13 June - The Knowledge

In the headlines

A 31-year-old man has been arrested on suspicion of murder after three people were found dead in Nottingham city centre early this morning. Three other people were injured when a van tried to run them over, in what is thought to be a linked incident. Donald Trump has been “scrambling to find a qualified Florida lawyer” ahead of his arraignment in federal court this afternoon, says The Washington Post. Several prominent attorneys have declined to defend the former president over his handling of classified documents, after two key members of his legal team “unexpectedly” resigned last week. The chicken may have come before the egg, it turns out. New research suggests that distant ancestors of modern birds, dating back to before the time of the dinosaurs, gave birth to live young rather than lay eggs, as was previously thought.

Photography

Danish architectural studio EFFEKT has completed Norway’s first treetop walkway, soaring above the woods in the country’s Fyresdal region. The 15-metre-high platform, designed with a gentle incline to be accessible for cyclists and pushchairs, ends in a circular viewpoint with panoramic views over the neighbouring bay. “It grew out of a heartfelt desire to give all people, regardless of physical abilities, the sensational feeling of walking among the treetops,” studio founder Tue Foged tells Dezeen.

On the money

The enormous cost of running chatbots is “threatening to throttle the global AI boom”, says The Washington Post. Services like ChatGPT require “dizzying amounts of computational power and specialised computer chips” known as GPUs – all involving an outlay that they’ll never recoup from adverts alone. Sam Altman, CEO of ChatGPT creator OpenAI, recently told Congress his firm was so short on GPUs, “the less people use our products, the better”.

Sport

When golfer Nick Taylor won the Canadian Open on Sunday – the first homegrown talent to triumph at the event for 69 years – his compatriot and fellow pro Adam Hadwin ran on to the 18th green to celebrate, spraying champagne. Unfortunately, an over-eager security guard mistook Hadwin for a fan – and floored him with a rugby tackle. See more angles here.

Art

French street artist Clet Abraham uses customised stickers to change the look of road signs. Examples include transforming the white bar on a no-entry sign into an arm grabbing a human figure; turning a give way sign into an olive-branch-clutching dove; and sticking a rope on a white arrow to make it an anchor. See more of his work here.

Quirk of history

At the end of last month, a Chinese vessel was detained by Malaysian authorities on suspicion of plundering World War II-era shipwrecks. These delinquent divers weren’t targeting hidden treasure, says Ed Conway on Substack – they were after what’s known as “low background steel”. Ever since the first nuclear test, on 16 July 1945, every tonne of steel produced in the world has been slightly contaminated by radiation. The amounts involved are so miniscule that they’re not harmful to humans, but they can throw off Geiger counters and other particularly radiation-sensitive devices. To get around that problem, you need pre-1945 steel – hence the “lucrative” market for it.

Snapshot

It’s George King-Thompson, the prolific free climber, shortly before he was arrested yesterday morning in South Korea while trying to scale the world’s sixth-tallest building. The 24-year-old had already made it halfway up the 1,820ft Lotte World Tower in Seoul – without a rope or crampon in sight – when police forced him to clamber into the 73rd floor via a maintenance cradle. The madcap athlete has previously been nicked for scrambling up the Shard and base-jumping off Europe’s tallest rollercoaster.

Quoted

“If I had to live my life again, I’d make the same mistakes, only sooner.”

American actress Tallulah Bankhead