Blue Danube to be broadcast into space, world's first robot fighting competition kicks off

A piece of classical music is to be played into space to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the birth of its composer and the 50th year of the European Space Agency (ESA). The Blue Danube, by Johann Strauss, will be beamed into the cosmos as it’s performed by the Vienna Symphony Orchestra on 31 May, and livestreamed with free public screenings in Vienna, Madrid, and New York. To avoid any technical issues, a pre-recorded version from the orchestra’s rehearsal on the day before will be played out, while a live performance provides the accompaniment. Sky News

The online safety regulator wants a $450,000 maximum penalty imposed on a man who posted deepfake images of prominent Australian women to a website, in the first case of its kind heard in an Australian court. The eSafety commissioner has launched proceedings against Anthony Rotondo over his failure to remove “intimate images” of several prominent Australian women from a deepfake pornography website. The federal court has kept the names of the women confidential. The Guardian

Google’s 2 billion Gmail users have a critical decision to make. But so does Google. And the tech giant’s might be the more critical. Gmail’s latest upgrade gives Gemini free reign over all your past emails and even your stored files. If you let it. That’s the decision you need to make. As for Google, it’s sitting on a critical decision of a different kind. “Gmail is getting personalized smart replies that incorporate your context and tone,” Google confirmed last week. “Draft replies will sound authentically like you and match your typical tone, as the responses are created from past emails and Drive files.” Forbes

Compacts are trendy right now, but Nikon’s smallest mirrorless camera is now cheaper than many of the most popular compact cameras. The Nikon Z30 has dropped to £595.04, with a 16-50mm zoom lens. The Z30 is the brand’s most compact current mirrorless camera, cramming a 20.9MP APS-C sensor into a body that weighs just 12.3 oz / 350g. While it won’t be as tiny as a point-and-shoot camera, it’s impressively small for a mirrorless, mixing a thin body with a comfortable grip for a camera that’s about 2.3 inches deep and under 3 inches tall. Digital Camera World

It is a heck of a lot of money to pay for a company that doesn’t make anything yet.This week, OpenAI paid $6.4bn (£4.7bn) for Sir Jony Ive’s design house, io. But then Ive is not just any old designer. The British-born guru was the man behind the iPhone, and many of the other iconic products that made Apple the biggest company in the world. The deal is a bet that he can pull off the same trick with an AI device. Telegraph

Tesco has become the latest supermarket to install cameras on self-service checkouts, with one major difference, you can watch yourself back. The new VAR-style tills record shoppers as they scan their items, then playback video clips where you’ve failed to scan an item properly. Any shoppers trying to sneak past products or even a 25p bag at the tills will receive a warning, stating: ‘It looks like that last item didn’t scan. Please check you scanned it correctly before continuing.’ Metro

Two humanoid robots traded punches while fans watched on, in a competition held in Hangzhou, China, on Sunday. The fight was part of the China Media Group World Robot Competition and featured robots developed by Unitree Robotics. The event included both fighting demonstrations and matches, marking a world-first combat sports event featuring humanoid robots. BBC