Category: Tech

• Andy Warhol’s 1985 portrait of Queen Elizabeth II sold for almost $900,000, per Canadian auction house Heffel.
• The portrait of the Queen shattered global records of an editioned Warhol print ever auctioned.
• Embellished with diamond dust, the print is part of Warhol’s 1985 Reigning Queen series.

One of Andy Warhol’s renowned portraits of the late Queen Elizabeth II has sold for almost $900,000 — a record sum for an editioned print ever auctioned, Canada’s Heffel Fine Art Auction House announced Thursday.

The print — dubbed the “crown jewel” of the sale by Heffel — was sold at the gallery’s Post War and Contemporary Art auction for more than twice the estimated sale price of roughly $405,000.

Created in 1985, the silkscreen print of the late monarch is based on a photograph shot by Peter Grugeon at Windsor Castle in 1975, which was subsequently published in 1977, on the occasion of the Queen’s Silver Jubilee.

The print is one of four in Warhol’s 1985 Reigning Queen series, per The Art Newspaper. 

This particular print features a portrait of the Queen donning the diamond and pearl Grand Duchess Vladimir Tiara, juxtaposed against a striking regal blue background. The print is also sprinkled with diamond dust, producing a glimmer effect under the light.

It is also one of two prints editioned “Hors d’Commerce,” meaning that the print is not for sale. Such prints are typically given by the artist as gifts.

Andy Warhol, a leading exponent in the field of pop art, is renowned for creating works that marry the themes of mainstream pop culture and societal defiance.

His most expensive work-to-date is his portrait of Marilyn Manroe named “Shot Sage Blue Marilyn”, which sold for a record $195 million at an auction on May 9, 2022. 

• Chinese police conducted random stop-and-search checks on phones, per WSJ and CNBC. 
• The authorities checked for banned foreign apps such as Instagram, Twitter, and Telegram. 
• These apps were reportedly used by protesters rallying against China’s zero-covid policy.

As protests over China’s draconian COVID-19 policy intensify, local police tried to quell further escalation by conducting random stop-and-search checks for banned foreign social media apps, the The Wall Street Journal and CNBC reported Monday. 

Some of the dissidents have been turning to foreign apps like Instagram, Twitter, and Telegram to share information on the protests with the outside world and to communicate and organise protests.

These foreign social media apps are banned in China, but they can be accessed through virtual private networks, or VPNs.

In Shanghai, police conducted phone inspections in People’s Square Station, a transportation hub, looking for banned apps, the Journal reported, citing messages posted in a chat room used by protesters and viewed by the publication. 

A video posted on Twitter by senior BBC journalist Edward Lawrence showed police officers in Shanghai forcing protestors to delete protest-related imagery from their phones. 

—Edward Lawrence (@EP_Lawrence) November 28, 2022

Another video circulating on Twitter appears to show an alleged plain-clothes officer hitting a person who refused to hand over his phone. 

—awetnappy (@awetnappy) November 28, 2022

Insider was unable to independently verify the authenticity of the videos.

The checks were conducted randomly, and “it can happen anywhere from on the street or at entrances to shopping malls,” tweeted DW’s east Asia correspondent William Yang. 

“It’s just been a cat-and-mouse game to be able to communicate and log in to the free world,” CNBC reporter Eunice Yoong said in a live interview on Tuesday.

The Shanghai and Beijing police did not immediately respond to Insider’s requests for comment.

Best Cyber Monday streaming deals

There are tons of great streaming deals during Cyber Monday. See our review of the best streaming services to see which one the best for you.

Discovery Plus: The service’s Ad-Lite plan is already very affordable year round, but right now you can join the service for only $1 a month for your first three months. It’s an excellent deal we only see during major deal events, like Cyber Monday.

Disney+ and Hulu: During Cyber Monday, you get Hulu (with ads) and Disney+ (no ads) for just $5 per month for a full year. This deal saves you $11 per month off the regular price of the two services when purchased separately.

HBO Max: HBO Max rarely sees discounts for subscribers, but now through November 28, new and returning subscribers can get their first three months of the ad-supported plan for only $6.

Hulu: New and returning members can get their first year for only $2 a month when they sign up before November 28. 

Paramount Plus: Now through November 27, new and returning subscribers can get 50% off an annual plan of Paramount Plus, bringing the Essential plan down to only $25 for a full year of content. 

Peacock Premium: Now through November 28, new subscribers can lock in a year of Peacock Premium for $1/month. That’s about 80% off the regular $5 monthly price.

• Seven acres of Nazi trenches in the Channel Islands are up for sale for about £40,000 ($50,000). 
• The heavily-fortified site was home to 24 soldiers and 3 Nazi officers in the Second World War.
• The Channel Islands were the only British territory to be occupied during the conflict.

A former Nazi encampment on a Channel island is up for sale for about £40,000 ($48,000).

The Channel Islands of Jersey and Guernsey, just off the coast of France, were the only British territory to be occupied during the Second World War.

The site is on Alderney, a tiny island just north of Guernsey. It features several acres of trenches, multiple gun stations, two bunkers, and numerous battlements and it was home to 24 soldiers and three officers from Nazi Germany.

Hitler heavily fortified the Channel Islands between 1942 and 1944 as part of his “Atlantic Wall” strategy — a system of coastal defenses intended to block an anticipated Allied invasion of Nazi-occupied Europe. 

Per the listing, the property offers “an amazing opportunity to own seven acres of WWII history.”

It’s also got “superb” sea views, a representative of estate agency Bell&Co told The Telegraph.

The site, known as Giffoine, is open to the public — and Bell&Co’s director Andrew Eggleston hopes it stays that way: “It would be a terrible shame if someone were to buy it and then start padlocking it.”

The property will be sold by sealed bid with offers being accepted until December 9. Several people have expressed interest, Eggleston told The Telegraph. 

• Blue Origin likes to ensure passengers tuck into breakfast before launching to the edge of space.
• Astronauts Sharon and Marc Hagle said they were told it was better to have food in their stomachs.
• However, the company advised passengers to avoid drinking coffee and orange juice, they said.

Blue Origin, Jeff Bezos’s rocket company, makes sure its passengers eat breakfast before blasting 62 miles above the Earth’s surface.

That’s according to Sharon and Marc Hagle, the first married couple to fly into space on a commercial vehicle. They were onboard Blue Origin’s 20th trip to the edge of space on March 31, along with four other passengers.

The Hagles told Insider about their experience of flying with Blue Origin. 

In the days before a rocket launch, Blue Origin passengers stay in the Astronaut Village campsite in the Texas desert, around 15 miles away from the company’s launch site near Van Horn.

After having to wake up around 4 a.m., Marc said the passengers left their rooms and went to have breakfast. Blue Origin laid a full spread out for them, the couple said.

“They insist that you eat breakfast,” Sharon said. “You have to have something in your stomach.”

Based on research from NASA and other experts in the space industry, the human body works better in zero gravity if there is food in the stomach, Marc said.

“They just asked us to stay away from orange juice and coffee because of the acid,” Sharon said.

NASA said in a flight surgeon’s report that pilots Alan Shepard and Virgil “Gus” Grissom, who flew on Mercury-Redstone 3 and Mercury-Redstone 4 missions respectively in 1961, were not allowed to drink coffee for breakfast on the morning of the launches because of its “diuretic properties.”

Blue Origin and NASA didn’t immediately respond to Insider’s request for comment.

The Hagles plan to launch again soon with Bezos’ rocket company but were unable to disclose the date.

During the interview, they also agreed with fellow Blue Origin astronaut William Shatner about space trips triggering feelings of grief and intense emotions. Shatner previously said his journey to space with Bezos’s company “felt like a funeral” and all he saw was sadness.

• Ghana’s government is planning to use gold to pay for oil instead of shelling out US dollars.
• The move is expected to reduce the “persistent depreciation” of the cedi, the Ghanaian currency.
• As of end-September, Ghana’s forex reserves were just enough to cover 3 months worth of imports.

Ghana’s government is planning to go back to a barter system of trade.

In order to protect the country’s fast-dwindling foreign currency reserves, Ghana wants to pay for oil with gold instead of shelling out precious US dollars, Mahamudu Bawumia, the country’s vice president said Thursday. 

Ghana’s gross international reserves  have fallen by about one-third — from $9.7 billion at the end of 2021 to around $6.6 billion at the end of September 2022, according to official data.

The reserves will cover just 2.9 months of the country’s goods and services imports — short of the government’s target of covering three-and-a-half-months worth of imports for 2022, according to a copy of the country’s budget speech delivered by finance minister Ken Ofori-Atta on Thursday.

The Ghanaian government is looking to implement the “new policy regime” of using gold to buy oil products in the first quarter of 2023, in order to counter inflation due to the depreciation of the cedi, Ghana’s currency. The cedi has fallen against the US dollars because there is strong demand for the greenback from oil importers, Bawumia explained in a Facebook post on Thursday. 

By not using the US dollar in the country’s oil trade, the move is expected to reduce the “persistent depreciation” of the cedi, because sellers of fuel in the country will no longer have to take the dollar-cedi exchange rate into account when pricing their products, he added.

Ghana’s gold-for-oil policy is unusual because it itself is an oil producing country. However, it still has to import refined oil products such as gas and diesel, because Ghana’s only oil refinery has been offline following an explosion in 2017, per Reuters.

It’s even more unusual, as barter deals typically involve an oil-producing country trading for non-oil goods.

But Ghana — which also produces gold — is mired in a debt crisis and is negotiating a relief package with the International Monetary Fund.

Finance minister Ofori-Atta said in his Thursday speech the country is “in high risk of debt distress” as the cedi’s depreciation was “seriously affecting” its ability to manage its public debt. The cedi has lost more than half its value against the US dollar so far this year.

• Anwar Ibrahim has been tapped to be the next Malaysian prime minister.
• He had a rollercoaster ride to the top, after spending years in jail on sodomy and corruption charges.
• He finally landed the job on Thursday, after 20 years of leading Malaysia’s opposition.

Malaysia’s new prime minister has had a wild ride to the top — he finally clinched the top job on Thursday after spending years in jail and two decades as Malaysia’s opposition leader. 

The 75 year-old’s fate had hung in the balance for close to a week after elections on November 19 led to a hung parliament.

The parties vying for power were the Pakatan Harapan alliance, led by Anwar, and ex-premier Muhyiddin Yassin’s Perikatan Nasional coalition. Neither coalition was able to reach the simple majority of 112 seats required to form government after Saturday’s vote.

Malaysia’s King Al-Sultan Abdullah Sultan Ahmad Shah intervened after coalition talks failed, and spoke to Malaysia’s nine state monarchs to figure a way out of their predicament.

The sultan made an announcement on Thursday for there to be a unity government in Malaysia, with Anwar as its leader. This ended the political deadlock between the two major political alliances.

“After going through the views of the other Malay rulers, HRH has granted his consent to appoint DS Anwar Ibrahim as Malaysia’s 10th prime minister,” the palace said in a statement seen by the South China Morning Post.

“HRH reminds all parties that the winners do not win all and the losers do not lose everything,” the statement read.

Anwar has spent two decades vying for the top job

Anwar was Malaysia’s deputy prime minister in the 1990s, serving under then-Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad. He was sacked by Mahathir in 1998, and later arrested and charged with crimes including sodomy and corruption.

In 1999, he was convicted on a corruption charge and sentenced to six years in prison. Then in 2000, he was convicted on a sodomy charge and given a nine year prison sentence. He was freed in 2004 after being acquitted of that sodomy charge.

But that wasn’t the end of it. In 2008, a man accused Anwar of sodomizing him. Anwar was convicted of that sodomy charge and sentenced to five years in prison in March 2014. 

Anwar has consistently denied these charges and called them politically motivated. 

Anwar received a royal pardon in May 2018, after Pakatan Harapan won the election that year. 

Malaysia is now set to swear in its new prime minister at 5 p.m. local time on Thursday. 

• A district judge proposed for Holmes to be sent to a prison camp at Bryan, Texas, court records show.
• Prison camps are minimum-security prisons with minimal or no perimeter fencing.
• Holmes was sentenced to 135 months in prison on November 18.

A district judge proposed Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes be sent to a federal prison camp, court filings show.

District Judge Edward Davila recommended for Holmes to be designated to the Federal Prison Camp at Bryan, Texas, according to a November 21 filing. The Federal Prison Camp in Bryan is a minimum-security prison that houses female inmates.

The Federal Bureau of Prisons describes prison camps as “work- and program-oriented,” and inmates are housed in dormitories. These prisons also have limited or no perimeter fencing. There are only seven such prison camps in the US.

Criminal defense lawyer Alan Ellis told Bloomberg that prison staff at the camp are more “open-minded,” and that Holmes’ lawyers had likely requested the location.

“No one wants to get kicked out because compared to other places in the prison system, this place is heaven. If you have to go it’s a good place to go,” Ellis said.

While Davila has recommended these provisions for Holmes’ incarceration, the final decision is slated to be made by the US Bureau of Prisons. Holmes has been ordered to surrender herself into custody by April 27, 2022.

Holmes was sentenced to 135 months, or 11 years and 3 months, in prison on November 18. She was found guilty of defrauding Theranos investors of several hundreds of millions of dollars. Holmes was also sentenced to three years of supervision upon her release from prison.

“I am devastated by my failings,” Holmes, who is pregnant, said in court. “I have felt deep pain for what people went through, because I failed them.”

Holmes’ former partner and Theranos COO Ramesh Balwani faces up to 20 years in prison and is expected to be sentenced in December.