GPS data revealed there had been discrepancies in the workers’ pay.

This week, Microsoft confirmed it's planning to invest billions in OpenAI, the company behind the viral new chatbot tool ChatGPT.

The prospect of Microsoft, maker of software that people mostly hate, getting involved with ChatGPT, a product people generally like, is raising a lot of eyebrows.

Almost immediately, people began joking on social media that ChatGPT could be used to revive the broadly maligned, big-eyed goon known as Clippy.

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In case anyone forgot, Clippy was Microsoft's dumb little virtual assistant who used to pop up offering to help you format your English Lit essay.

Clippy was cute, like a cartoon dog, and had an intelligence to match.

Perhaps the genuinely impressive tech underpinning ChatGPT could do what Clippy never could and offer, like, actual help, rather than just pop up unannounced with that dopey half-surprised look on its face.

My colleague Samantha Murphy Kelly spoke to AI experts about the prospect of a Microsoft-ChatGPT partnership.

"There is a kernel of truth to the Clippy comparison," David Lobina, an artificial intelligence analyst at ABI Research, told Sam.

"ChatGPT is a rather sophisticated auto-completion tool, and in that sense it is a much better version of Clippy."

In case you missed it, since November, ChatGPT has simultaneously impressed and horrified pretty much everyone whose job centres on content creation or the assessment thereof, journalists, academics, teachers, publishers, entertainers, anyone who composes emails or presents information.

This bot does everything — songs, poems, essays, news stories, news stories in the style of 1920s muckraker, news stories in the stream-of-consciousness style of Virginia Woolf, whatever your heart desires.

READ MORE: Australia Day Honours 2023 full interactive list

It can write your dumb emails for you. It can craft a speech. Your wedding vows. A cover letter for a job application.

That AI power is, understandably, an intriguing proposition for Microsoft, maker of some of the world's most despised and yet ubiquitous software such as Outlook, Word and Excel.

Per Sam:

Some potential use cases include writing lines of text for a PowerPoint presentation, drafting an essay in Word or doing automatic data entry in Excel spreadsheets.

For Microsoft's search engine Bing, ChatGPT could provide more personalised search results and better summarise web pages.

All of the above suggestions were generated by asking ChatGPT various forms of the question, "How could Microsoft integrate ChatGPT into its products?"

Argh, Samantha, you scamp!

Anyway, Microsoft, hasn't publicly offered any clues about its plans beyond saying it would integrate ChatGPT features to its cloud computing service.

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Even without details, it's interesting that Microsoft, Silicon Valley's equivalent of a Boomer, suddenly appears to be a frontrunner in Big Tech's AI race.

Google was reportedly caught off guard by the Microsoft-OpenAI partnership, and it stirred up some frustration for Meta's head of AI.

Of course, AI tech is still young, unreliable and rife with ethical quandaries.

"Systems such as ChatGPT can be rather unreliable, making up stuff as they go and giving different answers to the same questions — not to mention the sexist and racist biases," Lobina says.

Which raises the prospect of an anthropomorphic paper clip helper who could genuinely help you but also genuinely be as problematic and biased as the internet matter from which its brain is built.

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People packed beaches and swarmed streets during protests this Australia Day.

A hand-drawn map with a red letter X purportedly showing the location of a buried stash of precious jewellery looted by Nazis from a blown-up bank vault has sparked a modern-day treasure hunt in a tiny Dutch village more than three quarters of a century later.

Wielding metal detectors, shovels and copies of the map on cellphones, prospectors have descended on Ommeren — population 715 — about 80 kilometres southeast of Amsterdam to try to dig up a potential World War II trove based on the drawing first published on January 3.

“Yes, it is of course spectacular news that has enthralled the whole village," local resident Marco Roodveldt said.

“But not only our village, also people who do not come from here.”

READ MORE: Australia Day Honours 2023 full interactive list

He said that “all kinds of people have been spontaneously digging in places where they think that treasure is buried — with a metal detector.”

It wasn’t immediately clear if authorities could claim the loot if it was found, or if a prospector could keep it.

So far, nobody has reported finding anything. The treasure hunt began this year when the Dutch National Archive published — as it does every January — thousands of documents for historians to pore over.

Most of them went largely unnoticed. But the map, which includes a sketch of a cross section of a country road and another with a red X at the base of one of three trees, was an unexpected viral hit that briefly shattered the mid-winter calm of Ommeren.

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“We’re quite astonished about the story itself. But the attention it’s getting is as well,” National Archive researcher Annet Waalkens said as she carefully showed off the map.

Photos on social media in early January showed people digging holes more than a meter (three feet) deep, sometimes on private property, in the hope of unearthing a fortune.

Buren, the municipality Ommeren falls under, published a statement on its website pointing out that a ban on metal detection is in place for the municipality and warned that the area was a World War II front line.

“Searching there is dangerous because of possible unexploded bombs, land mines and shells,” the municipality said in a statement.

“We advise against going to look for the Nazi treasure.”

The latest treasure hunters aren't the first to leave the village empty handed.

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The story starts, Waalkens said, in the summer of 1944 in the Nazi-occupied city of Arnhem — made famous by the star-studded movie “A Bridge Too Far” — when a bomb hit a bank, pierced its vault and scattered its contents — including gold jewelry and cash — across the street.

German soldiers stationed nearby “pocket what they can get and they keep it in ammunition boxes,” Waalkens said.

As World War II nears its end in 1945, the Netherlands' German occupiers were pushed back by Allied advances. The soldiers who had been in Arnhem found themselves in Ommeren and decided to bury the loot.

“Four ammunition boxes and then just some jewelery that was kept in handkerchiefs or even cash money folded in. And they buried it right there,” she said, citing an account by a German soldier who was interviewed after the war by Dutch military authorities in Berlin and who was responsible for the map.

READ MORE: The Aussie treasure hunters unearthing forgotten relics

The archive doesn't know if the soldier is still alive and hasn't released his name, citing European Union privacy regulations.

Dutch authorities using the map and the soldier's account went hunting for the loot in 1947. The first time, the ground was frozen solid and they made no headway. When they went back after the thaw, they found nothing, Waalkens said.

After the unsuccessful attempts, the German soldier said “he believed that someone else has already excavated the treasure,” she added.

That detail was largely overlooked by treasure hunters who descended on Ommeren in the days after the map's publication. On a recent visit to the village, there were no diggers to be seen as peace and quiet has returned to Ommeren.

But the village's brief brush with fame left a sour taste for some residents. Ria van Tuil van Neerbos said she didn't believe in the treasure story, but understood why some did.

“If they hear something, they’ll head toward it," she said. "But I don’t think it’s good that they just dug into the ground and things like that.”

A star British runner has revealed she will not fly to Australia over "deep concerns" for the climate, ruling herself out of a potentially career-making championship.

Innes FitzGerald, from Devon, said she will not be available for selection for the World Athletics Cross Country Champions as she's refused to make the trip to Bathurst, in central-western NSW, next month.

She detailed her "concerns" in a letter to the sport's governing body this week.

READ MORE: Australia Day Honours 2023 full interactive list

"To have the opportunity to compete for Great Britain in Australia is a privilege," she wrote.

"When I started running, the prospect of me competing in the World Cross Country Championships would have seemed merely a dream. However, the reality of the travel fills me with deep concern.

"I was just nine when the COP21 Paris Climate agreement was signed. Now, eight years on, and global emissions have been steadily increasing, sending us on a path to climate catastrophe."

READ MORE: Man arrested as police search for missing Gold Coast teacher

https://www.instagram.com/p/CmFJISmL4jp/

The 16-year-old added she would "never be comfortable" flying and that it would cause her grief.

"The least I can do is voice my solidarity with those suffering on the front line of climate breakdown," she said.

"Coming to a decision has not been easy, however little compares to the grief I would feel taking the flight."

In December, the 16-year-old dominated the European Cross Country Championships in Turin.

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She set a national under-17 record for 3000-metres, and finished fourth in the 4000-metre race at the under-20s, going against athletes three years older.

The wins came despite the fact she missed much of her preparation because she was travelling.

Her 20-hour journey to the northern Italian city involved coaches, trains and cycling from station to station.

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FitzGerald has previously ruled herself out of competing at the European Under-18 Championships in Jerusalem.

Her concerns about travelling via aircraft stem from flight emissions; the aviation sector currently accounts for two per cent of emissions globally. 

According to the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO), one person flying from London to Sydney via Singapore would be responsible for 1.74 tonnes of CO2.

An iceberg nearly the size of Greater London broke off the Brunt Ice Shelf in Antarctica on Sunday according to the British Antarctic Survey.

Scientists first discovered significant cracks in the ice shelf a decade ago, but in the last two years there have been two major breaks. The BAS Halley Research Station is located on the Brunt Ice Shelf and glaciologists say the research station is safe.

The iceberg is around 1550 square kilometres. The researchers say this event was expected and not a result of climate change.

READ MORE: Australia Day Honours 2023 full interactive list

"This calving event has been expected and is part of the natural behavior of the Brunt Ice Shelf. It is not linked to climate change. Our science and operational teams continue to monitor the ice shelf in real-time to ensure it is safe, and to maintain the delivery of the science we undertake at Halley," Professor Dominic Hodgson a BAS glaciologist said in a news release.

The calving comes amid record-low sea ice extent in Antarctica, where it is summer.

"While the decline in Antarctic sea ice extent is always steep at this time of year, it has been unusually rapid this year," scientists at the National Snow and Ice Data Center reported in early January, "and at the end of December, Antarctic sea ice extent stood at the lowest in the 45-year satellite record."

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Researchers at the data centre say the low sea ice has been due in part to a large band of warmer-than-normal air temperatures, which climbed to 2 degrees Celsius above average over the Ross Sea in November and December.

Strong winds have also hastened the sea ice decline, they reported.

Recent data shows the sea ice has not since recovered, suggesting the continent could end the summer with a new record on the books for the second year in a row.

Antarctica has experienced a roller-coaster of sea ice extent over the past couple of decades, swinging wildly from record highs to record lows.

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Unlike the Arctic, where scientists say climate change is accelerating its impacts, Antarctica's sea ice extent is highly variable.

"There's a link between what's going on in Antarctica and the general warming trend around the rest of the world, but it's different from what we see in mountain glaciers and what we see in the Arctic," Ted Scambos, a glaciologist at the University of Colorado Boulder and lead scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data Center, previously told CNN.

Satellite data that stretches back to 1978 shows that the region was still producing record-high sea ice extent as recently as 2014 and 2015. Then it suddenly plunged in 2016 and has stayed lower than average since.

The frightening sci-fi technology featured in the cult second Terminator movie has inspired researchers to develop tiny shape-shifting robots that can move between liquid and solid states, and potentially save lives.

Like a kind of miniature T-1000 Terminator cyborg, remarkable video published today shows a legoman-sized robot escaping a small jail cell by melting into a liquid to move through bars, and then reforming to its full self, once free.

Fans of Terminator 2: Judgment Day will recall the scene where the T-1000, which is made of liquid metal, shape shifts to slide effortlessly through what seems an impenetrable jail-barred door of a psychiatric hospital while trying to kill Sarah Connor.

READ MORE: The jobs under threat from AI, robots and big data

Arnold Schwarzenegger, playing a less-advanced T-800 Terminator, then uses his sawn off shotgun to shoot the T-1000 multiple times, even blowing its head apart at point-blank range, but the killer machine simply reforms and carries on its maniacal pursuit.

Researchers from Carnegie Mellon University in the US and Chinese University of Hong Kong have just created a new type of material to successfully mimic the powers of the T-1000.

The team embedded magnetic particles in gallium, a metal with a very low melting point of 29.8 Celsius, to build their "magnetoactive solid-liquid phase transitional machine".

The magnetic particles enable the gallium to melt and reform, like the seemingly indestructible T-1000; it also boosts the mobility of the robot, and its ability to move around.

It is these combined features, the peer-reviewed study in Matter, that could see the robots put to work in hospitals, performing tasks like removing harmful foreign objects from a person's stomach or for fast-acting, direct drug delivery.

Where traditional robots are hard-bodied and stiff, soft robots have the opposite problem; they are flexible but weak, and their movements are difficult to control.

But the magnetised gallium – a soft, silvery metal - appears to solve this conundrum.

READ MORE: Do legendary rogue waves of the oceans actually exist?

"Giving robots the ability to switch between liquid and solid states endows them with more functionality," Chengfeng Pan, an engineer and lead author of the study, said.

An additional video in the study showed how a gallium robot can enter someone's stomach, melt to wrap itself around a marble-sized object, then reform and carry out the item in mere seconds.

Similarly, the paper said, robots can carry an important drug into a stomach, transform to liquid to rapidly release the medicine, rebuild itself and leave.

Researchers tested the robot's mobility and shape-morphing abilities by putting it through an obstacle course, which included jumping over moats, climbing walls, splitting in half, cooperatively moving objects and escaping the prison cell.

No tests involved asked the robot to kill John Connor, the researchers joked.

The substance may also have a future in the world of engineering.

In difficult to reach spaces, the study demonstrated how the material could work as smart soldering robots for wireless circuit assembly.

It was also able to act as a screw, melting into a threaded screw socket and then solidifying.

"We're pushing this material system in more practical ways to solve some very specific medical and engineering problems," Pan said.

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Actor Jeremy Renner was trying to stop his snow-removal tractor from sliding and hitting his grown nephew when he was pulled under the vehicle and crushed on New Year's Day, according to a Nevada sheriff's office incident report.

The parking brake was not engaged and would have stopped the snowcat vehicle, which runs on a track, as it started sliding sideways after the 52-year-old Avengers star used it to pull his nephew's truck out of snow, according to the redacted Washoe County Sheriff's Office report, filed on Friday.

"The Pistenbully snow groomer began sliding causing Renner to exit the vehicle without setting the emergency brake," reads the conclusion of the report, which CNN obtained through a public records request.

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"Although the Pistenbully had some mechanical issues, it is believed based on our mechanical inspection that the parking brake would keep the Pistenbully from moving forward.

"When Renner attempted to stop or divert the Pistenbully to avoid injury to (his nephew), he was pulled under the vehicle by the track and run over."

The brake indicator light inside the snowcat's cab was not functioning, and "mechanical issues may have been a factor in this accident", the report also notes.

The nephew was able to help Renner until help arrived, the report states.

Renner was airlifted to the hospital, where he stayed for more than two weeks, undergoing at least two surgeries and being treated in the intensive care unit.

Impairment was not believed to be a factor in the incident, the report also concludes. CNN has reached out to Renner's representatives for comment.

Moving track pulled actor under, report states

The incident began on New Year's Day, when Renner towed his nephew's truck off the actor's driveway after it had been stuck in snow, he told investigators on January 5 while hospitalised, according to the incident report.

After towing the truck into the street, the snowplow began "sliding sideways", then "it began to roll down the hill", Renner said.

At that point, Renner jumped out of the snowcat, he told investigators.

"Once he was off the Pistenbully, he realized it was heading directly toward (his nephew)," the report reads.

"He feared the Pistenbully was going to hit (his nephew), so he decided to attempt to stop or divert the Pistenbully."

To enter the snowplow's cab, Renner had to climb onto its moving track and was "immediately pulled under the left side track", the report notes.

Renner was "completely crushed under a large snowcat (vehicle)" and had "extreme (difficulty) breathing", with "the right side of his chest … collapsed — upper torso is crushed", a 911 call log obtained by CNN said.

"The Pistenbully rolled over him and continued down the road," the report says.

"He laid on the ground and focused on his breathing while (his nephew and others) rendered aid to him until medical personnel arrived on scene."

Renner, who plays superhero archer Hawkeye in the Marvel movie and TV Universe, broke more than 30 bones in the incident, he has said.

He posted a photo on Instagram last week.

"Morning workouts, resolutions all changed this particular new years," he said.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CnroWavLUqa/?igshid=OGQ2MjdiOTE%3D

"Spawned from tragedy for my entire family, and quickly focused into uniting actionable love ❤️ I want to thank EVERYONE for their messages and thoughtfulness for my family and I …. Much love and appreciation to you all.

"These 30 plus broken bones will mend , grow stronger, just like the love and bond with family and friends deepens . Love and blessings to you all."

Late Indigenous singer-songwriter and music legend Archie Roach is among the 1047 Australians to be recognised in this year's Australia Day Honours list.

Also on the honour roll are former senator Margaret Reynolds, Lieutenant General John Frewen, who oversaw Australia's vaccine rollout program, and actress Claudia Karvan.

Other Australians were recognised for their work in the fields of science, medical research, humanitarian work and the performing arts, as well as military service.

READ MORE: Body image activist Taryn Brumfitt named 2023 Australian of the Year

Six months after his death, Roach has been made a Companion of the Order of Australia, the highest recognition within the order.

Roach was part of the stolen generation of First Nations children who were forcibly removed from their homes by government authorities, and his best-known song, Took the Children Away, brought national attention to the stories of those who had been taken away from their families.

He had been made a Member of the Order of Australia in 2015, and was today made a companion for "eminent service to the performing arts as a songwriter and musician, to Indigenous rights and reconciliation, and through support for emerging First Nations artists".

Reynolds, the former Labor senator who sat in the federal upper house from 1984 until 1999, was named a companion for "eminent service to the people and parliament of Australia, to social justice, gender equality and Indigenous rights, to local government, and to the community".

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Frewen is the high-ranking army official who was appointed to lead Australia's national COVID-19 vaccine taskforce. He was named as an Officer within the military division of the Order of Australia.

Karvan is one of Australia's best-known actors, having appeared in Puberty Blues, Bump and The Secret Life of Us.

The 50-year-old from Sydney has been awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia for service to the film and television industry.

Norman Swan was named a Member of the Order of Australia for his role as a "science and media communicator", however the honour comes just a few months after he was forced into an apology for some of his coverage of COVID-19.

Swan apologised in November to the family of Kimberly Kitching after making comments linking the deaths of the former Labor senator and cricketer Shane Warne to COVID-19. Kitching had never said she caught the virus.

Also on the honour roll is rugby league legend Preston Campbell, who has been awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia for his work with young Indigenous people.

The sport's current players' association CEO, Clint Newtown, has been given the same honour for his "services to rugby league".

Australia Day Honours explained

• Individuals are appointed as a Companion of the Order of Australia (AC) for eminent achievement and merit of the highest degree in service to Australia or to humanity at large.
• Individuals are appointed as an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) for distinguished service of a high degree to Australia or to humanity at large
• Individuals are appointed as a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for service in a particular locality or field of activity or to a particular group.
• The Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) is awarded for service worthy of particular recognition.

You can check out the 2022 Australia Day Honours List here.

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Socceroos star and former refugee Awer Mabil has been named the Young Australian of the Year.

Mabil fled civil war in South Sudan for Australia and has become one of the nations' top footballers.

He recently played in the FIFA World Cup in Qatar, months after slotting a crucial penalty in a shootout to help Australia qualify.

READ MORE: Body image activist named 2023 Australian of the Year

But it was his work in helping "enlighten" the lives of other refugees that won him the title.

He set up his own non-profit organisation, Barefoot to Boots, to help other refugees in camps like the one he grew up in get into the sport.

He has personally delivered jerseys and other sports gear to the kids.

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"A refugee camp is like a prison without a wall," he said.

The scheme has grown, with hospital equipment also donated, plus sanitary products for girls who wouldn't otherwise be able to go to school.

Mabil described how as a kid he made a football using old plastic bags from rubbish.

He said playing football make young refugees feel like they "belong".

"For me the most important thing is to help the next generation," he said.

"People play, forget the poor living conditions of the camp."

Mabil, 27, was born in a Kenyan refugee camp to South Sudanese parents before moving to Australia as a five-year-old.

He told the BBC he'd lived in a hut built out of mud, after his parents fled civil war.

The family survived on one meal a day, and he used to pay $1 a time to watch football on TV.

He moved to Australia as part of a humanitarian program in 2006 and quickly excelled at football, signing for Adelaide United at 16

A crucial penalty he scored against Peru helped get Australia to the FIFA World Cup.

He has spoken about racism, saying he was once attacked and told, "Go back to your own country" by a neighbour.

Football Australia CEO James Johnson called Mabil a "role model".

"On behalf of Football Australia and the Australian football family, I want to congratulate Awer on being named the 2023 Young Australian of the Year," he said.

"Awer's contribution to Australian football as an immensely talented and popular member of the Subway Socceroos, and to society at large through his charity work, is a testament to the person and role model that he is."

His mother, a single mum, collected the award on his behalf as he now plays in Europe, for Sparta Prague in the Czech Republic.