remain

Sometimes a reverse is the ideal play. That appears to be the call made by quarterback Demond Williams Jr., who after huddling with family and advisers, announced on Instagram Thursday night that he will remain at Washington in 2026.

His decision to honor an estimated $4.5 million name, image and likeness contract he signed a week ago marks an about-face from the shocking announcement he made Tuesday that he would enter the transfer portal.

“After thoughtful reflection with my family, I am excited to announce that I will continue my football journey at the University of Washington,” he wrote. “I am fully committed and focused on contributing to what we are building.”

His decision to transfer was met with widespread derision from Huskies fans and officials, who made it known the university would enforce Williams’ contract even if it meant taking him to court. The Big Ten backed Washington’s stance.

Williams’ agent, Doug Hendrickson of Wasserman Football, dropped him as a client Thursday, citing “philosophical differences.” Williams hired lawyer Darren Heitner, who apparently determined that his client should return to Washington.

“The past 48 hours have underscored just how complex and challenging the current college athletics environment has become,” Washington athletic director Pat Chun said in a statement. “What has transpired has been difficult for all parties involved and is emblematic of many of the current issues in college sports.

“It is critical in this post-House, revenue-sharing environment that contracts with student-athletes are not only enforced but respected by everyone within the college sports ecosystem.”

Washington, which refused to place Williams in the transfer portal, was prepared to demand that the quarterback pay a large buyout of his NIL contract had he transferred.

Now, though, it seems all is well. Washington coach Jedd Fisch said in a statement that he and Williams “will work together to begin the process of repairing relationships and regaining the trust of the Husky community.

“Demond and I have engaged in very honest and heartfelt conversations about his present and future. We both agree that the University of Washington is the best place for him to continue his academic, athletic, and social development.”

Washington officials suspected that another school contacted Williams after he had signed his Huskies deal, and submitted evidence of tampering to the Big Ten. Tony Petitti, the conference commissioner, happened to be in Seattle on Tuesday for a Celebration of Life service for Washington goalkeeper Mia Hamant, who died on Nov. 6 from a rare form of kidney cancer.

Many Huskies football players and coaches also were in attendance when Williams posted his official announcement about entering the transfer portal on Instagram. In his Instagram post Thursday night, Williams apologized about the poor timing of his initial announcement.

“I never intended to call attention away from such an important moment,” he wrote.

Williams, who will be a junior, is expected to be one of the top handful of college quarterbacks next season. In his first season as a full-time starter, he threw for 3,065 yards and 25 touchdowns and earned honorable mention All-Big Ten honors.

Jan. 8 (Asia Today) — South Korea’s push to develop a national artificial intelligence model has exposed a fundamental question the government has yet to answer: What, exactly, qualifies as a “sovereign” or “independent” AI?

A government-backed competition is underway to build a national AI system intended for use across society. The initiative, led by Ha Jung-woo, former Naver executive and now senior secretary for AI future planning at the presidential office, and Bae Kyung-hoon, former head of LG AI Research and now vice minister of science and ICT, aims to secure what officials call “AI sovereignty.” The stated goal is a Korean-built AI developed entirely with domestic technology.

As the competition has intensified, disputes over technical standards have moved to the forefront. The most prominent issue is whether participating models were truly built “from scratch” – a term borrowed from sports that implies starting with no preexisting foundation.

The debate first erupted when the CEO of Syonic AI publicly questioned whether Upstage’s model met that standard. Upstage CEO Kim Sung-hoon responded the following day by opening all training logs, checkpoints and experiment records for public verification. The company live-streamed the session, answered questions without prior preparation and ultimately received a public apology from the original accuser.

Senior Secretary Ha and Vice Minister Bae both praised the process on social media, calling it evidence that the national AI project is fostering a healthy and transparent ecosystem. They commended Upstage for proving the allegations unfounded through verification and credited the accuser for acknowledging the findings.

The controversy did not end there.

Attention soon shifted to Naver’s own “from scratch” claim. The company acknowledged that its model uses an encoder from China’s Qwen but said the component was not significant. In a statement, Naver said it had “strategically adopted a verified external encoder” to ensure compatibility with the global ecosystem and optimize system efficiency.

That explanation has been met with skepticism in the industry. Critics argue that the encoder is a core component of the model and that identical weights suggest a level of dependence comparable to directly adopting a foreign model. Because the entire system was trained around that structure, they say, the dependency cannot simply be removed.

The contrast in responses has drawn sharp comparisons. If a national athlete faces doping suspicions, the burden of proof lies with the athlete. Upstage disclosed everything immediately. Naver, critics argue, has asked for time without offering detailed verification. Post-hoc review, they say, is meaningless once the competition is over.

Naver has countered that innovation does not require building every technology from the ground up, arguing that AI advances by adding unique value atop proven global technologies.

But that raises a larger question: Is that what the government meant by a national AI strategy?

Industry observers say the issue is not a minor technical dispute but a political and strategic one, touching on technological sovereignty, research ethics and industrial trust. Some argue that marketing ambiguous standards risks undermining the very purpose of the project.

National AI systems are expected to underpin public services, defense, finance and other critical sectors. If their core components depend on foreign technology – particularly from countries where security assurances are uncertain – the issue extends beyond competitiveness to national economic and security risks.

What defines a “domestic AI”? Where are public funds and computing resources being directed? Who verifies technological independence, and by what criteria?

These are questions only the government can answer.

The project is officially called the Independent Foundation Model initiative. Without clear standards and qualifications, however, the national AI strategy risks losing both credibility and direction.

– Reported by Asia Today; translated by UPI© Asia Today. Unauthorized reproduction or redistribution prohibited.

What started as a niche corner of the internet has evolved into a multibillion-dollar industry.

In 2025, prediction markets have become a substantial instrument for speculation and the forecasting of real-world events in both finance and media. Two major players in the sector, Polymarket and Kalshi, have amassed a combined volume of over $37 billion (€31.5bn) in wagers placed this year, according to the 2026 Digital Assets Outlook Report.

A prediction market is essentially a platform where people bet on what they think will happen, and the price of the bet becomes a forecast. For example, instead of asking people directly or through on-the-street interviews who they expect will win an election, you let people put money on their answer.

The market price tells you what outcome people collectively think is most likely, and the forecast updates in real time, which is why some believe prediction markets capture collective thinking better than polls.

The sheer amount of capital flowing through these exchanges has triggered a gold rush. This month, Kalshi secured a Series E funding round of $1 billion(€850mn) valuing the platform at $11 billion (€9.4bn).

Polymarket hit a milestone back in October when Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), the parent company of the New York Stock Exchange, announced a strategic investment of up to $2 billion (€1.7bn) and valued the platform at $8 billion (€6.8bn). Additionally, ICE became the distributor of Polymarket’s data to institutional investors globally.

The overall interest from financial institutions is undeniable. Terrence Duffy, the CEO of CME Group, the world’s leading derivatives exchange, described prediction markets as “a legitimate domain of speculation and information aggregation that our clients are demanding” during their third-quarter earnings call.

EU-based or homegrown prediction markets have yet to take off, and EU regulations have kept the existing ones largely offshore.

From beating polls to signing partnerships

As platforms, prediction markets function similarly to a financial exchange. Users buy and sell binary contracts, betting yes or no, on the outcomes of unknown future events such as election results, corporate earnings reports and sports scores.

Typically, these contracts pay out $1 if the event occurs and $0 if it does not. For example, if a contract is priced at $0.50 it implies that the collective belief of the participants is pricing a 50% probability of an event occurring.

The relevance of prediction markets was cemented after the 2024 US presidential election and the 2025 German snap election. In both cases, these platforms functioned as real-time scoreboards, consistently pricing outcomes and delivering predictions that were nearly as reliable or even more so than traditional polling.

This perceived accuracy has now forced legacy media to adapt.

Earlier this month, CNN set a global precedent by partnering with Kalshi to integrate live prediction market data into its broadcasts. A couple days later, CNBC made a similar announcement.

Before the recent partnerships, several media outlets were already starting to incorporate these predictions into their regular news stories, such as interest rate decisions and legislative votes, granting them similar editorial weight to conventional polling.

Hyper-commodification, insider trading and outcome manipulation

Critics of prediction markets argue that they have effectively gamified everyday human outcomes, drawing a dangerously thin line between serious forecasting and high-stakes gambling.

This gamification has accelerated a phenomenon some call “hyper-commodification”, which refers to the process of turning every aspect of social life into a commodity that becomes subject to market forces.

In its worst form, the phenomenon encourages gambling, creates new opportunities for insider trading and incentivises manipulating the outcomes of real-world events.

In early December, a Polymarket trader nicknamed “AlphaRaccoon” sparked controversy after winning 22 out of 23 bets related to Google’s 2025 Year in Search rankings.

The trader netted over $1 million (€850,000) in 24 hours, and was later accused of being a Google employee who used internal access to proprietary search data to find out the most searched terms ahead of the company’s announcement.

The incident raised concerns about the integrity of prediction markets, especially since the fact that users can be anonymous makes it more difficult for those engaging in insider trading to be immediately weeded out.

In late October, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong, who leads one of the largest crypto assets exchanges, turned the company’s third-quarter earnings call into ademonstration of the risks of outcome manipulation in prediction markets.

In the European Union, the crackdown on prediction markets began in late 2024 when the French National Gaming Authorityblocked Polymarket, ruling that its operation constituted unlicensed gambling.

The Romanian National Gambling Office (ONJN) blacklisted Polymarket in October after it hosted wagers on the Romanian 2025 presidential election held in May. In this case, the volume traded exceeded $600 million and the President of ONJN stated that “regardless of whether you bet in lei or crypto, if you bet money on a future result, under the conditions of a counterpart bet, we are talking about gambling that must be licensed.”

However, there are still many EU member states where prediction markets are accessible, such as Germany and Spain. The broader EU regulatory landscape remains fragmented, with no unified framework in place.

As we head into 2026, prediction markets also face the full implementation of the EU’s Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regulation, as most of these platforms make use of blockchain technology.

By July of next year, the grandfathering period ends for securing a Crypto-Asset Service Provider licence. According to the European Securities and Markets Authority, MiCA contains strict market abuse regimes that will apply to any prediction market using crypto assets.

The new reality is that every world event is being priced in real-time and the EU must decide if it will be a part of this era or opt for an outright ban.

Jacob Bethell said he wants to remain England’s number three but admitted he has “a lot more to do” to make the position his own.

The 22-year-old was recalled for the fourth Ashes Test and made a crucial 40 in the second innings as England won by four wickets to end an 18-match winless streak in Australia.

Bethell had never batted higher than number four in first-class cricket until he had three Tests for England at number three in New Zealand last year.

The left-hander played only three first-class matches in 2025 before replacing Ollie Pope for the Boxing Day Test.

His impressive 40 actually came at number four after England promoted Brydon Carse as a pinch-hitter in the second-innings run chase of 175. Now Bethell will get the opportunity to stake a claim for a long run in the team in the final Ashes Test in Sydney.

“I like three,” he said. “You come in when the ball is new and in some scenarios the ball’s going all over the shop, but in other scenarios it presents opportunities to score when bowlers are trying to take wickets and the field is attacking there’s loads of gaps.

“I’ve still got a lot more to do to call it my position.”

Bethell’s selection in Melbourne was the culmination of year-long speculation over Pope’s position at number three.

After impressing with three half-centuries in New Zealand last December, Bethell’s international progress was hampered by an injury, a stint at the Indian Premier League (IPL) and Pope’s good form at the start of the home summer.

The Warwickshire man made his first professional century in a one-day international against South Africa in September. Following the Ashes, he will be part of England’s white-ball plans in the new year then will return to the IPL with Royal Challengers Bengaluru.

It could mean Bethell’s next first-class cricket following the tour of Australia is England’s first Test of the home summer against New Zealand in June.

“I’m not thinking too far ahead yet,” said Bethell. “Hopefully next week in Sydney and then we’ve got a lot of cricket to play before next summer.”

Asked about securing the number three spot, he said: “I would like to. I would like to just nail down any role in the team. If you’re in the XI and contributing to winning I’m pretty happy with that.”

No. 1 Indiana booked its ticket to the College Football Playoff quarterfinals on Dec. 6 after defeating Ohio State 13-10 in the Big Ten championship game. With such a long gap before its New Year’s Day matchup against No. 9 Alabama in the Rose Bowl, Indiana offensive lineman Carter Smith said the Hoosiers are seeking a balance in preparing while still practicing with intensity.

“It’s all about keeping the speed of the game,” Smith said Saturday. “The biggest thing for us in the offensive line room has been going like it’s a game, every single breath, because we know that being away from the game for so long can affect that.”

The first two weeks of preparation were lighter workouts as the Hoosiers recovered from the season, tight end Riley Nowakowski said. Without knowing their opponent, the Hoosiers didn’t want to overwork older players. Instead the coaching staff gave younger players opportunities to get reps during practice.

But after Alabama punched its ticket to the Rose Bowl, the mentality changed.

“We really got into game prep and I think that’s kind of how you do it. … You start to really lock in and get back into normal game-speed stuff and game type of practices,” Nowakowski said. “I think it’s important to stay locked in mentally.”

Even with the bright lights of the Rose Bowl, Indiana offensive coordinator Mike Shanahan said the pressure will not be overwhelming.

“There might be a slight adjustment early in the game, but I feel like our guys will be ready to go and the experience within our group will help us there as well,” he said.

Dec. 22 (UPI) — A federal judge on Monday allowed Kilmar Abrego Garcia to remain free through Christmas as she barred Immigration and Customs Enforcement from re-detaining the Salvadoran native.

U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis in Maryland extended a temporary restraining order to keep federal officials from deporting Abrego Garcia, after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled he was deported and imprisoned in March without legal authority to El Salvador.

“This is an extremely irregular and extraordinary situation,” Xinnis told attorneys Monday, as she pressed the government on whether it would detain Abrego Garcia if there were no restraining order.

“Show your work, that’s all,” Xinis said. “Give it to me and we don’t have to speculate.”

Abrego Garcia was released from ICE detention on Dec. 11, following efforts to deport him to an African nation where he has no connection.

“Because Abrego Garcia has been held in ICE detention to effectuate third-country removal absent a lawful removal order, his requested relief is proper,” according to Xinis.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security called Xinis’ rulings “naked judicial activism by an Obama-appointed judge.”

Abrego Garcia, who illegally entered the United States nearly 15 years ago, has accused the White House of vindictive prosecution. The administration has called him an MS-13 gang member, which he denies.

Abrego Garcia had been living in Maryland with his wife and children before being deported to El Salvador’s CECOT mega-prison in March. He was returned to the United States in June and is awaiting trial on human smuggling charges in Tennessee. He has pleaded not guilty.

On Monday, Abrego Garcia’s attorneys said he is prepared to go to Costa Rica, which the judge said the government refuses to consider.

The “persistent refusal to acknowledge Costa Rica as a viable removal option, their threats to send Abrego to African countries that never agreed to take him and their misrepresentation to the court that Liberia is now the only country available to Abrego, all reflect that whatever purpose was behind his detention, it was not for the ‘basic purpose’ of timely third-country removal,” Xinis wrote.

Prior to this series, the 34-year-old agreed a new England central contract that will run until the end of the next Ashes in the UK in 2027.

This series loss, completed in only 11 days of cricket across the first three Tests, is likely to put pressure on the positions of McCullum and director of cricket Rob Key.

Given Stokes’ influence and importance to the England team, the Durham man would probably be given the opportunity to continue as captain if he wants the role.

He has a chequered injury history – Stokes has been dogged by knee, hamstring and shoulder problems over the past two years.

And the captain has noticeably devoted a lot of emotional energy to this series. On being dismissed in the second innings of the second Test in Brisbane, then again in the first innings in Adelaide, he threw his bat in the air in frustration.

Asked if he still has the energy for the job, Stokes replied: “Absolutely.”

After making 83 in more than five hours at the crease in the first innings, Stokes did not bowl on the third day in Adelaide, before taking the ball at the beginning of day four.

“I just didn’t feel right,” he said. “I knew I still had a big role to play so I didn’t want to expose myself.

“I felt like I was going to snap every time I ran after a ball, so I just looked after myself.

“I had a good night’s kip, woke up next morning and I was good to go again, but I actually listened to the advice that was given to me for a change from a few of the senior boys.”

DOVER AIR FORCE BASE, Del. — President Trump on Wednesday paid his respects to two Iowa National Guard members and a U.S. civilian interpreter who were killed in an attack in the Syrian desert, joining their grieving families as their remains were brought back to the country they served.

Trump met privately with the families at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware before the dignified transfer, a solemn ritual conducted in honor of U.S. service members killed in action. The civilian was also included in the transfer.

Trump, who traveled to Dover several times in his first term, once described it as “the toughest thing I have to do” as president.

The two Iowa troops killed in Syria on Saturday were Sgt. Edgar Brian Torres-Tovar, 25, of Des Moines, and Sgt. William Nathaniel Howard, 29, of Marshalltown, according to the U.S. Army. Both were members of the 1st Squadron, 113th Cavalry Regiment, and have been hailed as heroes by the Iowa National Guard.

Torres-Tovar’s and Howard’s families were at Dover for the return of their remains, alongside Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds, members of Iowa’s congressional delegation and leaders of the Iowa National Guard. Their remains will be taken to Iowa after the transfer.

A U.S. civilian working as an interpreter, identified Tuesday as Ayad Mansoor Sakat, of Macomb, Mich., was also killed. Three other members of the Iowa National Guard were injured in the attack. The Pentagon has not identified them.

They were among hundreds of U.S. troops deployed in eastern Syria as part of a coalition fighting the Islamic State group.

The process of returning service member remains

There is no formal role for a president at a dignified transfer other than to watch in silence, with all thoughts about what happened in the past and what is happening at Dover kept to himself for the moment. There is no speaking by any of the dignitaries who attend, with the only words coming from the military officials who direct the highly choreographed transfers.

Trump arrived without First Lady Melania Trump, who had been scheduled to accompany him, according to the president’s public schedule. Her office declined to elaborate, with spokesperson Nick Clemens saying the first lady “was not able to attend today.”

During the process at Dover, transfer cases draped with the American flag that hold the soldiers’ remains are carried from the belly of a hulking C-17 military aircraft to a waiting vehicle under the watchful eyes of grieving family members. The vehicle then transports the remains to the mortuary facility at the base, where the fallen are prepared for burial.

Iowa National Guard members hailed as heroes

Howard’s stepfather, Jeffrey Bunn, has said Howard “loved what he was doing and would be the first in and last out.” He said Howard had wanted to be a soldier since he was a boy.

In a social media post, Bunn, who is chief of the Tama, Iowa, police department, said Howard was a loving husband and an “amazing man of faith.” He said Howard’s brother, a staff sergeant in the Iowa National Guard, would escort “Nate” back to Iowa.

Torres-Tovar was remembered as a “very positive” family-oriented person who always put others first, according to fellow Guard members who were deployed with him and issued a statement to the local TV broadcast station WOI.

Dina Qiryaqoz, the daughter of the civilian interpreter who was killed, said Wednesday in a statement that her father worked for the U.S. Army during the invasion of Iraq from 2003 to 2007. Sakat is survived by his wife and four adult children.

The interpreter was from Bakhdida, Iraq, a small Catholic village southeast of Mosul, and the family immigrated to the U.S. in 2007 on a special visa, Qiryaqoz said. At the time of his death, Sakat was employed as an independent contractor for Virginia-based Valiant Integrated Services.

Sakat’s family was still struggling to believe that he is gone. “He was a devoted father and husband, a courageous interpreter and a man who believed deeply in the mission he served,” Qiryaqoz said.

Trump’s reaction to the attack in Syria

Trump told reporters over the weekend that he was mourning the deaths. He vowed retaliation. The most recent instance of U.S. service members killed in action was in January 2024, when three American troops died in a drone attack in Jordan.

Saturday’s deadly attack followed a rapprochement between the U.S. and Syria, bringing the former pariah state into a U.S.-led coalition fighting the Islamic State group.

Trump has forged a relationship with interim Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa, the onetime leader of an Islamic insurgent group who led the ouster of former President Bashar Assad.

Trump, who met with al-Sharaa last month at the White House, said Monday that the attack had nothing to do with the Syrian leader, who Trump said was “devastated by what happened.”

During his first term, Trump visited Dover in 2017 to honor a U.S. Navy SEAL killed during a raid in Yemen, in 2019 for two Army officers whose helicopter crashed in Afghanistan, and in 2020 for two Army soldiers killed in Afghanistan when a person dressed in an Afghan army uniform opened fire.

Price writes for the Associated Press. AP writers Konstantin Toropin and Darlene Superville in Washington, Isabella Volmert in Lansing, Mich., and Hannah Fingerhut in Des Moines, Iowa, contributed to this report.