Author: NCIJ NETWNCIJ NETWORK

Crypto spent 15 years building rails — lending, tokenization, stablecoins — and Jordi Visser argues the users it was built for were never meant to be human. In this conversation with Grace Remington and Sean Hagan, Visser lays out his Ghost Rails thesis, comparing today’s moment to the 14-year gap between Netscape going public and the App Store finally putting the internet in everyone’s hands. He explains why AI agents, not retail wallets, are the inflection point for the agentic economy, and why that’s “extremely positive” for Bitcoin specifically. If you’ve wondered what actually breaks the liquidity-driven narrative around this…

Depending on your locale, equinoxes can be seen as harbingers of longer nights and gloomy weather, or promising beacons of nicer temperatures and more sunlight. Observing and predicting equinoxes is one of the earliest skills in humanity’s astronomical toolkit. Many ancient observatories around the world observed equinoxes along with the more pronounced solstices. These days, you don’t need your own observatory to know when an equinox occurs, since you’ll see it marked on your calendar twice a year! The word “equinox” originates from Latin, and translates to equal (equi-) night (-nox). But what exactly is an equinox? An equinox occurs twice every year, in March and…

The recent disaster that sent a wall of water and debris roaring down rivers of the Tibetan Plateau serves as a warning for future hydropower development on Nepal’s rivers, especially the Karnali, the nation’s last undammed watershed.Two proposals have targeted the Karnali — which is home to Indigenous communities and provides habitat for endangered fish and reptiles — seeking to bore tunnels through its mountains, drain miles of riverbed, and turn whitewater into megawatts.“A free-flowing Karnali River is an insurance policy — ecological, cultural, and now, unmistakably, physical — against the very disaster that just killed hundreds of people…

Tom Dolphin’s excellent article on the failings of NHS management made sombre reading (The Letby inquiry report makes one thing crystal clear: too much NHS management is scandalously poor, 16 September). Yet I believe that most of our public services are thoroughly over-managed, with frontline professionals neither listened to nor respected by their institutional superiors, and at risk of damaging their careers if they speak out about poor decisions, excessive workloads and impossible targets or “performance indicators”.Like so many of our current woes, the rise of managerialism can be traced back to the public service reforms of the Thatcher governments…

Claim: U.S. President Donald Trump called the U.S. and Israel’s war with Iran “small potatoes.” Rating: Context Some people sharing the quote claimed Trump was specifically referring to the deaths of 18 service members during the conflict. He was in fact referring to the conflict itself. A rumor circulated online in September 2026 that U.S. President Donald Trump had called the Iran war, initiated by the United States and Israel in February 2026, “small potatoes.” Users shared the claim on social media and Reddit. Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., shared the purported quote and added, “Tell that to the families of the 18 troops…

FIFA President Gianni Infantino proposed an outside review of how the governing body makes major decisions on Monday, acknowledging in a letter to members that its handling of a now-abandoned ​investment plan had ‌caused concern. “First, I will ask the Council whether it wishes to commission an independent external ⁠review of FIFA’s current governance framework for major strategic initiatives and recommend potential improvements,” Infantino wrote to the FIFA Council and all 211 member association presidents in ‌a letter seen by Reuters. Read moreUEFA, CONCACAF demand FIFA make $2.1 billion payout to member groups amid funding row He also said he…

Burnham traveled to Ukraine to meet President Volodymyr Zelenskyy last month. He has since met leaders including France’s Emmanuel Macron and Canada’s Mark Carney and plans to attend November’s COP31 climate summit in Turkey. A decision looms over whether to attend two other major summits — the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Antigua and Barbuda, attended by his foreign secretary and King Charles III, and the G20 summit in December at the Trump National Doral Miami resort.Burnham will host G20 leaders next year in Manchester, the city where he spent nine years as mayor, at a cavernous former railway…

Ed Davey is to call for a global nuclear-style non-proliferation treaty to halt the development of super-intelligent AI when he makes his keynote speech at the Liberal Democrat conference, accusing Andy Burnham of relying on Donald Trump and “tech bros” to solve the problem.When he addresses the faithful on the final day of the gathering in Brighton, the party leader will call for a global pause on super-intelligent AI, comparing it to a nuclear arms race that could result in technology that could “destroy us all”.Davey is expected to lay out plans in his speech on Tuesday for a new…

Stay informed with free updatesSimply sign up to the EU energy myFT Digest — delivered directly to your inbox.French President Emmanuel Macron has called on Brussels to take immediate action to lower energy prices, including by delaying a law on methane emissions.In a letter to European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen, Macron called on the bloc to bring forward measures to tame energy prices. European gas prices have risen from €27 to €80 per megawatt hour this year due to the crisis in the Middle East, while oil futures recently traded above $100 a barrel. The letter, first reported…

Of all the events in the United Nations General Assembly taking place this week, the most anticipated by far is the upcoming meeting between Donald Trump and Chinese president Xi Jinping.Though the majority of the diplomatic activities are happening in New York, this face-to-face between the two leaders will take place at the White House. Trump is scheduled to personally welcome Xi at Joint Base Andrews on Wednesday, September 23—an unusual diplomatic gesture, as US presidents do not typically go to the airport to welcome foreign leaders.Ahead of that airport reunion, a US delegation led by Treasury secretary Scott Bessent…