What happened
Keir Starmer has reversed plans to force workers to use a new digital ID to prove their right to work, deciding the scheme will instead be voluntary when it launches later this decade. The prime minister had previously pledged that the digital credential would be compulsory for anyone starting a job, but the government has now concluded that mandatory use risked overshadowing broader debate about how digital identity might function in everyday life. 

Who said what
A government source said making the ID compulsory “was stopping conversation about what digital IDs could be used for generally”, adding that ministers wanted to avoid people being excluded from employment because they struggled with the technology. 

The reversal “represents Labour’s 10th about-turn since entering office”, said Genevieve Holl-Allen in The Telegraph. Dropping the mandatory requirement is a “major blow to the Government’s promotion of the scheme, which was lauded as a key tool in tackling illegal immigration”.

What next?
A public consultation will begin shortly to determine which digital checks should be used, ahead of the scheme’s planned introduction in 2029.

What happened
Astronauts’ brains change shape and shift position after spaceflight, a new study has found. Researchers looked at MRI scans from 26 astronauts who had been in space for varying amounts of time, and compared them with the scans of 24 people on Earth who were put on bed rest for up to 60 days with their heads tilted back, simulating a microgravity environment.

Both experienced similar changes in their brains’ shape and position, but the astronauts’ brains shifted upwards in the skull to a greater extent, with sensory-related and motor regions showing the biggest shifts.

Who said what
Most displacements and deformations recovered after six months of return to Earth, but “some persisted”, said the study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

“The people who went for a year showed the largest changes,” said co-author Rachael Seidler, professor of applied physiology and kinesiology at the University of Florida. “We need to understand these changes and their impacts to keep astronauts safe and healthy and protect their longevity.”

What next?
The study “has implications for Nasa’s goals to conduct long-duration missions to the Moon and Mars”, said NBC News.

“As anime rises in the box office ranks, Middle Eastern and American investors are circling the industry like sharks,” said The Telegraph. 

With a sizeable Gen Z and Gen Alpha following, as well as booming merchandise opportunities, anime is an increasingly lucrative market for countries like Saudi Arabia, who are looking to invest in cultural soft power.

Much of the interest in the industry stems from the Saudi Vision 2030 programme. Launched in 2016, the programme aims to build economic growth through means other than oil and establish the kingdom as a global leader in multiple sectors, including entertainment. 

Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s sovereign wealth fund has “set aside $1 billion” to launch Arena SNK Studios, the main purpose of which is “strip-mining the worlds of anime and video games” for new intellectual property. Meanwhile, state-backed studio Manga Productions has gone from licensing to “co-producing original content” with “major Japanese partners”, said Variety.

Despite the Crown Prince reportedly being a “keen fan of anime” himself, many are cynical of the Saudi programme, said The Telegraph. Critics point to two main objectives of the kingdom's investment in anime (“and ‘making great art’ is neither”): to “speed-diversify a national economy”, and to “win over all the international ‘feel-good industries’” in the hope that regime’s human rights abuses will be “politely forgotten”. “What the Saudis are doing now isn’t that different from what the US did exactly a century ago: win over the world by becoming its pop culture crucible”.