More than 90% of manufacturers embrace regionalization for stronger supply chains, Kearney findsSuspect in the killing of UnitedHealthcare’s CEO struggles, shouts while entering courthouse
Dell Technologies Q3 revenue falls short of estimates as weak PC demand weighsFor travelers, Puerto Rico is a floating island of desirabilitySaquon Barkley is the NFL's version of Shohei Ohtani: AnalysisCan't fix blame on one person, says Telugu film industry HYDERABAD: Telugu film industry came out Friday in support of Allu Arjun , saying he alone could not be held responsible for the Dec 4 theatre stampede that left a woman dead. Writer-director Trivikram Srinivas went to Nampally criminal court where Allu was produced after his arrest and spoke in support. Top producer Dil Raju was at Chikkadpally police station after police arrested Allu. He, however, refused to speak to the media. Actor Nani took to social media, saying: "We are all at fault here. One person is not responsible for this. I wish the kind of enthusiasm govt authorities and media show in anything related to people from cinema was also there for common citizens. Then we can all live in a better society". Balakrishna, actor and MLA of Andhra Pradesh's governing TDP, joined the chorus for Allu, terming his arrest "an act of injustice". "We will stand with Allu Arjun at this time," Balakrishna said. Actor Rahul Ramakrishna dubbed Allu's arrest "a tactic of the state to lay blame easily on soft targets like film celebrity figures". "The failure of law and order is not one man's fault or responsibility. Aren't cinemas and theatres public spaces? Isn't an individual allowed to visit one according to their choice? Regardless of the star's appearance and the tragic incident, why did police let such a huge crowd run amok in the first place?" Ramakrishna wrote. Stay updated with the latest news on Times of India . Don't miss daily games like Crossword , Sudoku , and Mini Crossword .
Texas AG puts tech platforms, including ‘predatory’ Character.AI, on notice after chilling lawsuitPride, bragging rights and more than $115M at stake when final college playoff rankings come out
Pride, bragging rights and more than $115M at stake when final college playoff rankings come out
Toronto Argonauts sign American running back Kevin BrownNASSAU, Bahamas — Scottie Scheffler brought a new putting grip to the Hero World Challenge and felt enough improvement to be satisfied with the result, a 5-under 67 that left him three shots behind Cameron Young on Thursday. Young was playing for the first time since the BMW Championship more than three months ago and found great success on and around the greens of Albany Golf Club, chipping beautifully and holing four birdie putts from 15 feet or longer for his 64. He led by two shots over Justin Thomas in his first competition since his daughter was born a few weeks ago. Thomas ran off four straight birdies late in his round and was a fraction of an inch away with a fifth. The big surprise was Scheffler, the No. 1 player in golf who looked as good as he has all year in compiling eight victories, including an Olympic gold medal. His iron play has no equal. His putting at times has kept him from winning more or winning bigger. He decided to try to a "saw" putting grip from about 20 feet or closer — the putter rests between his right thumb and his fingers, with his left index finger pointed down the shaft. "I'm always looking for ways to improve," Scheffler said. Scheffler last year began working with renowned putting instructor Phil Kenyon, and he says Kenyon mentioned the alternative putting grip back then. "But it was really our first time working together and it's something that's different than what I've done in the past," Scheffler said. "This year I had thought about it from time to time, and it was something that we had just said let's table that for the end of the season, take a look at it. "Figured this is a good week to try stuff." He opened with a wedge to 2 feet and he missed a 7-foot birdie putt on the par-5 third. But he holed a birdie from about the same distance at the next par 5, No. 6, and holed a sliding 6-footer on the ninth to save par. His longest putt was his last hole, from 12 feet for a closing birdie. "I really enjoyed the way it felt," he said. "I felt like I'm seeing some improvements in my stroke." Young, regarded as the best active player without a PGA Tour victory, is treating this holiday tournament as the start of a new season. He worked on getting stronger and got back to the basics in his powerful golf swing. And on this day, he was dialed in with his short game. He only struggled to save par twice and kept piling up birdies in his bogey-free round on an ideal day in the Bahamas. "The wind wasn't blowing much so it was relatively stress-free," Young said. Patrick Cantlay, along with Scheffler playing for the first time since the Presidents Cup, also was at 67 with Ludvig Aberg, Akshay Bhatia and Sahith Theegala. Thomas also took this occasion to do a little experimenting against a 20-man field. He has using a 46-inch driver at home — a little more than an inch longer than his regular driver — in a bid to gain more speed. On a day with little wind, on a golf course with some room off the tee, he decided to put it in play. "Just with it being a little bit longer, I just kind of have to get the club out in front of me and get on top of it a little bit more," Thomas said. "I drove the hell out of it on the back, so that was nice to try something different and have it go a little bit better on the back." Thomas said the longer driver gives him 2 or 3 mph in ball speed and 10 extra yards in the air. "It's very specific for courses, but gave it a try," he said. Conditions were easy enough that only four players in field failed to break par, with Jason Day bringing up the rear with a 75.Obama Speaks to Young Leaders as Some Democrats Push to Pass the Torch
WASHINGTON (AP) — The grinding war between Ukraine and its Russian invaders has escalated ahead of Donald Trump's inauguration, with President Joe Biden rushing out billions of dollars more in military aid before U.S. support for Kyiv’s defenses is thrown into question under the new administration. Russia, Ukraine and their global allies are scrambling to put their side in the best possible position for any changes that Trump may bring to American policy in the nearly 3-year-old war . The president-elect insisted in recent days that Russia and Ukraine immediately reach a ceasefire and said Ukraine should likely prepare to receive less U.S. military aid. On the war's front lines, Ukraine's forces are mindful of Trump's fast-approaching presidency and the risk of losing their biggest backer . If that happens, “those people who are with me, my unit, we are not going to retreat," a Ukrainian strike-drone company commander, fighting in Russia's Kursk region with the 47th Brigade, told The Associated Press by phone. “As long as we have ammunition, as long as we have weapons, as long as we have some means to defeat the enemy, we will fight,” said the commander, who goes by his military call sign, Hummer. He spoke on condition he not be identified by name, citing Ukrainian military rules and security concerns. “But, when all means run out, you must understand, we will be destroyed very quickly,” he said. The Biden administration is pushing every available dollar out the door to shore up Ukraine's defenses before leaving office in six weeks, announcing more than $2 billion in additional support since Trump won the presidential election last month. The U.S. has sent a total of $62 billion in military aid since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022. And more help is on the way. The Treasury Department said Tuesday it would disburse $20 billion — the U.S. portion of a $50 billion multinational loan to Ukraine , backed by Russia's frozen central bank assets — before Biden leaves the White House. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said the funds “will provide Ukraine a critical infusion of support.” And the State Department said Tuesday it had approved the sale of a $266 million package to help Ukraine with the long-term operation and maintenance of F-16 fighter aircraft from the U.S. and other allies. Biden also has eased limits on Ukraine using American longer-range missiles against military targets deeper inside Russia, following months of refusing those appeals over fears of provoking Russia into nuclear war or attacks on the West. He's also newly allowed Ukraine to employ antipersonnel mines , which are banned by many countries. Biden and his senior advisers, however, are skeptical that allowing freer use of longer-range missiles will change the broader trajectory of the war, according to two senior administration officials who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. But the administration has at least a measure of confidence that its scramble, combined with continued strong European support , means it will leave office having given Ukraine the tools it needs to sustain its fight for some time, the officials said. Enough to hold on, but not enough to defeat Russian President Vladimir Putin's forces, according to Ukraine and some of its allies. Even now, “the Biden administration has been very careful not to run up against the possibility of a defeated Putin or a defeated Russia” for fear of the tumult that could bring, said retired Gen. Philip Breedlove, a former supreme allied commander of NATO. He is critical of Biden’s cautious pace of military support for Ukraine. Events far from the front lines this past weekend demonstrated the war's impact on Russia’s military . In Syria, rebels seized the capital and toppled Russia-allied President Bashar Assad . Russian forces in Syria had propped up Assad for years, but they moved out of the way of the rebels’ assault , unwilling to take losses to defend their ally. Biden said it was further evidence that U.S. support for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was wearing down Russia’s military. Trump, who has long spoken favorably of Putin and described Zelenskyy as a “showman" wheedling money from the U.S., used that moment to call for an immediate ceasefire between Ukraine and Russia. And asked in a TV interview — taped before he met with Zelenskyy over the weekend in Paris — if Ukraine should prepare for the possibility of reduced aid, Trump said, “Yeah. Probably. Sure.” Trump's supporters call that pre-negotiation maneuvering by an avowed deal-maker. His critics say they fear it shows he is in Putin's sway. Zelenskyy said Monday that Russian forces’ retrenchment from outposts worldwide demonstrates that “the entire army of this great pseudo-empire is fighting against the Ukrainian people today.” “Forcing Putin to end the war requires Ukraine to be strong on the battlefield before it can be strong diplomatically,” Zelenskyy wrote on social media, repeating near-daily appeals for more longer-range missiles from the U.S. and Europe. In Kursk, Hummer, the Ukrainian commander, said he notices Russian artillery strikes and shelling easing up since the U.S. and its European allies loosened limits on the use of longer-range missiles. But Moscow has been escalating its offensives in other ways in the past six months, burning through men and materiel in infantry assaults and other attacks far faster than it can replace them, according to the Institute for the Study of War. In Kursk, that includes Russia sending waves of soldiers on motorcycles and golf carts to storm Ukrainian positions, Hummer said. The Ukrainian drone commander and his comrades defend the ground they have seized from Russia with firearms, tanks and armored vehicles provided by the U.S. and other allies. Ukraine’s supporters fear that the kind of immediate ceasefire Trump is urging would be mostly on Putin’s terms and allow the Russian leader to resume the war when his military has recovered. “Putin is sacrificing his own soldiers at a grotesque rate to take whatever territory he can on the assumption that the U.S. will tell Ukraine that U.S. aid is over unless Russia gets to keep what it has taken,” Phillips O’Brien, a professor of strategic studies at Scotland’s University of St. Andrews, wrote on his Substack channel. Putin's need for troops led him to bring in North Korean forces . Biden's decision to allow Ukraine to use longer-range missiles more broadly in Russia was partly in response, intended to discourage North Korea from deeper involvement in the war, one of the senior administration officials said. Since 2022, Russia already had been pulling forces and other military assets from Syria, Central Asia and elsewhere to throw into the Ukraine fight, said George Burros, an expert on the Russia-Ukraine conflict at the Institute for the Study of War. Any combat power that Russia has left in Syria that it could deploy to Ukraine is unlikely to change battlefield momentum, Burros said. “The Kremlin has prioritized Ukraine as much as it can,” he said. Novikov reported from Kyiv, Ukraine.GREEN BAY, Wis. (AP) — After losing to San Francisco in the playoffs three of the last five seasons, the Green Bay Packers wouldn’t mind seeing the 49ers get left out of the postseason entirely. The Packers (7-3) could damage San Francisco’s playoff hopes Sunday by beating the 49ers at Lambeau Field. San Francisco (5-5) dropped to .500 after losing at home to the Seattle Seahawks, though the 49ers remain just a game behind the Arizona Cardinals in the NFC West. Javascript is required for you to be able to read premium content. Please enable it in your browser settings.
A 7-year-old rivalry between tech leaders Elon Musk and Sam Altman over who should run OpenAI and prevent an artificial intelligence "dictatorship" is now heading to a federal judge as Musk seeks to halt the ChatGPT maker's ongoing shift into a for-profit company. Musk, an early OpenAI investor and board member, sued the artificial intelligence company earlier this year alleging it had betrayed its founding aims as a nonprofit research lab benefiting the public good rather than pursuing profits. Musk has since escalated the dispute, adding new claims and asking for a court order that would stop OpenAI’s plans to convert itself into a for-profit business more fully. The world's richest man, whose companies include Tesla, SpaceX and social media platform X, last year started his own rival AI company, xAI. Musk says it faces unfair competition from OpenAI and its close business partner Microsoft, which has supplied the huge computing resources needed to build AI systems such as ChatGPT. “OpenAI and Microsoft together exploiting Musk’s donations so they can build a for-profit monopoly, one now specifically targeting xAI, is just too much,” says Musk's filing that alleges the companies are violating the terms of Musk’s foundational contributions to the charity. OpenAI is filing a response Friday opposing Musk’s requested order, saying it would cripple OpenAI’s business and mission to the advantage of Musk and his own AI company. A hearing is set for January before U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers in Oakland. At the heart of the dispute is a 2017 internal power struggle at the fledgling startup that led to Altman becoming OpenAI's CEO. Musk also sought to be CEO and in an email outlined a plan where he would “unequivocally have initial control of the company” but said that would be temporary. He grew frustrated after two other OpenAI co-founders said he would hold too much power as a major shareholder and chief executive if the startup succeeded in its goal to achieve better-than-human AI known as artificial general intelligence , or AGI. Musk has long voiced concerns about how advanced forms of AI could threaten humanity. “The current structure provides you with a path where you end up with unilateral absolute control over the AGI," said a 2017 email to Musk from co-founders Ilya Sutskever and Greg Brockman. “You stated that you don't want to control the final AGI, but during this negotiation, you've shown to us that absolute control is extremely important to you.” In the same email, titled “Honest Thoughts,” Sutskever and Brockman also voiced concerns about Altman's desire to be CEO and whether he was motivated by “political goals.” Altman eventually succeeded in becoming CEO, and has remained so except for a period last year when he was fired and then reinstated days later after the board that ousted him was replaced. OpenAI published the messages Friday in a blog post meant to show its side of the story, particularly Musk's early support for the idea of making OpenAI a for-profit business so it could raise money for the hardware and computer power that AI needs. It was Musk, through his wealth manager Jared Birchall, who first registered “Open Artificial Technologies Technologies, Inc.”, a public benefit corporation, in September 2017. Then came the “Honest Thoughts” email that Musk described as the “final straw.” “Either go do something on your own or continue with OpenAI as a nonprofit,” Musk wrote back. OpenAI said Musk later proposed merging the startup into Tesla before resigning as the co-chair of OpenAI's board in early 2018. Musk didn't immediately respond to emailed requests for comment sent to his companies Friday. Asked about his frayed relationship with Musk at a New York Times conference last week, Altman said he felt “tremendously sad” but also characterized Musk’s legal fight as one about business competition. “He’s a competitor and we’re doing well,” Altman said. He also said at the conference that he is “not that worried” about the Tesla CEO’s influence with President-elect Donald Trump. OpenAI said Friday that Altman plans to make a $1 million personal donation to Trump’s inauguration fund, joining a number of tech companies and executives who are working to improve their relationships with the incoming administration. —————————— The Associated Press and OpenAI have a licensing and technology agreement allowing OpenAI access to part of the AP’s text archives.DALLAS — Chicago Cubs shortstop Dansby Swanson’s offseason surgery
Pride, bragging rights and more than $115M at stake when final college playoff rankings come out