Just last week, Apple revealed its first-ever augmented reality headset, the $3,499 Apple Vision Pro.

TL;DR: As of September 12, you can get a 3-in-1 USB-C Charging Cable for Apple

More than half of broadband customers have experienced problems with their connection over the past year, despite providers inflicting inflation-busting price hikes, a survey suggests. The latest “broadband satisfaction survey” by Which? found that 53% of the nearly 4,000 broadband customers polled had experienced connection issues in the year to January, most commonly frequent connection dropouts, “very” slow speeds and slow uploads and downloads. The issues were “persistent” across all the providers, with narrow margins between the best and worst offenders for poor customer experiences. It's completely unacceptable that customers who have faced these eye-watering increases are also experiencing so many problems with their connection Which? The watchdog noted that the scale of problems added “insult to injury” as many customers saw their bills jump by more than 14% after many providers chose to impose inflation-based price increases earlier this year. Providers often link their annual price rises to January’s Consumer Price Index (CPI) or the Retail Price Index (RPI), which were 10.5% and 13.4% respectively – an amount which would have been unforeseeable for customers signing up to their contract 18 or 24 months previously. The current system forces millions of customers to choose between paying more each month or exorbitant exit fees, which can exceed £200. Industry watchdog Ofcom is currently investigating whether inflation-linked, mid-contract price rises give customers sufficient certainty and clarity when signing up to new contracts. Of the UK’s biggest providers, Sky, Virgin Media, and EE had the lowest proportion of customers who had not experienced any issues, with just 32%, 35% and 37% of their customers not reporting any problems. Of the major providers, BT fared best with 49% of its customers not experiencing a performance issue in the past year. Hyperoptic, Shell Energy Broadband and Utility Warehouse performed better, with half or more of their customers not experiencing any performance issue over the 12 months. However, even with these providers, at least four in 10 customers said they had experienced at least one problem. Frequent connection drop outs were the most common broadband issue, experienced by 19% of those who had suffered a problem. Some 17% suffered slow speeds, while 15% experienced slow uploads and downloads. One in seven (14%) said they had been left without a connection for at least an hour. One in 10 (12%) experienced slow or disrupted streaming when listening to music or watching videos and 8% said they were left without connection for more than a day. Overall, around four in 10 (44%) said they had experienced some kind of customer service issue and 11% said they had either found it difficult to get in touch with their provider or struggled to get their issue resolved. It’s absolutely critical that Ofcom’s review of inflation linked mid-contract hikes results in changes that ensure customers are never trapped in this situation again Rocio Concha, Which? Rocio Concha, Which? director of policy and advocacy, said: “A reliable connection is essential to modern life. Earlier this year, many broadband consumers were hit with mid-contract price hikes of more than 14% – meaning that it’s more important than ever that their provider offers a reliable connection and good customer service. “It’s completely unacceptable that customers who have faced these eye-watering increases are also experiencing so many problems with their connection. Broadband firms need to work harder to resolve these issues and offer a better service. “While some customers are able to switch away to better service and prices, many are trapped in contracts where they either have to accept above inflation price hikes in the spring or pay exorbitant exit fees to leave the contract early. “It’s absolutely critical that Ofcom’s review of inflation linked mid-contract hikes results in changes that ensure customers are never trapped in this situation again.” A Sky spokeswoman said: “We are committed to providing the best service to our customers. “We do not believe this is a representative survey – Ofcom’s quarterly complaints data shows we are consistently one of the least complained about broadband providers and, in Ofcom’s latest report, we received the fewest complaints out of all broadband providers.” A Virgin Media spokesman said: “While these findings are only taken from a small sample of customers, the latest, fuller data from Ofcom shows that our customers benefit from the fastest download speeds, and customer complaints on our broadband services fell by 22% in the first quarter of this year.” EE said: “Ofcom’s latest complaints report shows that we remain one of the least complained about broadband providers, with complaints remaining well below the industry average throughout recent years. “We have proudly led the way with social tariffs since 2008, with around 80% of the total market being supported on BT social tariffs. “Customers who are struggling financially and are eligible for our social tariffs can move penalty-free at any point in their contract, this also includes EE and Plusnet customers. “ Read More Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live Will.i.am hails AI technology as ‘new renaissance’ in music Heart transplant woman’s daughter twice saved her life using Alexa Dolly Parton on AI and not wanting to leave her soul ‘here on earth’

With Apple's Vision Pro threatening to take a chunk out of the virtual reality market,

The world wants to master the process of corralling carbon, and Occidental Petroleum Corp. is building a futuristic

By Sam Nussey TOKYO Sony Group Corp said on Wednesday that its status as an independent provider of

If you know the right string of seemingly random characters to add to the end

Social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, on Monday sued a nonprofit that fights hate speech and

When he’s not making radical, controversial changes to Twitter/X, Elon Musk is eyeing up plans to colonise Mars in the coming years with his company SpaceX – and now a team of researchers at the Virginia-based George Mason University claims it has found out the minimum number of people needed to successfully takeover the red planet. In the study – the results of which were published to the research platform Arxiv in August - the academics established a model to find out the ‘initial population size’ required on Mars to produce a “stable colony size”. They ran the model five times for 28 Earth years, and increased the population by 10 people each time - from 10 to 170 individuals. “Given that there are four critical tasks that are needed continuously (air, water, food production and waste removal) in addition to handling disasters, and two skills needed for each task, we chose a population size of 10 as the minimum needed for a ‘stable’ colony size. “The population is allowed to dip below 10 as long as it bounces back within 1.5 years, or the amount of time between Earth resupply shuttles.” The test found all initial population sizes over 50 were able to sustain a population of at least 10 people across the time period, and that the bare minimum number to meet that criteria is at least 22 people. There you go, Elon. You’re welcome. It’s certainly a decrease in the minimum number previously suspected by French researcher Jean-Marc Salotti in June 2020 – that was the rather astronomical figure (sorry) of at least 110 people. And the Virginia researchers didn’t stop there, either, as they also took a look at the personality types best placed to handle the highly stressful environment that is living on a completely different planet. There’s four: “agreeables”: low competitiveness and aggressiveness, and not fixated on “stringent routine “socials”: medium competitiveness, extroverted, require social interaction but not fixated on stringent routines “reactives”: medium competitiveness and fixed on stringent routines “neurotics”: high competitiveness, highly aggressive and a “challenged ability to adapt to boredom or a change in routine” Perhaps unsurprisingly, the “agreeables” came out on top. The researchers added: “In all runs, the Agreeable personality type was the only one to survive the full duration of model runs. This is likely because it has the highest coping capability.” Their results found that while the “neurotic” was “most likely to fail”, and both “reactives” and “socials” fluctuated, the “agreeables” was the “most resilient”. “While this model assigns equal numbers of each personality type, future work could try adjusting the proportion of each to possibly lead to a lower required minimum initial population. For example, a crew of all Agreeable personalities may be more successful,” they suggest. Musk, meanwhile, said earlier this year that he was optimistic humans landing on Mars was "possible" in the next five years, and "highly likely" in a decade. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

X is suing a nonprofit group in US federal court over reports that hate speech has flourished at the platform...

Twitter owner Elon Musk says the platform, which is currently in transition to what he calls an “everything app” X, would soon only have “Dark Mode” as its theme, bidding adieu to its iconic white and blue colours. Responding to a Twitter user’s post asking what the colour of the verification checkmark on X should be, Mr Musk said the platform will soon only feature the “dark mode” theme. “This platform will soon only have ‘dark mode’. It is better in every way,” the Tesla and SpaceX chief tweeted. Mr Musk’s comment suggests ‘X’ or Twitter could soon only have the dark mode available and turned on by default with no options likely to change it. This expected change comes as the multibillionaire’s plan to build Twitter into an “everything app” X is underway. The company’s new chief Linda Yaccarino, who took charge last month, shared more details about what the new X app will be, tweeting on Sunday that this rebranding was aimed at transforming “the global town square” beyond a social network. “X is the future state of unlimited interactivity – centred in audio, video, messaging, payments/banking – creating a global marketplace for ideas, goods, services, and opportunities. Powered by AI, X will connect us all in ways we’re just beginning to imagine,” Mr Yaccarino tweeted. “For years, fans and critics alike have pushed Twitter to dream bigger, to innovate faster, and to fulfil our great potential. X will do that and more. We’ve already started to see X take shape over the past 8 months through our rapid feature launches, but we’re just getting started,” she said. The recent changes, including the replacement of the company’s iconic blue bird logo with ‘X’, indicate that the platform is heading in a different direction aimded at a different set of users might alienate its once fiercely loyal user base, according to social media experts. Following this change, Mr Musk said he wanted to change polled his followers whether they would favour changing the site’s colour scheme from blue to black, posting a picture of a stylised ‘X’ against a an outer space-themed black background. “And soon we shall bid adieu to the Twitter brand and, gradually, all the birds,” he tweeted. Read More Elon Musk forces firms to pay X $1,000 to keep gold ticks Elon Musk takes control of @X account from user who had held it for 16 years Elon Musk’s SpaceX may have ‘punched hole’ in edge of space with rocket launch

The Justice Department announced on Tuesday five criminal cases against people accused of stealing or illegally diverting American technology and materials for the Russian, Chinese and Iranian governments.