this is bbc news. the headlines. sedans are may say it's launching a large—scale iq on khartoum to recapture areas help either rival support groups. officials say at least 500 people have been killed during the two weeks of fighting between the army and the rival paramilitary force. police in texas say five people, including a eight—year—old child been killed after shooting at a house. the local sheriffs office said the suspected government is armed with an assault rifle and still on the loose. russian officials say a blaze at an oiled demo at russian occupied crimea was caused by a drone attack

put the facility is located home to russia's taxi fleet. all four teaching unions in england say they will co—ordinate strikes if members vote for industrial action. this is bbc news. and now on bbc news it's time for click. we are mave! this week, we're at the gig of the future where the bands are not as they seem. i'm at a gig, but i'm not at a gig. or where you'd expect. we're in a hobbit hole. it gets weirder. - this is very strange.

but how much control do you really want over your pop idols? so what happens when you tweak the nostrils? 0h! liverpool is getting ready to host the biggest music event on earth. eurovision is coming to town, and this city is about to become the centre of the music universe. it's an amazing event in an amazing place — one which gave us the greatest four—piece band of all time. so which one's benny and which one's bjorn? laughs. you're going to get so much abuse for that. i know, i'm regretting it already. but anyway, welcome to the british music experience. this is an immensely colourful journey through the british pop scene from 1945 to now, and where every hour, on the hour, a hologram boy george plays live. # karma, karma, karma, karma

karma chameleon... # liverpool's hosting eurovision on behalf of ukraine. and in amongst the memorabilia, here's the outfit that helped the uk sparkle last year. there's plenty of interactive stuff here. you can find a musical link to wherever you're from in the uk. and there are lessons for dancers and budding musicians... ..of which we are neither. ah, take that and the spice girls — i remember when they were new and exciting. every generation has their idols, and they were mine. and the brilliant thing about music is it's always looking for new and exciting, and the next big thing. and the latest batch of idols, well, they need to be seen to be believed. from travis scott to ariana

grande tojustin bieber — pop stars are entering the so—called metaverse, performing virtually on pixelated stages they'll never physically set foot on. and hollywood is leading the charge. it's home to capture studios like wave and yoom that digitally scan artists and teleport them to online audiences around the world. today, with this technology, we're actually able to bring the actual artists, process themselves into a photorealistic performance. they use eight camera rigs, 32 motion sensors, 48 led lights, and four infrared projectors to capture sd shapes and textures. so the playback looks more like a 3d video than an animation. it's notjust their song that you like. you also like to see how they move and how they express the music, and their body position and their body movement, their facial expressions. yoom puts on festivals where concert—goers can gather at certain showtimes, wander about and have a chat

with other fans if they fancy. oh, that's me — hi! so hold on, if i walk up to this chap, what are they doing? create voice chat zone... to attend, you just need a web browser. half of the population of internet, so we're talking about four billion people potentially with the access to these music concerts. but is this just a fad amidst waning metaverse hysteria? the percentage of people gaming versus watching tv is really incomparable. i mean, we're seeing that shift coming up. if we look at where audience are and where audience are consuming content, this is where we want to bring the music. nothing can replace the live concert, but it's expensive for fans, for musicians to travel. icelandic artist margret ran of electronic group gusgus has received the technical treatment for her virtual tour. this isjust so nice to be able to, you know, go to your computer and immediately connect just like this, from

wherever in the world. because i haven't been to japan. i mean, i live in iceland, in a small island in the atlantic ocean. so this is exciting for me to see an artist that maybe lives in korea, and i can see them from iceland. for the artist, it's really opening a new opportunity for revenue, a new opportunity for promotion, a new opportunity for expansion of their art and creation into the worldwide audience that is really today logging into interactive spaces and looking for content. and of course, you have a captive audience keen to buy digital merch. travis scott reportedly made around $20 million for his nine—minute—long concert in fortnite. other acts are embracing virtual worlds in unique ways. the uk's miro shot is an exploratory halfway house between physical and digital. they play their music live on stage whilst the audience

wear mixed—reality headsets, seeing the band sometimes, whilst at others being immersed in computer—generated visuals. in a part of a song that you feel should be spacey or you should send them to somewhere else, we can send them to the alps, or we can put them in a motel that's somewhere in wisconsin. and you can kind of... really, it's the same decisions you make when you're making a music video. the song already has its own energy state. i'm ata gig, but i'm not at a gig. but i'm at a gig, but i'm not at a gig. the band has been using vr for a while now, but as the tech evolves, so does the show. the visual fidelity of these headsets is super clear, so it's almost like having a triple—a gaming experience in a live music performance. what technology can do is bring the artist's imagination to life. but the show will never be about the technology, it's always going to be about what the experience will be.

it's quite strange experience actually, going to see a real live performance, a real—world gig, but also see a virtual cityscape. any artist will want to use tools that can say something new or say something else. so for us, it's just this amazing new palette of colours to paint with. that was nick. and it's not only western musicians that are feeling the need to have virtual versions of themselves. k—pop group aespa also took to a virtual stage at south by southwest. k—pop is known for constructing its bands — from picture—perfect appearances to impeccable behaviour, idols are made to be flawless. and now, some have been taken to the next level. this is eternity, and these are not real faces. whilst professional singers provide the voices

and different dancers perform the routines, theirfaces are swapped out for ones generated by ai, which were selected by a public vote. although face—swapping software is fairly automated these days, it's the job of technical artists like shin seunho to make the videos as perfect as possible. # are you keeping it real? # the technology's not perfect, so sometimes we have to manually catch those frames and... so you have the characters dancing and their face starts wandering off to one side. don't you just hate it when your face goes wandering off to one side? not too far away, also in the city of seoul, the band mave have gone one better. we are mave! their bodies are also computer—generated, and they come with a suitably futuristic back story. translation: four young girls from udipia, a future city - where emotions have been eliminated, crashland in the modern day in search of hopes and dreams. right then...

you can turn her eyes. so what happens when you tweak the nostrils? 0h! you don't have to touch it. and get this — members of both bands don'tjust perform in pre—recorded videos, they can appear live too. translation: every morning, i report on stories about al - for broadcaster sbs, and i've also been reporting on different food cultures from around the world. well, i'm sat here with jane, not jane. and what's weird is i can see this person's real face. but you can't, because by the time you watch this, jane's face will have been deep—faked on top. and even over there, i can see jane on my reference screen. this is alljust completely weird.

jane, hello. so, the big question — why? why go to all of this trouble when you have perfectly good human performers around? translation: well, as the virtual human| and influencer industry expands, what is often brought up is that virtual humans will never age and that there will never be scandals. translation: furthermore, unlike real idols, virtual- idols do not need sleep and can exist anywhere and everywhere. although at the moment, the singers' faces are essentially being animated by hand, one of the hopes is that in the future they could plop someone in this chair and get them to say a load of words, and the footage from these cameras will be fed into a computer to allow an al

to learn what emotions and what facial expressions go with what combination of words. and that means that the singers' facial expressions can be automated simply based on the song lyrics. yes, in the future, mave could take on a life of their own. translation: already there's a lot of content j being produced by ai technology, like chatgpt. so i do think there will come a day when mave will be able to talk for themselves, sing by themselves, and even compose songs by themselves. in the near future, they could be personalised, ithink, so that, you know, it might be possible to have your mave. she might know about your personal things like, you know, if you fight with your father yesterday, then the day after, she might be possible to ask you about, you know, how's your father?

so we're notjust talking about a pop band now, we're talking about some sort of, like, virtualfriend who... yeah. this is really the realm of fantasy now. this is like your favourite pop star also turns up on a video call and starts talking to you about your personal problems. yeah, right. all of this begs the question, how are human performers meant to live up to these perfectly curated beauty standards and talents? translation: for instance, just like how mickey mouse l is still a popular and active character, i also hope mave will be recognised as an iconic character like mickey mouse. this might either be creepy or dreamy — the end of human creativity or the beginning of a new creative era. where you stand on this may depend on your age, might depend on your music tastes. so ask yourself this — what would your ideal pop idol look like?

ok, time for a look at this week's tech news now. the uk's competition watchdog has blocked microsoft's proposed plan to buy gaming giant activision blizzard. the competition and markets authority said it's concerned that the $68.7 billion deal would reduce innovation and consumer choice in the fast—growing cloud gaming sector. the theory is that cloud gaming will eventually become the kind of de facto distribution way that games are distributed to the end user. what do you think of this? it's a mouth—based touchpad. augmental�*s mouthpad can connect to smartphones or laptops via bluetooth and allows people who can't use hands—on touchpads to navigate digital interfaces using one that's literally on the tip of their tongue. ukraine says it's ramping up its homegrown drone production to meet demand on the front line.

the expansion is backed by its army of drones campaign, which has raised over £87 million since lastjuly. and finally, a new study suggests that video calls could help pet parrots feel less lonely. yes, research by scientists at the university of glasgow and northeastern university saw us parrot owners help their pets video call others, also saw them engage in more social behaviour, like preening, playing and singing. i wonder whether they tweet, too? electronic instrumental. it's time to get the band back together. and if you're wondering where they are, they're in this flashing box. i've been promised a gateway to an immersive virtual studio where musicians can collaborate

in a new kind of real—time. now, while artists like the weeknd are experimenting with virtual performances, mixing music production with the metaverse is something that hasn't happened before. with the onset of the pandemic, interacting with work colleagues and family via video conference calls quickly became the new normal. and musicians, used to jamming with one another in the same studio, were also forced to use these same platforms. but making music together online doesn't really work. it's because of something called — wait for it — latency. see, it takes a certain amount of time for sound to travel, and the further away you are, the longer it takes. and while you might not notice that lag in a room like this, you certainly would online. latency is essentially the time it takes for data,

or in this case audio, to pass from one point on a network to another. and although this data is traveling at the speed of light, delays or high latency can still be an issue. we ran this series of workshops to explore the possibility of using lower—latency technology offered by wireless communication, like 56, for having remote collaboration between actors and musicians. and we have heard from people involved, and these were both actors and musicians, that while these 5—7 milliseconds were completely negligible for the actors, it bothered the musicians. when it came to audio, it played an important role in giving them less than perfect experience, basically. enter the scenekey, developed by a company called meloscene. it's essentially a device that imports music made with real—world instruments to a vr studio. it allows for instantaneous

cooperation between collaborators anywhere in the world. this is one ofjust four prototypes in existence, and for the first time, all four are going to be connected simultaneously. i'll be jamming with other musicians, logging in from west london, los angeles and amsterdam. this is very strange. we're in a hobbit hole. this is very, very... it gets weirder. it looks great. although i have one criticism that's playing with the reality of a music studio, which is the sofa is far too clean. where are the coffee rings? way too clean in here! i had a kind of rough idea of like 120, 130bpm, somewhere inside there, mid to up—tempo. hey, how about this, boss, obviously, since you're the producer — will you guide what you want and drop files and all that? yeah, sure, sure. 120, i'll start some chords, maybe. we'll default to you. 0k, cool.

i'll turn my headset down and i'm going to hop - on my kit really quick. all right, i'm going to do the same. oh, that's nice. 0h! i like the fact that everyone's avatars are bobbing their heads, like proper sound engineer types. can we make those notes shorter, so more staccato at the top — the ding, ding, ding? a whole hour flew by in the low—latency virtual studio. and before i knew it, it was time to head back to the real world. i'm back. i don't want to be — i want to be back in here. it's freezing cold where we're filming, and my fingers are completely numb, but i'm somehow managing to forget about that inside this sort of la—type cool music studio. yeah, i'm surprised. but my fingers are freezing. i travelled to the other side of london to meet one of my collaborators face—to—face.

so i could see some people watching this and they might think, hang on, ijust need a sound card or a computer and an internet connection. most people are going away from pcs and just using tablets to do the majority of their stuff. but mobile processing can't handle the heavy workloads. so when people want to get into music, they're having to buy a $2,000 computer or whatever, they have to buy the interface. all these things to get going, whereas we're putting it all in one box. you could tell i was really enjoying myself in there. yes, a little bit. but i could also tell that it's a work in progress still. it must have been quite frustrating when things kept falling over. oh, my gosh. it's a very large endeavour to kind of bridge the gap between hardware, software, internet, remote collaboration, all that. so one of the ways that we've done it for the prototype, the very, very beginning, is that we're just having to use... we're basicallyjust patching it through third—party software. and so we're at the mercy of the third—party software companies, which is why we're building our own system that

specifically is for audio and art and creativity, things like that. everything is mapped out on how to solve it. that's probably the most frustrating thing, having the design of your supercar and all you have is like an old beater. even with the issues on the day, i was genuinely excited by the scenekey�*s premise, helping musicians to collaborate in real—time, wherever we are. that was lj. right, let's go back in time to see what was happening in the music news of 1953, shall we? look, british jazz trumpeter ken colyer introduced the new orleans jazz sounds to this country. everest was conquered. but i think probably the biggest news, from this small isle at least, was the coronation of queen elizabeth ii. and now, 70 years on, all eyes and ears are on london for the coronation of king charles. beaming a live event like that across the world is no mean feat. so alasdair keane's been taking a look at some of the technology that's being used. newsreel: the world's finest

equipment will be used, including the largest telephoto lens in the world and a zoom lens which cost over £1,000, to bring the complete magnificent spectacle to this theatre... 1953, and the coronation of queen elizabeth ii was a huge moment for the technology behind broadcasting. fast forward 70 years and, while the coronation of king charles might not be sending people to the shops to buy their first tv, it is seeing new tech being rolled out to broadcast the events in london to screens right around the world. it's here at the site of loch lomond in scotland, more than 400 miles away from buckingham palace, that a network that will connect many of the cameras is being put through its final testing. think of it as popping on a bubble of private sg wireless connectivity. and then what we are doing at the coronation is to allow

the international broadcast community the ability for their cameras tojump on our 56 network all the way down the mall. it's really to give freedom of movement for some of the newscasters who might want to go into the crowds, almost unscripted, and do interviews with participants. cameras and their quality is getting better and better. and that means, for live broadcasting, they need a really good connection. this technology allows that over a wider area, meaning me and the camera operator can be remote and still send that good quality all around the world. this is basically an entire 56 network in a couple of boxes. so in this unit here, we've got a computer, this is running our 56 software stack and also the core network. there's a radio head in that box. there's an antenna up here. and that's the whole 56 network. at the moment, we're passing video data through this. we've got a camera over

there, which is streaming through the network, breaks out of our core and goes into our video receiver box. and that's the video feed that we can see on the screen here. this creates the network, but the cameras have got to be linked to it somehow. talk us through what's on the camera. yes, i mean, this is a sort of homebrew encoder that we've built up, called the haggis cam. there's a video feed coming out of this camera, going into an encoder box that lives in here. we've then got a small computer which is connecting back to the 56 network, and that computer also enables bidirectional internet connectivity. so back in some central office, the producer can zoom the camera in and out, change the settings and all that kind of stuff. so basically we can take this to anywhere and literally in five minutes pop up a network. from a phone, you can connect to a 56 network. what's different about what you provide? as soon as you get a large, large number of people who participate in the venue, you suddenly notice that, even though you've got your ag or your 56, the performance of that degrades heavily.

and we want to control that, we don't want everybody else being able to access our network because they'lljust steal resources, effectively, from the communication channel. we've come a long way in 70 years, but the king's coronation will still be the biggest test of this 56 tech yet. that was alasdair, and that's all we've got time for from the british music experience in liverpool. yeah, thanks for watching. and if you'll excuse us, we've got a dance to learn. hello. for many parts of the uk, spring warmth arrived just in time for the bank holiday weekend,

but that wasn't the case everywhere. there were parts of north—east england and scotland that got stuck with a lot of cloud, some spots of rain and a rather chilly feel. and even where the sun did shine, some big shower clouds developed, and through the rest of the weekend we will continue to see some of those heavy showers, but also some spells of warm sunshine. this is the satellite picture from earlier on. you can see that shield of cloud that sat across parts of north—east england and scotland. and then more cloud gathering out in the atlantic, and as that feeds its way eastwards as we head through the night, it will bring a band of showers across many parts of the uk. ahead of that, there could well be some areas of mist and fog. a little bit chilly across parts of east anglia, maybe down to 3 or 4 degrees. also quite cold in shetland, 2 for lerwick, but out west 10 for belfast, so a mild start to sunday. so, through the day tomorrow we will see this band of cloud and showery rain pushing its way eastwards. some more persistent rain is likely to develop for a time across the northern isles.

and then through the afternoon the skies will brighten in northern ireland. we'll see some spells of sunshine but also a scattering of heavy and probably thundery showers. staying mostly dry across east anglia and the south—east, and here the highest temperatures up to 18 or 19 degrees, but a bit less chilly than it was today in parts of north—east england and scotland. now, as we head on into bank holiday monday we will see a couple of different weather systems, this one bringing some showers early on into eastern parts of england. there's also a weak cold front up towards the north of scotland. that'll sink southwards, bringing a bit of patchy rain to south—east scotland and north—east england and a northerly wind following on behind, so a slightly chillier feel — temperatures for stornoway, for example, around 8 degrees, 11 for aberdeen, further south 17—19 for south wales and southern england. now, as we head into tuesday, high pressure builds, so that will give dry weather for most of us for tuesday and wednesday, but then we see frontal systems approaching from the south—west, threatening to turn things a bit more unsettled as we head

into next weekend — which is, of course, another bank holiday weekend. so, actually, a fair amount of dry weather through the first part of the coming week, but the increasing chance that we will see some outbreaks of rain, and, also, a brisk wind.

live from london, this is bbc news. fighting continues in sudan with fresh artillery and air strikes. thousands more people try to leave the country. at least five people, including an eight—year—old child, have been killed after a mass shooting in texas. this neighbourhood, they're always shooting. they're always calling the cops and there's nothing done for that. yeah, just, i mean, especially on holidays — fridays, saturdays — there always shootings. russian officials say a massive blaze at an oil depot in occupied crimea was caused by a drone attack. england has watched women rugby players wrap up a six nations grand slam with victory over france in front of a world record crowd at twickenham.