News & Reviews:   research

As you should know by now, X and xAI's Grok got into a big controversy over the past few days. Investigations were launched a few days ago, and new research reveals that Elon Musk’s Grok AI chatbot generated an estimated 3 million sexually explicit images over 11 days, including around 23000 that appear to depict children, sparking global alarm over the misuse of generative AI technology.

Industry research firm Counterpoint Research has revised its outlook for the global smartphone market, now projecting a slight contraction in shipments in 2026. The adjustment is largely due to a sharp rise in memory chip prices, especially for DRAM (RAM) used in smartphones, as supply tightens against booming demand from artificial intelligence (AI) data centres and other high-end computing sectors.

Within the span of ten days in October 2025, two cases made shocking news across Malaysia. First was a 16-year-old girl murdered by a schoolmate, followed by a 9-year-old brother who slashed his younger sibling. Both well-known stories have been linked to video games (and other media content), especially the latter on Roblox, and once again, this brought back the classic old question: Do video games make kids violent?

Generative AI is utilised in various aspects today. We use these platforms to help summarise and discover solutions to our problems and perform other tasks. For instance, NotebookLM helps with research and studying. The latest update adds new features to help students study better.

A recent study from UCLA reveals that artificial intelligence is not just changing how we work but also how we speak and write. According to the research, humans are increasingly mimicking the linguistic style of AI chatbots like ChatGPT, even without realising it.

Yes, of all the data, you don't see this kind of study every day, particularly from Samsung. According to the company, its findings from the Southeast Asia and Oceania (SEAO) Gaming Insight Study found that 7 in 10 online consumers in the region are gamers.

At the moment, there are two best ways to unlock your phone - using a fingerprint scanner or face recognition. Both are easy and quick, and there seem to be no other ways, but it seems that a team of researchers from Kyushu University and the University of Tokyo in Japan just brought a breath of fresh ideas to the table (pun intended).

From time to time, you would still have people telling you playing games is a waste of time and bad for your brain. However, a recent study from the University of Oxford says otherwise, saying that there's no relation between the amount of time gaming and a person's mental health. 

The global chip shortage issue persists by having the wait time hit 21 weeks, the longest it has ever been. To put it simply, companies would now have to wait that long after placing their orders with the semiconductor manufacturers.

Most of us living in this era probably treat a smartphone as essential. Without it, some might even find it challenging to carry on with activities for the rest of the days. However, this new research is telling us that not all of us need a smartphone in our lives, by showing that half of the world's population doesn't own the device.