News update

GOOGLE has agreed to settle a lawsuit from 2016 that outlined the Bay Area tech giant’s strict confidentiality policies for workers. The suit helped launch a wave of employee activism in the industry, and has been litigated across seven years and thousands of pages of court documents. In the end, Google will pay out only $27 million, a drop in the bucket for such a titanic company — and just a fraction of that money will actually go to workers. The suit, filed by an unnamed Google product manager from San Francisco, alleged that the company’s confidentiality agreements were illegal. The plaintiff alleged that Google prohibited workers from speaking to the press, disclosing how much they earned, telling others about their working conditions and reporting rule violations to Securities and Exchange Commission workers. The lawsuit also shared details about various alleged anti-whistleblowing measures. The lawsuit was filed under California’s Private Attorneys General Act, which ov...

Marvel boss Kevin Feige has stated that Marvel has no plans to resurrect Robert Downey Jr.'s Iron Man character, who died in 2019's Avengers: Endgame. In Hollywood, and with Marvel superhero movies specifically with their multiverses, anything is possible. But Feige won't bring back Robert Downey Jr.'s Iron Man, as has been rumored as being a possibility. "We are going to keep that moment and not touch that moment again," Feige told Vanity Fair. "We all worked very hard for many years to get to that, and we would never want to magically undo it in any way." Variety reported that Marvel was considering trying to get Downey Jr. and Scarlett Johansson to come back to play Iron Man and Black Widow again, with the suggestion being that the entire team would assemble again, including Chris Evans as Captain America. Feige responded to the report, saying, "I've literally not even seen that; is that a new rumor?" Johansson, meanwhile, said it wo...

Back-to-back storms fueled by atmospheric rivers were expected to move over the northwestern United States this week, bringing heavy rains and snow and raising concerns about flooding, forecasters said. After a brief break between atmospheric rivers on Sunday evening, another was expected on Monday, with the heaviest rainfall likely to occur in western Washington State.  The forecast came as snow had already blanketed mountain areas of Washington State with as much 40 inches since Thursday, according to the National Weather Service office in Seattle. Through Monday evening, three to seven inches of rain could drench areas of western Washington and Oregon, forecasters said. The Weather Service said there were “moderate-to-high chances” of more than 12 inches of snow falling in the higher terrain of central Idaho, the Tetons in western Wyoming, the Colorado Rockies and the Wasatch mountain range in Utah. The Weather Service in Cheyenne, Wyo., also warned of strong gusts on ...

Golden Bachelor” star Gerry Turner seemingly blew off claims that he allegedly  broke up with his ex-girlfriend  due to her weight gain. “I don’t have time to reflect on comments like this,” Turner  told the Los Angeles Times  in an interview published Thursday. My only response is that I have so many positive things in my life right now. I have the wonderful love of Theresa, my partner,” he shared, adding that he is “happy to look forward.” The reality star’s golden character came into question last week when the Hollywood Reporter released an exposé claiming that Turner lied about his past. Per his ex, who goes by Carolyn to maintain her anonymity, the 72-year-old bachelor had a live-in girlfriend, whom he dated for three years, shortly after the death of his wife. This information conflicts with the heart-wrenching story Turner shared on the dating show in which he claimed he hadn’t been kissed since his wife’s 2017 death. However, per his interview...

  Sandeep Reddy Vanga's Animal, starring Ranbir Kapoor in the lead role, had a stellar start at the box office. The film released in theatres on Friday and it clashed with Meghna Gulzar's Sam Bahadur at the box office. Animal collected a whopping ₹ 63.80 crore on its release day, reported Bollywood trade analyst Taran Adarsh. He mentioned in his X (earlier known as twitter) post that the film's box office collection on Day 1 was phenomenal. "Animal is sensational. Non-holiday / non-festival release. Non-franchise. No superstar cameos. 'Adults' certificate. 3+ hours run time. Clash with another film...Yet, Animal has a phenomenal day 1 across India... Fri ₹ 54.75 cr. Hindi version. Nett BOC. Box office.. Note - Biggest start for an 'Adults' certified film. Biggest opener of Ranbir Kapoor," he wrote  Taran Adarsh added in his post that the South Indian languages collection for Friday was ₹ 9.05 crore. The overall c...

U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan has denied a request to dismiss Special Counsel Jack Smith’s indictment that alleges the former president sought to overthrow the results of the 2020 presidential election. The request, made by lawyers acting for Donald Trump, argued that the indictment criminalizes his free speech and thus violates the First Amendment.  His lawyers asked Chutkan to recall former President Richard Nixon’s immunity from civil damages while in office, a 1982 Supreme Court decision that protected the president from litigation.   “Here, 234 years of unbroken historical practice—from 1789 until 2023— provide compelling evidence that the power to indict a former president for his official acts does not exist,” his lawyers argued. That argument failed to land.  On Friday, Chutkan issued a scathing ruling that made one thing abundantly clear: Trump is not a king and he will face charges.  “Defendant’s four-year service as Commander in Chief...

  Omid Scobie vowed on his and his family’s life he did not include names of royals who had concerns over Prince Archie’s skin colour in his hotly released book, Endgame. The royal author even refused to apologise for leaking the name of two senior working royals as he insisted that the English version of the book that he “signed off” did not have them. In an interview with BBC, Scobie, who is a close friend of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, claimed he was as shocked to learn about the leaked names as everyone else was. ALSO READ: Prince Harry, Meghan Markle have left ‘poisonous legacy’ with royal racist claims Scobie said he does not have any idea how the Dutch version of his book have the names of the royals racists despite translators insisting the monikers were mentioned in the manuscript they were sent. When asked if he would apologise to the Royal family, Scobie said, “It's not for me to apologise because I still want to know what's happened.” He went on to ad...