BRUSSELS (Reuters) – The European Union is drawing up guidelines on how much patent holders should charge for their technologies, a thorny issue that pits Apple and other users against Qualcomm and Ericsson.Trillions of dollars in sales are at stake as regulators ponder whether a fridge maker should pay a different rate for crucial patents than a carmaker, or whether a flat, fixed rate would be fairer.The patent fee model used by world No. 1 smartphone chip designer Qualcomm predominates in the tech industry and is based on how much value a technology adds to a product, but is opposed by Apple and others in Silicon Valley.Other models are in use and the EU aims to set a uniform one for Europe, opening a new front in a global dispute that has already seen multiple lawsuits between Apple and Qualcomm.

The new iPhone 8, as you probably couldn’t help learning a few weeks back, boasts “wireless charging that’s truly effortless”, meaning that instead of having to plug it into the wall, you simply place it on a special pad. Whoch you then plug into the wall. If you’re struggling to imagine the kind of person who finds the act of plugging a cable into their phone unacceptably inconvenient – especially since you’ll still have to leave your phone in one place while it charges – well, that makes two of us.

Vi lämnar dagligen efter oss digitala fotavtryck. Sociala medier som Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat och Twitter samlar in mängder av information om oss, och med hjälp av så kallade cookies och platstjänster kartläggs vårt surfande – för att sedan användas för att skapa riktad reklam. Journalisten Judith Duportail frågade den populära dejtingappen Tinder om sin data – och fick enligt egen utsago tillbaka 800 sidor av sina ”djupaste, mörkaste hemligheter”.I förra veckan skrev den franska journalisten Judith Duportail en uppmärksammad artikel i brittiska The Guardian. Den handlar om att hon har begärt ut alla sina data från Tinder, det vill säga all personlig information som företaget har sparat om henne sedan hon registrerade sig som användare.