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The Saudi designer to the stars
He has dressed celebrity royalty around the world from Beyonce and Deepika Padukone to Zendaya and Cardi B but for years few of Mohammed Ashi's clients knew he was Saudi Arabia's first big-name designer."In the 90s I was the only designer from Saudi. But I never said I was Saudi. I wanted the clothes to be out front, not me," Ashi told AFP in a rare interview at his Paris studio. It is partly shyness -- he still prefers not to be photographed...
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'Everything Everywhere All at Once’ sweeps with seven Oscars
Surreal sci-fi film "Everything Everywhere All at Once" dominated the Oscars on Sunday, winning seven golden statuettes including best picture, Hollywood's most coveted prize. The unorthodox but beloved movie -- which features multiple universes and hot dog fingers -- also won best director, best actress, best original screenplay, best editing, and both the best supporting actor and actress prizes.Michelle Yeoh, who is Malaysian, becomes the...
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At San Francisco expo, AI 'sorry' for destroying humanity
Advances in artificial intelligence are coming so hard and fast that a museum in San Francisco, the beating heart of the tech revolution, has imagined a memorial to the demise of humanity. "Sorry for killing most of humanity person with smile cap and mustache," says a monitor welcoming a visitor to the "Misalignment Museum," a new exhibit on the controversial technology.The pieces in this temporary show mix the disturbing with the comic, and this...
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Goats, boyfriends, UFOs: New York reveals bizarre hotline calls
New York's non-emergency hotline is largely intended for noise complaints, rat sightings and enquiries about much-loathed alternate side parking rules.But the 311 number has, in its 20 years in operation, also received its fair share of obscure enquiries that operators may have struggled to answer, the city has revealed."Can you tell me the steps for boiling a live chicken?" one caller asked, according to a list released Thursday to mark the...
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Girl with AI earrings sparks Dutch art controversy
At first glance it seems to be just a modern take on Johannes Vermeer's masterpiece "Girl with a Pearl Earring". But look more closely and things get a little strange.Firstly, there are two glowing earrings in the image hanging in the Mauritshuis museum in the Dutch city of The Hague. And aren't those freckles on her face actually... a slightly inhuman shade of red?That's because the work -- one of several fan recreations replacing the 1665...
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Warnings over AI and toxic beauty myths follow TikTok's Bold Glamour filter
TikTok's latest sensation is a real-time filter called Bold Glamour that sashays right past debates over toxic beauty standards on social media, going all in on giving users a new face. Quietly released to the app's more than a billion users, Bold Glamour convincingly blends a user's real face with an AI-generated ideal of a supermodel, drawing both laughs and alarm.Millions of posts on TikTok capture the shock at Bold Glamour's superpowers, with...
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Machine magic or art menace? Japan's first AI manga
The author of a sci-fi manga about to hit shelves in Japan admits he has "absolutely zero" drawing talent, so turned to artificial intelligence to create the dystopian saga. All the futuristic contraptions and creatures in "Cyberpunk: Peach John" were intricately rendered by Midjourney, a viral AI tool that has sent the art world into a spin, along with others such as Stable Diffusion and DALL-E 2.As Japan's first fully AI-drawn manga, the work...
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Qatari Amir receives Kuwait's Foreign Minister
DOHA: Qatari Amir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani on Sunday met the visiting Representative of His Highness the Amir Sheikh Nawaf Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah, Kuwait's Foreign Minister Sheikh Salem Abdullah Al-Jaber Al-Sabah, who is heading Kuwait's delegation at the fifth United Nations Conference on the Least Developed Countries in Doha.Sheikh Salem conveyed sincere greetings and well wishes from His Highness the Kuwaiti Amir, His Highness the...
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ChatGPT turns to manga in 'One Piece' author experiment
The AI programme ChatGPT has passed exams, penned news articles and produced code. So perhaps no surprise that "One Piece" author Eiichiro Oda has turned to it for inspiration.The man behind the record-breaking manga often referred to as one of the best-known in the world seemed to have found himself struggling with writer's block last month."Hello. This is the author. I cannot come up with a story for One Piece next week. Would you think of a...
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Demon Slayer Movie 2 not shown in Kuwait theaters
After Saudi Arabia banned the Japanese anime film 'Demon Slayer: To the Swordsmith Village' from local theaters over censorship issues, Kuwait has seemingly followed suit as the movie is no longer listed by local cinema providers despite being advertised earlier to release this weekend.Saudi Cinema had posted a message on its Twitter profile to explain the reason behind the cancelation, saying that “the company that has the rights to distribute...
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Egypt unveils hidden corridor in Giza pyramid
Scientists have discovered a hidden passage inside Egypt's Great Pyramid, the authorities announced on Thursday, part of a seven-year international research project.The passage is nine meters (30 feet) in length and more than two meters in width, the antiquities ministry said in a statement.Egypt's Tourism and Antiquities Minister Ahmed Issa told reporters at the ancient site in Giza also known as the Khufu, or Cheops, pyramid, that the "gabled...
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Swapping kabsa for kale: Saudis embrace healthy eating
Long partial to heavy lunchtime platters of meat and rice, Asim Al-Shammari has recently turned to lighter fare from a self-described diet restaurant, swayed by Saudi Arabia's anti-obesity push. Roughly one in five Saudi adults is obese, according to an in-depth study published by the World Bank last year that described the problem as "alarming".The Global Obesity Observatory places the kingdom at number 17 in its international rankings of...
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French energy group TotalEnergies CEO Patrick Pouyanne attends a panel during the World Economic Forum Special Meeting in Riyadh on April 28, 2024. -- AFP
France to ‘fight’ TotalEnergies’ New York listing
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DUBAI: A car drives along a flooded street on May 2, 2024, as heavy rains returned to the United Arab Emirates. - AFP
Schools, offices shut as heavy rain returns to UAE
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MEIZHOU, China: This photo taken on May 1, 2024 shows an aerial view of a collapsed section of a highway near Meizhou, in southern China’s Guangdong province. -- AFP
Death toll from south China road crash rises to 48
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BEIRUT: Lebanon's Prime Minister Najib Mikati poses for a picture with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides during their meeting at the Grand Serail government headquarters on May 2, 2024. - AFP
EU vows $1bn for Lebanon, urges migration curbs
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LOS ANGELES: Police clash with pro-Palestinian students after destroying part of the encampment barricade on the campus of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) on May 2, 2024. - AFP
Biden says ‘order must prevail’ amid campus protests