The secret is out: how Australian Open helped usher in three-week slam festivals
Grand slam qualifying used to be an oasis for tennis hipsters but a game of one upmanship between the Australian and US Opens has set the standard for spectacular lead-in weeksDuring the early days of the US Open singles main draw last year, the tournament director, Stacey Allaster, was holding court with a small group of journalists in a suite overlooking Arthur Ashe Stadium.Much of the discussion centred on the revamped mixed doubles tournament, which had dominated the tennis discourse for days.With a smile, Allaster explained the amount of work that had gone into the event and cited the final attendance numbers for the week it was held.The US Open, she asserted, is now a three-week event.For many years, the traditional grand slam fortnight was preceded by a nondescript week of preparation.
While lower-ranked players quietly worked through the qualifying draw in front of vacant stands, the top players finished their preparation to minimal fanfare.Access to the tournament grounds at the Australian Open, French Open and US Open were free for qualifying.Still, few people came.To most hardcore fans, grand slam qualifying was an oasis for tennis hipsters, the sport’s best-kept secret.The secret is out.
Over the past decade, the grand slams have gradually come to understand the great potential of their qualifying weeks and they have transformed them into true extensions of the tournament,These initiatives have been led by the Australian Open and the US Open, which at times seem to be in the middle of an arms race to build the most spectacular lead-in week possible,While the US Open branded its qualifying week as “Fan Week”, the Australian Open settled on “Opening Week”,The concepts are very similar, attempting to attract tens of thousands of fresh spectators, enticed by the promise of watching top players practise and other professionals compete for a fraction of the price of entry to the subsequent two weeks,A grounds pass ticket to the Australian Open’s Opening Week is good value at A$20 (£10), but at the US Open entry to the tournament grounds during Fan Week is free.
Each day at the Australian Open this week, the tournament organisers have published comically large attendance records, with tens of thousands of spectators streaming through the gates of Melbourne Park each day.On Monday the 29,261 attendance eviscerated the previous record of 7,543 and on Thursday the figure was 35,805, with a total attendance of 136,248 in the first four days.Some have argued that Tennis Australia’s marketing is actually too good, with a number of spectators complaining on social media after arriving on the grounds this week expecting to see main draw matches.These days, the event is more akin to a festival than a tennis tournament.The grand slam oval, a large separate space filled with food venues and hundreds of seats, is located at the southern point of the grounds.
The oval is built to host the masses of spectators that will enter the grounds once the main draw begins, but even on a Tuesday afternoon in Melbourne the seats are about 70% full.A stage sits at the centre and hosts a variety of trivia games, musical performances and player appearances.Beyond the exorbitant food and drink prices, these weeks also serve a positive purpose.They provide a platform to drive grassroots participation, with multiple mini-tennis courts around the grounds and a Kids’ Tennis Day on Saturday.Outside John Cain Arena, hundreds of parents have queued up each day to receive free rackets as part of Tennis Australia’s drive to give away a total of 5,000.
During the open daytime practices this week, only the bottom half of the 15,000-seated Rod Laver Arena is open to spectators, yet Novak Djokovic and Carlos Alcaraz have filled out the entire second half of the bowl.Other tennis events include ticketed full exhibition matches, the Red Bull bassline exhibition tournament and an inaugural opening ceremony featuring Roger Federer.On Thursday there was the One Point Slam, which launched to great fanfare, the Australian Open’s answer to the US Open’s reimagined mixed doubles event.While the French Open has not developed its lead-in week as dramatically as the two hard-court grand slam tournaments and its tickets are more expensive, it is still accessed by a significant number of spectators.One of the more memorable moments of the 2024 season was the deafening cheers from a packed court Suzanne Lenglen, the French Open’s second biggest stadium, as Dominic Thiem played his final match in Paris.
While the festivities continue in Melbourne, the latest chapter of Wimbledon’s lengthy legal battle surrounding the All England Lawn Tennis Club’s Wimbledon Park Project, its statutory trust claim trial, is unfolding in the high court,It feels fitting,The AELTC’s attempts to convert the private golf course directly across the road into an extension of the club, which would allow Wimbledon to hold its qualifying event on site, has been mired by various legal challenges,The proposals include converting some of the private space into a public park, along with 38 new grass courts and a new show court,While the other grand slam tournaments continue to expand at a dramatic pace, Wimbledon, which once towered above all others, is being left behind.
The qualifying tournament is essentially held on a basic field in Roehampton,Between its relatively tiny grounds and the delicate nature of the grass surface – meaning it would be inadvisable to host pre-tournament events on Centre Court or Court No 1 – the All England Club’s current facilities are simply not compatible with the initiatives demonstrated at the other majors,Wimbledon is the last two-week grand slam tournament left,
Grok scandal highlights how AI industry is ‘too unconstrained’, tech pioneer says
The scandal over the flood of intimate images on Elon Musk’s X created non-consensually by its Grok AI tool has underlined how the artificial intelligence industry is “too unconstrained”, according to a pioneer of the technology.Yoshua Bengio, a computer scientist described as one of the modern “godfathers of AI”, said tech companies were building systems without appropriate technical and societal guardrails.Bengio spoke to the Guardian as he appointed the historian Yuval Noah Harari and the former Rolls-Royce chief executive Sir John Rose to the board of his AI safety lab.X has announced it is stopping Grok from manipulating pictures of real people to show them in revealing clothes such as bikinis, including for premium subscribers, after a public and political backlash.Asked what the furore showed about the state of the AI industry, Bengio said the situation across the sector was “not completely a free for all” but needed to be addressed
Musk’s X to block Grok AI tool from creating sexualised images of real people
The UK government has claimed “vindication” after Elon Musk’s X announced it had stopped its AI-powered Grok feature from editing pictures of real people to show them in revealing clothes such as bikinis, including for premium subscribers.After a fortnight of public outcry at the tool embedded into X being used to create sexualised images of women and children, the company said it would “geoblock” the ability of users “to generate images of real people in bikinis, underwear, and similar attire via the Grok account and in Grok in X”, in countries where it was illegal.It said it would do this in the UK in line with law changes ministers have pledged to introduce. X also said it had “zero tolerance for any forms of child sexual exploitation, nonconsensual nudity, and unwanted sexual content”. It did not specify whether people would still be able to create such images on the standalone Grok app
California attorney general investigates Musk’s Grok AI over lewd fake images
California authorities have announced an investigation into the output of Elon Musk’s Grok.The state’s top attorney said Grok, an AI tool and image generator made by Musk’s company xAI, appears to be making it easy to harass women and girls with deepfake images on X and elsewhere online.“The avalanche of reports detailing the non-consensual, sexually explicit material that xAI has produced and posted online in recent weeks is shocking,” California attorney general, Rob Bonta, said in a statement. “I urge xAI to take immediate action to ensure this goes no further.”Bonta’s office is investigating whether and how xAI violated state law
Elon Musk’s stubborn spin on Grok’s sexualized images controversy
Hello, and welcome to TechScape. I’m your host, Blake Montgomery, US tech editor for the Guardian. Today, we discuss Elon Musk’s rosy depiction of Grok’s image generation controversy; the seven-figure panic among Silicon Valley billionaires over a proposed wealth tax in California, though with one notable exception; and how AI and robotics have revitalized the Consumer Electronics Showcase.The firestorm over the Grok AI tool has been raging for more than a week now, and it shows no signs of dying down.Last week, I wrote about the rising backlash against Elon Musk’s Grok AI tool, which in recent weeks has allowed users to generate thousands of sexualized images of women
X ‘acting to comply with UK law’ after outcry over sexualised images
Elon Musk’s X is understood to have told the government it is acting to comply with UK law, after nearly a fortnight of public outcry at the use of its AI tool Grok to manipulate images of women and children by removing their clothes.Keir Starmer told the House of Commons on Wednesday that photographs generated by Grok were “disgusting” and “shameful”, but said he had been informed that X was “acting to ensure full compliance with UK law”.“If so, that is welcome,” the prime minister said. “But we are not going to back down. They must act
Young people, parents and teachers: share your views about Grok AI
Degrading images of real women and children with their clothes digitally removed by Elon Musk’s Grok tool continue to be shared online, despite widespread alarm and a pledge by the platform to suspend users who generate them.While some safeguards have been introduced, the ease with which the AI tool can be abused has raised urgent questions about consent, online safety and the ability of governments worldwide to regulate fast-moving AI technologies. Meanwhile, the misuse of AI to harass, humiliate and sexually exploit people – particularly women and girls – is rapidly escalating.We’d like to hear from young people, parents and teachers about how tools like Grok are affecting you. Are young people aware of how easily these images can be created? If you’re a parent, has this changed how you talk to your children about social media, consent or online safety? If you’re a teacher or work with young people, have you noticed an impact in classrooms or among students? Do you have concerns?You can share your views on Grok and other AI tools using this form
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