
AI is not yet a substitute for human logic
To be clear, even humans make errors on the more complex versions of the Tower of Hanoi. However, AI systems were supposed to improve on this, not replicate human flaws. As Marcus points out, artificial general intelligence (AGI) should combine human creativity with machine-level precision. But instead of outperforming people in logic and reliability, today’s large models still make basic errors.
Most AI models failed when asked to handle scenarios involving more than seven discsiStock
Apple’s results also support concerns raised by Arizona State University’s Subbarao Kambhampati, who has cautioned against assuming AI models reason like humans. In reality, they often skip steps or fail to understand the underlying principles of a problem, despite producing convincing-sounding answers.
Caution urged for businesses and society
The implications are significant for businesses looking to integrate AI into their operations. While models such as GPT-4, Claude, and others perform well in areas like writing, coding, and brainstorming, they remain unreliable for high-stakes decision-making. As Marcus points out, these systems can’t yet outperform classical algorithms in areas like database management, protein folding, or strategic games like chess.
This unpredictability limits how much society can rely on generative AI. While the technology will continue to be useful in supporting human tasks, it is far from being a replacement for human judgement or traditional rule-based systems in critical contexts.
The illusion of intelligence
Perhaps most concerning is how easily these models can appear more capable than they are. If an AI performs well on an easy test, users may assume it can handle more complex problems too. But Apple’s study shows this confidence can be misplaced. The same model that solves a four-disc puzzle may completely fail when asked to solve one with eight.
This illusion of intelligence could lead to overtrust in AI systems — something experts warn must be avoided if the technology is to be used responsibly.
Rethinking the future of AI
Despite the findings, Marcus remains optimistic about AI’s future, just not in its current form. He believes that hybrid approaches, combining classical logic with modern computing power, could eventually produce more reliable systems. But he is sceptical that current LLM-based systems are the answer.
The Apple paper shows that hype around generative AI has outpaced its real-world abilities. Until AI can reason in a consistent, logical manner — not just produce convincing text — it will remain limited in scope.
As researchers and developers reflect on these findings, one thing is clear: the path to truly intelligent machines will require more than just scaling up. It will demand smarter, better-designed models that prioritise reliability over illusion.
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Kendrick Lamar on stage after winning Best Video for Not Like Us at the 2025 BET Awards
There’s no question who ruled the night at the 2025 BET Awards. Kendrick Lamar walked away with five trophies, including Album of the Year for GNX and Video of the Year for Not Like Us. The ceremony, held at the Peacock Theatre in Los Angeles, paid tribute to Black excellence in music, acting, and sports, and Kendrick made sure his voice and message were front and centre.
Kendrick Lamar accepts Best Album for GNX at the BET Awards in Los AngelesGetty Images
Lamar, Doechii, and a moment that mattered
The GNX rapper also won Best Male Hip-Hop Artist and shared the Video Director of the Year award with Dave Free. Accepting his award, Lamar reflected on his long-standing relationship with BET, saying, “They’ve always kept the culture at the core and put me in the middle of it.”
— (@)
Rising rapper Doechii also made headlines, not just for winning Best Female Hip-Hop Artist but for calling out former US President Donald Trump. In a fiery speech, she criticised the use of military force to break up protests in LA following ICE raids in Latino communities. “Every time we stand up for our rights, the military is sent in. What kind of leadership is that?” she asked the crowd.
A night of icons and throwbacks
The night wasn’t just about current stars. The BET Ultimate Icon Award honoured Mariah Carey, Snoop Dogg, Jamie Foxx, and gospel star Kirk Franklin for their decades of influence in music, entertainment, and community action. Stevie Wonder presented Foxx’s award as he opened up about his recovery from a 2023 stroke. “When I saw the ‘In Memoriam’ segment, I thought that could’ve been me,” he said.
Mariah Carey celebrates her Ultimate Icon Award with a rare live performanceGetty Images
Mariah Carey, presented her award by Busta Rhymes, lit up the stage with a brief but heartfelt speech. “If you're going to win one of these, it might as well be the Ultimate Icon,” she joked, hinting at the ups and downs of her legendary career.
With Lamar and SZA heading back on tour and voices like Doechii’s rising louder, the 2025 BET Awards proved it is a stage for change.
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Harris Dickinson debuts as Rhode’s first male model in new Glazing Mist campaign
Rhode, Hailey Bieber’s rapidly growing skincare label, has chosen Babygirl actor Harris Dickinson as the face of its new product, the Glazing Mist. Known for his understated performances and growing fashion presence, Dickinson is the first male model to front a campaign for the brand. The new mist, priced at £24 (₹2,520), goes live on 24 June exclusively at rhodeskin.com.
A surprising choice that feels just right
The campaign, shot in stark black-and-white, features close-up visuals of Dickinson misting his face with the Glazing Mist, designed to refresh skin and deliver a natural glow. With ingredients like ectoin, ceramides, and magnolia extract, the formula offers both hydration and barrier support. It has also earned a stamp of approval from the National Eczema Association.
Hailey Bieber explained her choice simply: she watched Babygirl, loved Dickinson’s performance, and sensed he could bring the kind of quiet edge she wanted. “I didn’t want it to feel too ‘on-the-nose’ with the film,” she said. “It had to be chic and sporty.” The internet, however, couldn’t resist the connection to Dickinson’s now-infamous milk scene in the film, and fans were quick to point out how the dewy mist echoed that very vibe.
Rhode expands, without changing its DNA
Since its 2022 launch, Rhode has stood out for sleek, limited product drops and a focused digital presence. Its recent £790 million (₹82,950 crore) acquisition by e.l.f. Beauty has only amplified interest in where the brand goes next. While introducing a male face might suggest a shift, Bieber was clear: this isn’t about launching a men’s line but widening the brand’s appeal. “I want everyone to see themselves in Rhode,” she said.
Dickinson’s inclusion reflects a subtle repositioning. Best known for roles in Beach Rats, Triangle of Sadness, and now Babygirl, he has also been a regular in fashion, working with Dior and Loewe.
With this campaign, Rhode continues to evolve clearly, without losing the minimalist identity that made it stand out in the first place.