Judge says coffee giant has no standing in appeal of NRLP finding it illegally fired two workers for trying to unionize
A federal appeals court has largely rejected Starbucks’ appeal of a National Labor Relations Board (NRLB) finding that the coffee chain illegally fired two Philadelphia baristas because they wanted to organize a union.
The third US circuit court of appeals said the coffee shop giant lacked standing to challenge the constitutionality of administrative law judges of the NRLB, the government agency that is set up to enforce labor laws in the US concerning labor practices and collective bargaining.
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© Photograph: Jessica Griffin/AP
© Photograph: Jessica Griffin/AP
FC Barcelona have reportedly closed a last-minute €100m (£82.9m) deal to sell VIP boxes at the newly renovated Camp Nou to Middle Eastern investors, enabling them to meet financial fair play rules and finally extend Dani Olmo’s registration.
With the deadline for registration just three days away and Barcelona facing the prospect of Olmo leaving as a free agent just six months after joining on a a €55m (£45.6m) transfer, club president Joan Laporta exercised a sale option on Saturday which the club believe will see the first payment made before 31 December.
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© Photograph: Albert Gea/Reuters
© Photograph: Albert Gea/Reuters
A Brazilian judge has ordered the release from prison of four players from River Plate’s women’s football team, all of whom were arrested over an alleged racial slur during a match against Grêmio.
Judge Fernando Oliveira Camargo decided to free the Argentinian club’s quartet of Candela Díaz, Camila Duarte, Juana Cángaro and Milagros Díaz, on condition they remain in Brazil and show up at court in São Paulo every month until the case is concluded.
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© Photograph: Reuters
© Photograph: Reuters
Large language models have changed how big corporations function, and the arrival of AI ‘agents’ – essentially automated Moneypennys – could prove irresistible
If 2024 was the year of large language models (LLMs), then 2025 looks like the year of AI “agents”. These are quasi-intelligent systems that harness LLMs to go beyond their usual tricks of generating plausible text or responding to prompts. The idea is that an agent can be given a high-level – possibly even vague – goal and break it down into a series of actionable steps. Once it “understands” the goal, it can devise a plan to achieve it, much as a human would.
OpenAI’s chief financial officer, Sarah Friar, recently explained it thus to the Financial Times: “It could be a researcher, a helpful assistant for everyday people, working moms like me. In 2025, we will see the first very successful agents deployed that help people in their day to day.” Or it’s like having a digital assistant “that doesn’t just respond to your instructions but is able to learn, adapt, and perhaps most importantly, take meaningful actions to solve problems on your behalf”. In other words, Miss Moneypenny on steroids.
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© Photograph: Julian Claxton/Alamy
© Photograph: Julian Claxton/Alamy
In a private property market where supply is restricted, increased family wealth can simply drive up the cost of suitable homes
Improvements in the education of girls is one of the most positive shifts in the developing world over the past decade. Supported by aid agencies, including Camfed and more recently the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, efforts to send girls to primary and secondary school and on to further and higher education have made great strides.
In his new year message, the pope will urge rich countries to support the education of poor children as part of a big debt relief programme in the 2025 papal jubilee year.
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© Photograph: George Esiri/REUTERS
© Photograph: George Esiri/REUTERS
Institutions in and around the city combine great works with humdrum relics of local life, to fantastic effect
I’ve been living partly in Sheffield for the past month or so, which has given me the chance to catch up on some of the great monuments of industry and power in and near the city – the model miners’ village and the fantastical Jacobean castle in Bolsover, the stately home of Wentworth Woodhouse with its battleship-length Palladian facade, the buildings of the subtle modernist Peter Womersley in Huddersfield.
Also the Weston Park Museum in Sheffield and the Derby Museum and Art Gallery, both of which combine world-class art with humdrum relics of local life. In one, a large John Singer Sargent portrait of three young Yorkshire women shares the premises with the plastic car roof sign of a 1970s driving school. In the other, there is a gallery full of the illuminated tableaux of science and humanity by Joseph Wright of Derby and another room with a collection of stuffed animals, presumably from a local donor. I hope institutions like this, apart from whatever upgrades might be desirable, don’t change: art comes to life when it’s seen as part of the place it comes from.
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© Photograph: Robin Weaver/Alamy
© Photograph: Robin Weaver/Alamy
While droughts are a natural feature of California’s climate, human-induced warming has made them even drier. After Eric Haas, 62, moved to Oakland in 2007, California was in a drought so severe a statewide emergency was declared. After experiencing drought conditions for several years, the California professor had a rainwater and greywater capture system installed at his highly efficient urban home to do his part to conserve water.
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© Photograph: Jenna Garrett/The Guardian
© Photograph: Jenna Garrett/The Guardian
15 December 1930 – 27 July 2024
The actor recalls his friend, the Irish writer who was shunned by her country for her progressive work – and whose parties were the stuff of legend
I first met Edna at the Royal Court theatre in 1973 at the premiere of Brian Friel’s play The Freedom of the City, which was about Bloody Sunday in Derry. I was in the bar afterwards and, to my surprise, there she was. I’d read all her books – The Country Girls, August Is a Wicked Month, Girls in Their Married Bliss – because you could get them in the north of Ireland when they were banned in the south. Like a lot of people I was slightly in awe of her, but she came over and chatted and she was extremely warm and generous.
Soon after that, she began to invite me to her famous soirees at her house in Carlyle Square in Chelsea, and we became friends. There were always big stars at her gatherings and she would cook roast lamb for everybody. I remember Jack Nicholson showed up at one. He kept calling her “Ed”, can you imagine?
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© Photograph: ITV/Shutterstock
© Photograph: ITV/Shutterstock
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