Business

India and European Union reach long‑running trade agreement in New Delhi

The European Union and India announced a trade agreement on Jan. 27, 2026, in New Delhi after nearly 20 years of negotiations. European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen and European Council president António Costa joined Prime Minister Narendra Modi as honorary guests for India’s Republic Day to unveil

Culture

Hytale adds Grimoire: Rekindle Embers to summon skeletal minions

Pcgamer reports Hytale's latest patch adds the Grimoire: Rekindle Embers, a necromancy book that summons undead minions. The Grimoire lets you summon undead 'hordes' but has a limited number of pages, so at full capacity it functions more like a small skeletal squad. You can find

Politics

Chris Madel ends Minnesota governor bid, cites immigration crackdown in Minneapolis

Chris Madel, a Minneapolis defense lawyer who had been running for governor of Minnesota as a Republican, said he was ending his campaign on Jan. 26, 2026 because he had become outraged by the Trump administration's immigration crackdown in Minneapolis. Mr. Madel said the operation "has departed

Culture

Jennifer Mnookin chosen as Columbia’s next president after leading UW-Madison

Columbia University’s trustees have picked Jennifer Mnookin, the chancellor of the University of Wisconsin‑Madison, to be the university’s next president, the trustees said. At Wisconsin, Dr. Mnookin negotiated a range of fraught compromises: she persuaded pro‑Palestinian students to peacefully remove an encampment protesting the Gaza war

Culture

Insomnia: Nolan thriller with Pacino and Williams deserves more attention

Polygon calls Christopher Nolan's 2002 thriller Insomnia an underrated entry for Nolan and its leads, Al Pacino and Robin Williams, and notes the film is set in Nightmute, Alaska during the spring when the sun never sets. It follows LAPD detective Will Dormer (Pacino) and his partner Hap

World

Trump says he will raise South Korea tariffs back to 25 percent

President Trump announced he was raising tariffs on South Korean exports, including cars, back to 25 percent, saying Seoul was not moving fast enough to implement a recent investment agreement. South Korean officials said the announcement caught them off guard. In October, Mr. Trump agreed to lower tariffs on South

Culture

Lego adds Millennium Falcon, Mos Eisley Cantina and Dagobah to Smart Play

According to Gamesradar, Lego has expanded its Smart Play range with five new Star Wars sets, including the Millennium Falcon, Mos Eisley Cantina and Yoda's hut on Dagobah; all are available to preorder now from the Lego store ahead of their March 1, 2026 launch. None of the

Tech

MSI Prestige 14 Flip AI+ is a powerful ultraportable with long battery life

MSI's Prestige 14 Flip AI+ is available now for $1,299 and, according to ZDNET, delivers significant processing power in a sleek, productivity-focused ultraportable design. The 2.9‑pound 2‑in‑1 features a 14‑inch touchscreen OLED, an included "Nano Pen," and hardware that includes

Tech

Writer replaces Tarkov friends with AI bot, finds experience unsettling

Kotaku reports that Matthew Gault, a games and tech writer at 404 Media, tried replacing his friends with an AI chatbot after failing to convince them to play Escape from Tarkov with him and found the result disturbingly convincing. Gault, who calls himself a "certified AI hater," said

Culture

Jonathan Anderson reframes Dior’s heritage in Rodin Museum couture show

Jonathan Anderson, the 41-year-old Northern Irish designer who took over Dior last year, presented his first haute couture show for the house in the garden of the Rodin Museum in Paris, leaning into the brand’s dramatic backstory. Anderson reworked Christian Dior’s 1947 hourglass silhouette into a silk georgette

Culture

Rachel McAdams’ 11 best films, from Mean Girls to Send Help

Movieweb published a ranked list of the 11 best Rachel McAdams movies, charting her career from early rom‑com breakthroughs to a 2026 horror return. The piece notes McAdams’ early breakthrough in the early 2000s with The Notebook and highlights her versatility across comedies like Mean Girls and Wedding Crashers,

Culture

Aphex Twin's QKThr fuels TikTok surge as he overtakes Taylor Swift on YouTube Music

An obscure 88-second cut from Aphex Twin’s 2001 album Drukqs, called QKThr, has become a staple of short-form online content and helped the producer overtake Taylor Swift in monthly YouTube Music listeners, with 448 million to her 399 million, according to the report. QKThr, a dreamy, ambient piece that

World

Heavy rains flood southern Mozambique, affecting at least 600,000 people

Weeks of intense rain in December and January have inundated southern Mozambique, displacing hundreds of thousands and affecting at least 600,000 people, NASA Earth Observatory reported. NASA imagery shows the scale of the flooding: the MODIS instrument on the Aqua satellite captured a false-color image of floodwaters moving down

World

Rare Avalanche Blocks Coxton Road in Luzerne County During Winter Storm Fern

People reports Winter Storm Fern produced a rare avalanche in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, that blocked Coxton Road on Sunday, Jan. 25 at about 2:30 p.m., authorities said. Duryea Fire and Police, which responded to the scene, said a “large snow slide” occurred about 1.5 miles from the

Politics

Kyle Rittenhouse Reemerges Online After Alex Pretti’s Killing

After the death of Alex Pretti at the hands of federal immigration officers, social media users turned to Kyle Rittenhouse as a reference point in debates over armed civilians and law enforcement actions. Mr. Rittenhouse, who arrived armed with an AR-15-style rifle at a 2020 Black Lives Matter protest and

Crypto

RIVER Soars ~500% in 2026 Amid Listings and Investment, Analysts Raise Risks

Beincrypto reports River (RIVER) has surged approximately 500% year-to-date to become 2026’s top-performing altcoin. The token reached a new all-time high of $87.73 on Monday, but fell more than 7% over the past 24 hours and was trading at $70.76 at press time; trading volume declined 21.

Politics

One year after Reagan National midair collision, safety concerns remain

One year after a midair collision on Jan. 29, 2025, above Washington, D.C., concerns about safety at Ronald Reagan National Airport persist, according to victims’ families, regulators and people familiar with the control tower. The Federal Aviation Administration has reduced hourly flights into the airport and closed the air

Culture

Merlin endures as a beloved BBC cult classic more than a decade later

Collider reports that Merlin, the BBC fantasy series that premiered in 2008, remains a cult classic 13 years after its ending. The five-season adaptation reworked Arthurian origin stories by positioning Merlin (Colin Morgan) as Arthur's (Bradley James) peer and hiding his powers, and it leaned on character dynamics

World

All-night zat pwe concerts draw crowds on Yangon outskirts as junta seeks normalcy

All-night zat pwe performances have returned on the outskirts of Yangon, drawing packed audiences for shows that stretch through the night into dawn. Performers such as U Than Zaw Htwe, known as San Yay Moe, and U Chit Myo Htike, known as Phoe Chit, have led long programs of music,

Tech

Google explores turning Gmail into a relationship-aware AI assistant

Google is exploring reworking Gmail into a proactive, relationship-aware AI assistant, according to a ZDNET interview with Blake Barnes, Gmail's vice president of product. The company and Barnes described these ideas as exploratory and not product commitments. Barnes told ZDNET that Google wants Gmail to do more than

Sports

Seahawks volunteer to face Rams at Melbourne Cricket Ground for NFL's first Australia game

Cbssports reports the Seattle Seahawks have volunteered to face the Los Angeles Rams at the Melbourne Cricket Ground for the NFL's first game in Australia, Seahawks director of international Isabelle Van Coevorden said in an interview with the Herald Sun in late October. The Rams will play the

Culture

José Pizarro’s slow-roast celeriac with rosemary and crisp chorizo

José Pizarro offers a recipe for slow-roast celeriac with rosemary and crisp chorizo, presented as a simple winter dish that largely looks after itself. The piece notes celeriac is easy to ignore but deserves attention in winter. January is described as a time for turning on the oven and cooking

Culture

Sue Webster readies solo show after split, painting motherhood at 52

Sue Webster is preparing her first institutional solo show, centred on a wall-filling confessional work called Crime Scene and a series of large paintings of herself pregnant with her son Spider, whom she had at 52. Webster came to prominence as part of the YBAs with Tim Noble after arriving

Business

Starbucks removes CEO travel cap and requires company jet for personal flights

Businessinsider reports that Starbucks is directing CEO Brian Niccol to use the company’s private jet for all air travel, including personal trips, and has removed his $250,000 annual limit on personal travel spending. A Monday filing said that before September Niccol’s non-work use of the plane was

World

Gunmen kill at least 11 at football match in Salamanca, Guanajuato

Gunmen opened fire at a football match in Salamanca in central Guanajuato state on Sunday, killing at least 11 people and wounding 12, the town mayor said. César Prieto, Salamanca's mayor, posted that the attackers arrived at the end of the match; ten people died at the scene