Alvaro Lopez Ortega / 2026-08-14 Briefing

Created Fri, 14 Aug 2026 19:13:39 +0000 Modified Tue, 29 Sep 2026 21:52:50 +0000
7337 Words

Ukrainian officials found an Nvidia AI chip in a Russian missile, urging stricter export controls. Autonomous AI attacks on critical infrastructure now pose a ‘clear and present danger,’ experts warn. Trump plans to revert Navy catapults to steam power. France’s tax authority admitted a data breach after 2M records were offered for sale. Trezor also confirmed a logistics breach exposing 13,000 customers.

🤖 AI & Machine Learning

Less than a year on, Microsoft tells Mico to pipe down

Microsoft is discontinuing the voice feature of its Copilot AI assistant less than a year after its debut. The assistant’s animated “blob” icon will shift to a new role focused on education.

Claude Code returns blank thinking blocks, but reasoning still costs you

Developers using Claude Code report that its “thinking blocks” are sometimes returned empty or truncated, yet these incomplete reasoning steps still consume the same usage costs. The issue means users are charged for reasoning processes that may not be fully visible or delivered.

Google adds toggle in Gemini and Flow to remove visible watermarks on AI media; SynthID/C2PA remain

Google now lets users toggle off visible watermarks on AI-generated images, videos, and music in Gemini and Flow. The change removes the “sparkle” marker, but invisible SynthID watermarks and C2PA metadata remain embedded so content can still be verified as AI-generated. The setting will also roll out to Search, except in countries where visible watermarks are required.

Alibaba releases Qwen3.8 weights (Apache 2.0); 27B beats Qwen3.7-Plus in real-world coding

Alibaba has released the open weights for its Qwen3.8 models under the Apache 2.0 license, including the Qwen3.8-27B. The company claims the 27B-parameter multimodal dense model outperforms its Qwen3.7-Plus overall and excels in real-world coding and office workflows. It features 262K native context, extendable to 1M.

AI by Hand

“AI by Hand” is a newsletter by Prof. Tom Yeh that teaches AI concepts—including math, algorithms, and architectures—through hands-on, manual exercises. The publication has attracted over 73,000 subscribers.

Unsloth Qwen3.8-27B GGUF files

The article provides setup instructions for using the unsloth/Qwen3.8-27B-GGUF model across multiple platforms, including llama.cpp, Ollama, Unsloth Studio, Pi, and Docker. It details installation commands, server startup, and configuration steps for each tool.

Qwen3.8-27B

The article is a browser verification page that automatically checks the user’s browser. If the check fails, users are advised to whitelist extensions, update to a modern browser, retry, or contact support with a reference ID.

Qwen3.8-27B is now available on Hugging Face

Qwen3.8-27B has been released on Hugging Face as part of the Qwen3.8 collection, available in standard and FP8 variants. The model is an image-text-to-text model with 28B parameters, updated within the last four hours. The collection also includes larger offerings such as the Qwen3.8-2.4T-A95B text generation model.

Qwen 3.8 27B

The article provides usage instructions for the FP8-quantized Qwen3.8-27B-FP8 multimodal model, including code examples for Hugging Face Transformers, vLLM, SGLang, and Docker. It details setup, serving, and API calls for image-text tasks, noting compatibility with multiple inference frameworks.

When Genius Fails: The Intellectual Arrogance of the AI Labs

Leopold Aschenbrenner’s AI-focused hedge fund, Situational Awareness, collapsed after making massive leveraged bets, showing that expertise in AI does not guarantee success in finance. The article draws parallels to Long-Term Capital Management, whose brilliant founders also overreached and failed. It argues that intellectual arrogance in AI labs encourages overconfidence beyond their actual domain.

Why does Opus 5 feel worse to work with?

Opus 5 feels like a downgrade despite being more capable because it makes assumptions and reinterprets plans without asking for clarification, unlike earlier models. The author suspects this is due to benchmark-driven training that rewards bold guesses over clarifying questions, which is problematic for real-world coding agents where ambiguity is common.

Eclipse: The Xiaomi 17 Ultra Confuses the Moon and the Sun

The Xiaomi 17 Ultra mistakenly rendered lunar craters and reliefs on the Sun during the August 12 eclipse photo, revealing the smartphone’s AI enhancement trick. The system, trained on Moon images to embellish zoomed shots, confused the two celestial bodies, proving it does not show what the camera actually sees.

Qwen3.8 27B

Qwen3.8-27B, a renewal of the Qwen model, is scheduled for release on August 14, 2026, with 6,398 users already waiting. It is described as delivering unmatched intelligence density.

Lumabri – Run Moe Models on a P2P Swarm with Colibri

lumabri is a pure-C, dependency-free engine that runs mixture-of-experts models from a peer-to-peer swarm, fetching model bytes on first use and caching them locally for fast subsequent access. It is designed for CPU and SSD first, with GPU only accelerating performance without changing output, and experts are executed on peers while data integrity is verified even against untrusted participants.

🔒 Security & Privacy

French tax authority admits data heist after crook touts 2M records

France’s tax authority has admitted to a data breach after a criminal advertised 2 million stolen records for sale. However, officials dispute the crook’s claims of continued access, while investigators assess the extent of the damage.

Autonomous AI attacks pose ‘clear and present danger’ to critical infrastructure

Autonomous AI attacks against critical infrastructure are no longer theoretical, with attackers using open-source AI agents in July to hack government systems and energy companies. Experts warn that weaponized AI could disable safety systems and cause kinetic disasters, calling it a “clear and present danger” as geopolitical tensions rise.

Crypto wallet maker Trezor confirms 13,000 customers’ details exposed in logistics breach

Trezor confirmed that a logistics breach exposed personal details of 13,000 customers. The incident highlights that even secure hardware can be vulnerable if a third-party supplier is compromised.

Scottish prosecutors cast eye over leaky supplier after staff data exposed

Scottish prosecutors are reviewing a data breach at an unnamed supplier that exposed staff details. A third party detected suspicious activity, with names, roles, and email addresses potentially affected. The incident is now under investigation.

OpenAI ditches Recall-style screenshot surveillance for friendly keylogging

OpenAI has introduced a feature called “Computer History” that records user clicks and typing to help build ChatGPT memories, moving away from screenshot-based surveillance similar to Microsoft’s Recall. The tool functions as a form of keylogging to personalize AI responses.

Find out who’s tracking you with DecryptAds

DecryptAds is a free service that scrapes and cross-references publicly available adtech disclosure files from websites and apps, making it easier to identify which companies are tracking users. It is designed for security and privacy use cases, such as uncovering malicious ads, detecting ad networks in adversarial nations, and spotting AI-generated slop sites. For example, a search for espn.com reveals 143 ad partners and 19 data brokers, including several entities based in geo-risk areas like Russia, China, and the UAE.

AI agents just showed what an autonomous hacking crew looks like

Researchers uncovered a four-day AI-driven cyberattack on Taiwanese government agencies that used up to eight autonomous AI sub-agents with minimal human input, compromising at least 85 accounts and stealing over 2,500 personnel records. The campaign also pivoted to nuclear safety and energy targets, demonstrating that AI can lower the cost and manpower required for state-backed hacking operations.

Google is making private AI practical with homomorphic encryption

Google has unveiled HEIR, an open-source compiler that lets pre-trained AI models run on homomorphically encrypted data, enabling private inference without exposing user information. Designed to make cryptographic privacy practical for non-experts, the tool has drawn adoption from hardware partners and academic institutions. Google showcased several applications compiled with HEIR, highlighting its growing maturity.

France’s tax authority had data stolen on 680k taxpayers

France’s tax authority confirmed a data breach affecting 680,000 taxpayers after hacker ZeroBytes leaked the data on a cybercrime forum. The attack occurred in late June and was detected at the time but never publicly disclosed. Stolen data includes names, addresses, dates of birth, and property records, but no passwords or banking details.

Phones should have a ‘guest lock’ feature

The article argues that smartphones should include a system-level “guest lock” feature to restrict access to the currently open app when handing the device to someone else, preventing them from browsing other apps. It also calls for a way to hide specific photos or photo sets from the camera roll to protect privacy. Both features are intended to improve trust and privacy when sharing a phone.

Ruby 4.0 Universal RCE Deserialization Gadget Chain

A new universal Ruby deserialization gadget chain turns a single Marshal.load into command execution on Ruby 4.0.6 and works unchanged back to 3.3. It replaces previously patched gadgets with new ones, including using Gem::Specification.load to evaluate a controlled file, and opens with Gem::SpecFetcher to trigger RubyGems autoloading.

Rsync 3.5.0: a huge number of security fixes

Rsync 3.5.0 is a major security release fixing 33 vulnerabilities, including symlink-based arbitrary file read/write, path traversal, and chroot escapes. Every fix includes a regression test, and many issues affect narrower version ranges than all earlier releases. The release also credits numerous contributors for help triaging issues and developing tests.

US conducted mass spying campaign against leftwing and anti-ICE protesters

The US Department of Homeland Security conducted extensive spying on leftwing organizations and anti-ICE protesters in Minnesota as part of “Operation Puppet Master,” using undercover agents, infiltrated Signal chats, and obtaining financial records of unions and non-profits. The surveillance was revealed in a criminal case against 15 Minneapolis protesters accused of conspiring to impede immigration officers, though none of the targeted organizations have been charged.

SparrowMap – Cameras that watch government vehicles

SparrowMap lets volunteers use spare phones or webcams to detect government vehicles on public streets, processing video locally to destroy photos and license plates before sending only anonymous location data to a server. It runs in a browser without installation or an account, and a PC can be set up with a single command to contribute to the public map.

How Obama’s BlackBerry got secured (2023)

Despite initial reports that Barack Obama had to give up his BlackBerry for security reasons, he was allowed to keep the device after the NSA and other agencies secured it with special encryption software and hardware modifications. The compromise involved using the SecurVoice application to encrypt calls and messages, and the device was extensively tested and modified by the NSA.

💻 Software & Development

ActivityPub Won by Being Boring

ActivityPub succeeded because its design is deliberately mundane, relying on familiar web technologies like HTTP, JSON, and URLs, plus simple actor/inbox/outbox models rather than novel concepts. This unremarkable, implementable approach lets diverse platforms like Mastodon, PeerTube, and Lemmy interoperate without becoming a single product. As co-author Evan Prodromou noted, the protocol’s deliberately boring core is why the Fediverse works.

Thunderbird’s Desktop Calendar Visual Redesign

Thunderbird’s design team is modernizing its outdated calendar, guided by principles of serving a broad user base and competing with major calendar apps. They began by redesigning isolated components like the Event Details dialog, and are now working toward a unified design integrating the calendar grid, navigation, and management.

Unexpected (to me) behaviour in Lisp sub-typing

In Common Lisp (SBCL), literal array syntax like #1A(1 2 3) is typed as simple-vector, which is not a subtype of specialized arrays like (simple-array (unsigned-byte 16)), causing type errors. This stems from upgraded array element types, where unconstrained types upgrade to T but fixed-width types like (unsigned-byte 16) do not. The workaround is to explicitly create arrays with make-array and specify the intended element type.

Guilt-Driven Development

The author describes feeling guilty when production errors affect users, even if they turn out to be false alarms, and reflects on how software failures waste users’ time and create cascading harm. They argue that workarounds are not real fixes, and this guilt should motivate developers to build more reliable, respectful software.

There Is Still No Silver Bullet

Fred Brooks’s 1986 essay “No Silver Bullet” argued that software’s essential difficulty lies in the conceptual construct, not the accidental labor of representing it, so no single technology or management technique can yield an order-of-magnitude improvement. The article contends this argument remains undefeated after forty years, and that even modern LLMs, while excellent at compressing accidents like boilerplate, do not address the essential work of deciding what to build.

Curl Performance

Curl has launched a performance test suite, initially running on the developer’s local machine because cloud environments were too unstable. The scripts build curl, run tests such as downloading a 100GB file from localhost, and automatically publish summaries and graphs to curl.se/perf. Live results have already helped developers identify and merge improvements.

Introducing Bluesky Protocol Services

Bluesky launched Bluesky Protocol Services, a new brand and website organizing documentation for its AT Protocol infrastructure. It introduced Jetstream v2 with Network Replay, which lets developers access historical network data through authenticated archive requests while keeping the live stream free and unauthenticated. New Jetstream SDKs for TypeScript and Go were also released, and the Bluesky TypeScript SDK was rebuilt on the lex framework.

Computing graph dominators

The article explains graph dominators and presents an iterative algorithm for computing them, where a node’s dominators are the intersection of its predecessors’ dominators plus itself. It compares the Lengauer-Tarjan algorithm with the simpler “Simple, Fast” approach, noting that performance differences are negligible for typical graphs. The algorithm iterates until convergence, using reverse postorder for efficiency.

Comments in the code vs PR description

Pull request descriptions should explain and justify why a change is needed and how it was validated, acting as point-in-time persuasive arguments for reviewers. In contrast, code comments should provide durable information about how the code works. Good PR titles help reviewers quickly identify relevant changes during regression investigations.

SlopScan: Displays a “slop score” when viewing public git repositories

SlopScan is a Firefox for Android extension that displays a “slop score” letter grade next to repository names on GitHub, Codeberg, and Sourcehut. It uses a repo-slopscore web server, defaulting to the public instance at slopscan.ava.pet, and lets users click the extension button to scan any page.

The Art of CHIP-8

CHIP-8, a simple 1977 language for the COSMAC VIP, remains a popular tool for learning emulator design, but decades of divergent interpreter implementations have caused fragmentation. The article outlines its architecture—12-bit address space, 16 registers, and 34 instructions—and offers guidance on writing programs that run reliably across most existing interpreters.

DeepSeek debuts MIT-licensed Harness dev preview: ’everything is a plugin’

DeepSeek has released DeepSeek Harness v0.1, an open-source agent harness under the MIT license built on a modular “everything is a plugin” architecture that lets developers swap out models, tools, and other runtime components. The launch, alongside the new V4-Pro model, marks DeepSeek’s expansion into developer infrastructure for AI agents, positioning it against tools like Anthropic’s Claude Code, though the harness remains a developer preview with potential breaking changes.

Discrete Fourier Transform by Hand

The article presents a hands-on exercise showing that the Discrete Fourier Transform (DFT), despite its complex mathematics, is essentially a series of matrix multiplications. It demonstrates how inverse DFT converts frequency-domain signals into time-domain samples and how DFT recovers the original frequency weights. It also contrasts learned neural network filters with the DFT as a fixed, hand-designed transform.

LuaCAD – Parametric CAD Scripted in Lua

LuaCAD is a parametric CAD tool that models solids using Lua instead of OpenSCAD’s scripting language, featuring operator overloading for CSG operations. It includes a CLI and desktop app, and is built in Rust with OpenCSG and Manifold for rendering and mesh generation. The author claims it fully replaces OpenSCAD, offering a better experience with native support for BOSL2 functions.

Maximizing the value of your Claude Code sessions

To minimize token waste in Claude Code, use /clear between tasks, inspect loaded context with /context, and run /compact before breaks since the prompt cache expires after an hour. Token costs vary by model size, input/output type, and caching, with output tokens more expensive, so match model and effort levels to task complexity.

RustDesk now supports true unattended remote access on Wayland

RustDesk has released a preview build offering true unattended remote access on Wayland for x86_64 Debian/Ubuntu systems, including multi-monitor support. This enables connections without per-session approval, even from the login screen after reboot. Since competitors like AnyDesk and TeamViewer still lack full Wayland support, RustDesk is seeking real-world testing before a broader release.

RayforceDB – a pure C analytics database with a Lisp-like syntax

Rayforce is an open-source, pure C analytics engine that combines columnar analytics, graph traversal, and recursive queries into a single embeddable execution pipeline, eliminating the need to move data between separate engines. It rewrites the entire query plan as one DAG, and is already used in production trading, market connectivity, and investment analytics systems.

“Solving a largely imaginary user goal”

Lea Verou proposes that dark mode toggles offer only two visible options—light and dark—but behave “smartly” by following the system theme when the chosen option matches it, and locking to the opposite theme otherwise. The article endorses this approach, arguing that tri-state toggles expose unnecessary system complexity and increase cognitive load.

Graft – Claude Code hooks that cut grep tokens by 42%

Graft is an open-source context layer that builds a codebase graph to provide faster, cheaper, codebase-specific context for coding agents like Claude Code, Cursor, Codex, and Gemini via CLI and MCP integration. Benchmarks show it reduces tool calls by 46%, token usage by 42%, and time by 60%, while improving SWE-bench Verified correctness to 66% versus a 54% baseline.

Introducing Toast 1

Toast 1 is a specialized search agent that matches or outperforms frontier models like Claude Opus 5 and GPT-5.6 Sol while being up to 10× cheaper and 12× faster, and it works with any search backend. By taking over the search loop, it reduces token usage and costs, improving financial analysis accuracy to 70% at $1.15 per task and cutting legal benchmark token use by 3.5× with over 60% cost reduction.

Self-hosted web push Cloudflare Worker, works on iOS

Kukuroo is a self-hosted push notification system built on Cloudflare Workers and KV, enabling iOS 18.4+ devices to receive encrypted web push notifications without a native app or App Store. Setup takes under a minute via a single command, and it integrates with existing Workers or allows any HTTP client to send alerts through a simple curl request. It supports only Safari on iOS/macOS and Cloudflare Workers, with the free tier sufficient for personal use.

Earth.nullschool.net

The article warns that mass firings at NOAA, initiated by the U.S. administration on February 27, threaten weather forecasting and public safety, and could disrupt access to NOAA data relied on by the website. The author says the firings must be reversed, and urges readers to speak up and contact their representatives.

Every Fucking Website (2020)

The article satirizes the ubiquity of cookie consent banners and promotional popups on websites, mocking the obligatory “I agree” clicks and the legal threats from EU and California regulations. It highlights the absurdity of the repetitive, unavoidable nature of these notices, even including a fake discount code (10PERCENTOFF).

I turned my RSS feeds into an e-ink newspaper to stop reading on my phone

The author purchased a small e-ink e-reader (X4) to reduce phone reading, installed open-source firmware, and built a tool called “feedpaper” that converts RSS feeds into an e-pub newspaper. This enabled them to read blog posts on the e-ink device instead of a phone.

We Implemented the IPv8 Internet-Draft in Linux, Libc, and BGP

A team fully implemented the speculative IPv8 Internet-Draft across the Linux kernel, Musl libc, BGP, and related tools, then tested it on a multi-AS network. While the protocol worked in an isolated lab, real-world deployment exposed critical issues, including path MTU blackholing due to the larger header and asymmetric uRPF drops for multi-homed addresses.

WhatCable: Know what your USB-C cable can do

WhatCable is a Mac utility that diagnoses slow USB-C charging by reading cable, charger, and Power Delivery data to identify whether the cable, charger, or Mac is the limiting factor. It decodes cable specs, negotiated power, and port context, offering plain-English verdicts, with deeper diagnostics available through a Pro version and a bundled CLI. The app runs on Apple Silicon and relies on macOS-reported data rather than packaging claims.

For the love of god stop using CPU limits in Kubernetes

Removing Kubernetes CPU limits prevents apps from being throttled even when node CPU is idle, which improves tail latency and startup performance. CPU requests should remain as the real guarantee, and memory limits should stay, but CPU limits should be removed. This change can reduce hardware needs and cut costs significantly.

Ntfy – open-source Push to Mobile

ntfy is a free, open-source HTTP-based pub-sub notification service that lets users send push notifications to phones or desktops via scripts or a REST API. Topics are created on the fly, and it integrates with many tools, with optional paid plans or self-hosting available.

I want extern “fil-C”

The author proposes a new Rust FFI, extern "fil-C", that would use Fil-C’s memory-safe ABI to integrate C libraries, sacrificing runtime performance for safety while keeping Rust as the fast path. They point to filnix’s Nix packaging of Fil-C and Zig’s similar ABI proposal as groundwork, and call for cross-ecosystem collaboration to make the bridge a reality.

Bluesky Protocol Services

Bluesky launched Bluesky Protocol Services, a new website and brand consolidating developer docs for its AT Protocol infrastructure. Jetstream v2 now offers Network Replay, allowing access to historical data via authenticated archive requests while keeping the live stream open. New TypeScript and Go SDKs were also released.

TRS-80 Color Computer Extended Basic Emulator in JavaScript

A JavaScript-based emulator fully recreates the TRS-80 Color Computer’s Extended Color BASIC environment, allowing users to run classic programs in the browser or Node.js. It includes authentic graphics, sound, and a comprehensive set of BASIC commands, with no required dependencies.

📈 Tech & Business

Virgin Galactic flights stay grounded while ticket prices head for the Moon

Virgin Galactic continues to face delays in its commercial spaceflight operations, keeping flights grounded. Meanwhile, the company is raising ticket prices, underscoring the persistent difficulties of the space business.

TalkTalk Business and ARO to borg into UK tech services giant

TalkTalk Business and ARO are merging to create a major UK tech services provider. The combined entity will serve 70,000 customers, though its name and leader have not yet been revealed.

Apple opens ad bookings on Apple Maps ahead of US/Canada rollout

Apple has officially opened ad bookings for Apple Maps, allowing businesses to secure ads ahead of a full rollout in the US and Canada. Ads will appear in search suggestions and relevant search results, with a limited-time promo offering 15% monthly statement credit for up to a year.

Amazon and Alphabet Q2 other income from investment gains totaled ~$121B, 66% and 71% of profits.

In the second quarter, Amazon and Alphabet reported a combined ~$121 billion in after-tax “other income,” largely from investment gains, which accounted for 66% and 71% of their respective profits. This reliance on paper gains from marking up equity stakes, such as in Anthropic, is inflating earnings at major tech firms and making it harder for investors to distinguish real growth from one-time gains.

Stablecoin payments company RedotPay has delayed its planned US initial public offering to 2027 or later, according to sources. The postponement comes as the company seeks regulatory approvals and works to resolve legal issues.

Alibaba nears deal to sell Lingxi Games to Trustar Capital at $1.5B+ valuation

Trustar Capital is nearing a deal to acquire Alibaba’s video game unit, Lingxi Games, at a valuation exceeding $1.5 billion. The private equity firm outbid other suitors, and the potential sale is part of Alibaba’s ongoing reorganization.

Blackbird, Airtree cut Canva to $34.9B from $42B, internal $31B from $38.9B amid AI struggles

Canva’s valuation was cut by $US7.1 billion ($10 billion) through downgrades from backers Blackbird Ventures and Airtree, bringing it to $34.9 billion, while Canva’s own internal valuation fell further to $31 billion. The company also lowered its revenue growth expectations, citing difficulties rolling out AI-powered tools due to the high cost of frontier models.

Pony AI to deploy 2K+ Uber robotaxis in Europe, add 4 cities after Zagreb, then Middle East

Uber and Pony AI plan to deploy over 2,000 robotaxis across Europe, expanding their partnership beyond Zagreb to four additional cities. The rollout will also extend to the Middle East, with further details to be announced later.

Selena Gomez accused of fraud by investors who put $1.2M into her mental health app

Investors are suing Selena Gomez, her mother Mandy Teefey, and Wondermind over a $1.2 million investment, alleging the company overstated partnerships and resources while the app was never built. The lawsuit claims Gomez failed to promote the startup despite a marketing role tied to her 500 million followers, and the company quietly collapsed, with investors only learning of its failure in 2025.

Apple proposes to take a 15% cut of purchases made outside the App Store

Apple submitted its proposed commission rates for purchases made via external links in iOS apps, following the Supreme Court’s rejection of its bid to delay the filing. The proposal sets a 15% commission for standard apps, 5% for small business developers, and 10% for special program participants and subscription renewals, in the ongoing Epic Games legal battle.

In Australia, a home battery boom has helped cut wholesale power prices

Australia’s home battery subsidy program, launched in July 2025, has driven over 500,000 installations, giving the country more home batteries than the US. The 30% discount on residential battery systems has helped slash wholesale power prices by 47% and eased grid strain by supplying stored solar energy during peak evening demand.

Cursor is now a part of SpaceX

Cursor has been officially acquired by SpaceX, completing a process that began in April. The deal gives Cursor access to SpaceX’s massive GPU fleet to build stronger, more economical AI models, with Grok 4.6 as an early result. Cursor will continue focusing on helping users spend less time coding and more time on harder problems.

The TEMU-Fication of Software, Digital Goods and Services

The article hypothesizes that digital goods such as software, books, and music will undergo “TEMU-fication,” with AI-generated content creating a cheap, abundant, low-quality tier while human-made works become a luxury segment. It argues that, like fast fashion, this model externalizes costs—not through exploited labor, but through compressed quality derived from human-created training data.

DeepSeek peak/off-peak pricing update

DeepSeek has launched DeepSeek-V4-Pro, featuring major agent upgrades, flexible reasoning effort levels, and native OpenAI Responses API support optimized for Codex, available on app/web and via API. The company also introduced peak and off-peak API pricing with off-peak rates 50% lower, effective August 16, 2026 at 16:00 UTC.

‘Not acceptable’: Judge orders Google to make rival app store installs easier

Judge James Donato ordered Google to remove “anticompetitive friction” that makes it harder for users to install rival Android app stores, after Epic Games demonstrated issues like poor search results, extra confirmation steps, and warning screens. The judge demanded fixes within a week, and Google agreed to make the changes.

🌍 Policy & Geopolitics

Russian missile uses Nvidia AI chip to help target Ukraine

A Russian missile has been found to use an Nvidia AI chip to assist in targeting Ukraine, according to Kyiv. The discovery has led Ukrainian officials to push for stricter international controls to prevent foreign silicon from ending up in Russian weapons.

Trump sends the US Navy back to the steam age

President Trump plans to replace the U.S. Navy’s troublesome electromagnetic catapults on aircraft carriers with older steam-powered technology, according to the report. The move is seen as reverting to a more traditional launch system after issues with the current design.

New Zealand says China tried using space investments to spy on local affairs

New Zealand’s intelligence service has accused China of using space-related investments to spy on local affairs. It also warned that the proliferation of toxic content online makes it harder to detect domestic threats.

Nevada grants Tesla robotaxi permit, caps fleet at 10, not 5,000, bans airport pickups

Nevada approved Tesla’s robotaxi permit but capped the fleet at 10 vehicles, far below the 5,000 Tesla sought. The state also banned airport pickups and imposed additional restrictions on the service.

Judge orders Google to remove anticompetitive friction for third-party app stores in Epic case

Judge James Donato ordered Google to reduce “anticompetitive friction” for installing rival Android app stores, agreeing with Epic that extra steps like hiding third-party stores in search results, using a “view” instead of “install” button, and showing an “are you looking for” screen were unnecessary. He demanded Google fix these issues within a week.

JPMorgan Chase terminated its banking relationship with Polymarket in 2025 over regulatory concerns, though it still maintains some ties to the prediction platform. The largest US bank has continued cultivating a connection with the company as Polymarket seeks a $20bn valuation.

White House announces drone tariffs: 100% levy on sensitive models to cut Chinese tech reliance

The White House announced new tariffs on drones and drone components, including a 100% levy on particularly sensitive models. The move targets Chinese drone technology and aims to reduce US reliance on Chinese tech, further escalating trade tensions between the two countries.

CFTC probes prediction markets’ ‘mention markets’; Kalshi removes sports word-choice bets

The CFTC has launched a probe into prediction-market “mention markets,” where users bet on words speakers will say, amid concerns over manipulation. In response, Kalshi has removed all sports-related mention markets, following an incident involving President Trump’s teleprompter operator profiting from such bets.

Count Binface receives over a quarter of votes in Clacton by-election

Count Binface, a satirical candidate, finished second in the Clacton by-election with 9,455 votes (26.9%), his best-ever result, while Nigel Farage won with 63.3%. The result continued Binface’s history of running against prominent UK politicians as part of Britain’s tradition of novelty election candidates.

Taxpayers Funded a $533M Artillery Plant That Made Nothing

The Army funded a $533 million General Dynamics artillery shell factory near Dallas that relied on poorly vetted Turkish machinery, but the equipment repeatedly malfunctioned—including robots catching fire—and the facility never produced a single usable shell. The Army halted two of three production lines, yet General Dynamics faced no public accountability or repayment and has since received $2.5 billion in new contract awards.

Private prisons announce $1.4B in revenue as immigration detentions climb

CoreCivic and GEO Group reported a combined $1.4 billion in quarterly revenue as U.S. immigration detention nears record highs, with CoreCivic’s revenue up 27% and GEO Group’s up 15%. CoreCivic also gained $1.6 billion from selling four detention facilities to the Department of Homeland Security, and both companies are expanding contracts such as GPS ankle monitoring for Haitian immigrants who lost protected status.

US loses one-fourth of drone fleet as Iran war drains its arsenal

The US has lost at least 45 MQ-9 Reaper drones during the Iran war around the Strait of Hormuz, amounting to roughly a quarter of its fleet and costing over $1.3 billion. The losses have strained US weapons stocks, prompting a $67 billion supplemental funding request to replenish supplies and address concerns about depleted arsenals.

Israeli forces force families from homes amid settler terror campaign West Bank

Israeli troops forced two Palestinian families from their homes in the West Bank village of Qusra and took over eight others, days after a senior Israeli commander vowed to end a settler campaign to drive them out. Settlers remained in the village, and residents said soldiers damaged property and violated orders against displacement. Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert condemned the siege as a “concerted and meticulous attempt at ethnic cleansing.”

Major oil slick washes up on Iran coast after Hormuz ship strike

A major oil slick from the Minoan Pioneer bulk carrier, struck in the Strait of Hormuz on 3 August, has washed up on Iran’s Qeshm Island, threatening mangrove forests, turtle nesting sites, and fishing communities. Satellite imagery showed the spill spreading across over 300 sq km, with analysts attributing the attack likely to Iran, though Tehran has not acknowledged responsibility. Local officials claim the spill has been almost completely cleaned up, but BBC Verify could not independently confirm this.

Covert CIA program said to be behind mysterious attacks on Galápagos boats

The Washington Post reports that mysterious attacks on Ecuadorian fishing boats near the Galápagos Islands this year were part of a covert CIA program. Flight data indicates a surveillance plane flew from El Salvador toward the boats before drone strikes occurred.

📚 Culture & Community

BOFH: How our Covid ransomware protocol’s Y2K blockchain lowered uptime

The BOFH column humorously recounts how a Covid ransomware protocol’s Y2K blockchain caused reduced uptime. Written as a diary of an excuse hound, it features pie charts that only serve to make the author hungry for pizza.

Five years after quitting a job, developer’s former boss asked for rapid tech support

Five years after leaving a job, a developer received a request from their former boss for urgent tech support. The task, which began with simply connecting a power cord, unexpectedly turned into a lucrative all-nighter.

What are you doing this weekend?

The article invites readers to share their weekend plans and ask for help or feedback. It also reassures that it is perfectly acceptable to do nothing at all.

Data center boom in Quincy, WA farming town cuts poverty from 29.4% to 6.2%

Quincy, a rural Washington farming town of 8,500, has seen a “miracle” transformation thanks to a data center boom, which now funds about 57% of its property taxes and enabled new schools, parks, and infrastructure. This boom created around 900 jobs and helped cut the poverty rate from 29.4% in 2012 to 6.2% in 2024, though it has also made the town unaffordable for many agricultural and food-processing workers.

Amy Kremer, pro-Trump activist who organized Jan 6 rally, now leads anti-data center Humans First

Pro-Trump activist Amy Kremer, who helped organize the January 6 rally and has a history of election denial, now chairs Humans First, a grassroots group opposing data centers. The group aims to mobilize conservatives against AI infrastructure, though some local protesters were unaware of Kremer’s background.

‘The Nerd Reich’ tracks the ‘unmasking of Silicon Valley’s true politics’

Journalist Gil Durán’s book The Nerd Reich argues that Silicon Valley billionaires and venture capitalists, having aligned with MAGA, view democracy as an obstacle and seek to replace it with corporate-style rule. Durán builds his case from their own writings and speeches, citing influences like The Sovereign Individual and Curtis Yarvin, and points to tech leaders’ prominent role at Trump’s inauguration as proof of their long-term political project.

Seven books I keep close because I love them

The author keeps seven beloved books within arm’s reach for writing inspiration, with Roget’s Thesaurus as the most-used reference. She notes the thesaurus is commonly misunderstood as a synonym finder, when it is actually a conceptual classification system that helps writers refine and explore related ideas. After comparing editions, she preferred the fourth edition over the newer eighth, which she found unnecessarily bulky.

Dear people who work at the airport

The article is an open letter from a frequent but anxious passenger to airport staff, explaining that confusing signage, contradictory instructions, and panic-inducing announcements make airports difficult to navigate, especially for inexperienced travelers. The author acknowledges staff know the airport well but argues passengers are trying their best under stressful conditions. They conclude by offering to consult on airport design from the perspective of an anxious, exhausted traveler.

Border blaster

A border blaster is a broadcast station licensed in one country but aimed at listeners in another, most notably Mexican AM stations covering the U.S. and U.S. stations covering Canada. These powerful stations often disrupted American broadcasts and were later regulated by bilateral agreements, though their influence declined with AM radio. Similar European examples included Radio Luxembourg and Radio Free Europe.

Even Claude Is in the Dark About Dario Amodei’s Wife

Cami Clark, wife of Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, serves as his sounding board and strategic adviser, often accompanying him to major events. She helped bring former Google CEO Eric Schmidt on as an early Anthropic investor after having dated him. Despite her influence, Clark maintains a minimal online presence, with efforts reportedly made to remove references to her.

Dario’s wife tried to raise money from Epstein for a porn studio

Dario’s wife reportedly sought financial backing from Jeffrey Epstein to fund a porn studio. The article’s content is blocked by a browser verification page, but the headline indicates the fundraising attempt.

S.F.’s top-paid employee made $900K. Here’s what every city worker gets paid

San Francisco police officers and sheriff’s deputies dominate the city’s highest earners, with several making over $800,000 annually, largely due to overtime; public safety workers represent 72% of top earners despite being less than 20% of the workforce. Sheriff’s Lieutenant Mercy Ambat earned about $903,000, including $440,000 in overtime, making her the second-highest-paid city employee. City officials have proposed reducing overtime costs, such as using retired officers, amid ongoing staffing shortages.