Monthly Archives: September 2023

Bank of England boss says interest rates close to peak | BBC News

Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey has said interest rates are close to their peak, but that they may still have further to rise.

He told MPs “we are much nearer now to the top of the cycle” of rate rises.

The Bank has hiked rates 14 times in a row as it tries to slow the fastest pace of price rises among the world’s big economies.

It is expected to raise borrowing costs again later this month, taking the Bank rate to 5.5%.

The theory is that raising interest rates makes it more expensive to borrow money, meaning people have less to spend, reducing demand and slowing inflation, which is the rate at which prices rise.

But the Bank rate is currently at its highest level for 15 years, and inflation has remained stubbornly high.

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Report: Meta Employees Mandated Back Into Office | Entrepreneur

Last month, a leaked memo detailed Meta’s updated return to office policy, with some employees being asked to return three days a week with a mandate for accountability.

Now, those changes have reportedly gone into effect.

“We believe that distributed work will continue to be important in the future, particularly as our technology improves,” a spokesperson for Meta told CNBC in a statement. “In the near term, our in-person focus is designed to support a strong, valuable experience for our people who have chosen to work from the office, and we’re being thoughtful and intentional about where we invest in remote work.”

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OpenAI will host its first developer conference on November 6 | TechCrunch

OpenAI will host a developer conference — its first ever — on November 6, the company announced today.

At the one-day OpenAI DevDay event, which will feature a keynote address and breakout sessions led by members of OpenAI’s technical staff, OpenAI said in a blog post that it’ll preview “new tools and exchange ideas” — but left the rest to the imagination.

News of GPT-5, the presumed name of OpenAI’s next flagship generative AI model, is unlikely — OpenAI CEO Sam Altman confirmed in April that OpenAI wasn’t training GPT-5 and “wouldn’t for some time.” But we might learn more about OpenAI’s plans for Global Illumination, the AI design studio that it acquired in August, and an update on the availability of GPT-4’s image understanding capabilities. (While GPT-4, OpenAI’s current leading model, can technically analyze and interpret images, OpenAI has reportedly been holding the image-processing capabilities back on fears of privacy issues.)

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15 Ways to Digitally Protect Your Business | Getentrepreneurial.com

In today’s digital age, technology reigns supreme, leaving businesses to face an ever-increasing threat of cyberattacks and data breaches. The importance of implementing robust digital protection measures cannot be overstated. Safeguarding sensitive information, preserving customer trust, and ensuring uninterrupted operations are vital to a successful business strategy. This article explores 15 effective ways to protect your business digitally, offering practical tips and solutions to fortify your defenses against the lurking dangers of the online world.

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Apple iOS 17: Some features won’t be ready on launch day | Mashable

Apple iOS 17 is almost here, with features like StandBy and mental health assessments coming. We’ll have to wait, however, for a few revamps. In Apple’s iOS 17 preview, it lists several features as “coming later this year.” Here are the features that won’t be available on launch day:

AirDrop updates

Content you share over AirDrop will continue to send if you move away from AirDrop range, as long as you and the recipient are logged into iCloud. While finishing transfers when you’re away won’t be available on launch, other AirDrop features will be: putting phones close together to initiate an AirDrop transfer, for one, as well as communication safety and sensitive content warnings.

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United delays all flights nationwide following ground stop due to ‘equipment outage’ | CNN Business

United Airlines delayed more than 300 flights after the FAA lifted a brief ground stop that continued to disrupt the carrier’s service nationwide.

On Tuesday afternoon, United Airlines delayed all flights nationwide due to an “equipment outage,” according to an alert from the Federal Aviation Administration.

In an update about an hour later, the FAA alert said the “ground stop is cancelled.”

“We have identified a fix for the technology issue and flights have resumed. We’re working with impacted customers to help them reach their destinations as soon as possible,” United Airlines posted on social media.

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Warner Bros. Discovery cuts profit outlook due to writers and actors strikes | CNN Business

Warner Bros. Discovery trimmed its full-year earnings guidance for 2023 on Tuesday by $300 million to $500 million because of the continued strike by actors and writers, which has stopped production of most shows and movies.

The corporate parent of CNN had previously told investors that it expected the strike to be over by early September. But WBD now says it cannot predict when the strike will ultimately end, and it assumes the impact will continue through the rest of this year.

“WBD is hopeful that these strikes will be resolved soon,” said a filing the company made with the Securities and Exchange Commission with its new guidance early Tuesday.

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CRISPR used to ‘reprogram’ cancer cells into healthy muscle in the lab | Live Science

Scientists have transformed cancer cells into healthy muscle tissue in the lab using CRISPR gene-editing technology — and they hope new cancer treatments can be built on the back of this experiment.

In a study published Aug. 28 in the journal PNAS, researchers found that disabling a particular protein complex in cells of rhabdomyosarcoma (RMS) — a rare cancer in skeletal muscle tissue that mainly affects children under age 10 — in the laboratory causes the tumor cells to turn into healthy muscle cells.

Although the research is still in its early days, this process of “resetting” cancer cells into healthy cells, broadly known as differentiation therapy, has already been tested in other types of cancer, such as bone and blood cancer. Four drugs have been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to treat the latter disease and generally work by inhibiting a specific protein in the cancer cells.

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Accountant vs. Bookkeeper: What’s the Difference? | Business News Daily

Both accounting and bookkeeping play an important financial role in business, there is a difference between the two. Bookkeeping is a direct record of all purchases and sales your business conducts, while accounting is a subjective look at what that data means for your business and cash flow strategies. An accountant can be considered a bookkeeper, but a bookkeeper can’t be an accountant without proper certification.

Learn more about the differences between accounting and bookkeeping below.

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How to Get a Federal Employer Identification Number | businessnewsdaily.com

A federal employer identification number (FEIN), also known as a tax identification number, is issued to entities that do business in the United States. The FEIN is a unique nine-digit corporate ID number that works the same way a Social Security number does for individuals. A FEIN is required for businesses to get a business license.

Read on to learn what a FEIN is and how to get one.

What is the purpose of a FEIN?

A FEIN is a way for the IRS and other government entities to identify and track business entities’ tax and financial activities. It’s required to file tax returns, as well as to set up retirement accounts and health accounts to offer medical and dental benefits to employees, among other uses.

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