The Know Daily - Wednesday 19 August 2026

_{Read in 4m 09s ∙ Listening to Kane Brown ∙}

Who needs a petrol station when you've got sunshine? ☀️ Dutch engineering students have unveiled what they say is the world's first solar-powered ambulance, designed to bring lifesaving medical care to remote communities where fuel and electricity can be hard to come by. The prototype is heading to Kenya for real-world testing, and the team is hoping companies will help take the idea from a clever student project to ambulance fleets that could make a real difference. 

🕶️ Meta glasses

There’s been a lot of chat about Meta’s smart glasses in the news lately – but what exactly are they, and why have they sparked a debate about privacy and consent?

So, what are Meta glasses?
Meta’s Ray-Ban smart glasses look just like ordinary sunglasses or glasses. The big difference is that they have built-in cameras, microphones and speakers. They can take photos and videos hands-free, play music, make calls and use an AI assistant to answer questions or interact with what the wearer is looking at. Basically, they let you do things you’d normally reach for your phone to do, without taking your phone out.

Why have they become controversial?
The biggest concern is privacy. Unlike holding up a phone to take a picture, someone wearing camera-equipped glasses may be recording without the people around them immediately realising. That has raised questions about consent, particularly in places where people reasonably expect more privacy. Forbes argues that smart glasses challenge the social cues we’ve developed around smartphones, while the Observer has reported concerns about their potential to be used to film people without their knowledge.

There is another side to the debate, though. Smart glasses can be genuinely useful, particularly for people with disabilities. The Guardian has reported on users who say the technology can help with things such as reading signs, navigating and communicating more independently. 

Have any new rules been put into place?
Yes. The debate has already moved beyond concerns about how people might use the glasses. In England and Wales, Meta smart glasses are now banned from court buildings, with HM Courts & Tribunals Service saying they will be confiscated when people enter and returned when they leave. The concern is that their cameras could be used to record proceedings or people inside court. Some restaurants, pubs and theatres have also introduced their own restrictions on smart glasses, largely because of concerns about filming without consent. 

What’s Meta doing about it?
Meta says the glasses have privacy measures built in. There is a visible LED light designed to indicate when the camera is recording, and the company has also introduced measures intended to stop people from tampering with that indicator. The bigger question is whether those measures are enough to make people feel comfortable around the technology. That's really what the debate is about: not whether smart glasses are useful, but whether the convenience of wearing a camera on your face can coexist with other people's right to know when they're being recorded.

✉️ 40 academics have signed an open letter calling for the UK to support a new international panel on global inequality.

• The bigger story: The proposed UN panel would bring together research on the causes and effects of the issue and examine policies that could reduce it. The letter, signed by Nobel Prize winner Joseph Stiglitz and other leading economists, comes as the UK prepares to chair the G20 summit in 2027, giving Burnham an opportunity to put inequality higher on the international agenda.

💅 A gel nail ingredient that allows the polish to cure under ultraviolet light has been banned in the UK.

💬 The most mispronounced words have been revealed in a new study of 2,000 adults – any guesses what came out on top? 

🦫 Scientists have used OnlyFans to help sustain long-running research into marmots, raising more than $100,000.

📺 The five nominees selected for the National Television Awards best drama performance category is an all-female shortlist for the first time.

🌌 An earliest known cosmic collision happened when the Milky Way absorbed a dwarf galaxy named Low-energy-Kraken-Heracles almost 12 billion years ago, scientists have said.

👩‍💻 The best cities for digital nomads have been revealed, with this country dominating the top 10.

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Trivia answer: B) The festival dates back to when eight theatre groups turned up uninvited to perform at the Edinburgh International Festival 😏

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