Alvaro Lopez Ortega / 2026-09-25 Briefing

Created Fri, 25 Sep 2026 21:50:51 +0000 Modified Fri, 25 Sep 2026 21:51:26 +0000
10043 Words

Oura’s IPO is about 4x oversubscribed, offering 50M shares at $40–$44 to raise up to $2.2B. Nscale raised $3.36B in convertible financing ahead of its US IPO. A court upheld Anthropic’s Pentagon supply-chain blacklisting. Trump said Bessent won’t be AI czar. Tesla ramped Optimus output to hundreds weekly. Gates warned AI could let ill-intent actors cause a billion deaths.

🤖 AI & Emerging Tech

Huang to Klein: AI just software; risks overstated—but his bar would shut OpenAI, 10x safety spend.

In a podcast with Ezra Klein, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang argued that AI is just software and that existential risks are overstated. Yet his strict safety and quality-control standards would, if applied consistently, call for shutting down OpenAI and vastly increasing AI safety spending. The article notes this matters because Huang heavily influences chip allocations, investments, and U.S. AI policy.

Ando exits stealth with $20M pre-seed/seed for human+AI team messaging

Ando, a startup founded by Sara Du, has emerged from stealth with a team messaging platform designed for both human and AI-agent participants. It raised $20 million in pre-seed and seed funding from investors including Accel, Index Ventures, and Emergence. The platform aims to replace tools like Slack by giving AI agents their own identities, inboxes, and the ability to join channels, DMs, and calls without always being tagged.

Tesla ramps Optimus output to hundreds/week amid hand, automation, supplier hurdles

Tesla has ramped up production of its Optimus humanoid robot to several hundred units per week, roughly a tenfold increase in recent months, according to The Information. However, the company still faces hurdles involving the robot’s hands, automation equipment, and supplier constraints as it scales up.

Bill Gates warns AI could let ill-intent people cause a billion deaths

Bill Gates is warning on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that AI could wipe out humanity and is powerful enough to cause a billion deaths. He says the risk comes from people with ill intent using the latest AI tools, calling the combination potentially more dangerous than any weapon. Gates is urging government and political parties to work together to prevent AI from spiraling out of control.

Microsoft Reboots Copilot as AI Super App

Microsoft launched a redesigned Copilot “super app” that bundles AI chat, coding, and agents into Home, Code, and Autopilot tabs, rebranding Scout as Autopilot and using usage-based billing for Cowork, Code, and Autopilot. The reboot merges Copilot’s consumer and workplace versions into a single corporate-focused product after a six-month effort, signaling Microsoft is ceding the personal AI chatbot market to rivals like OpenAI, Google, and Meta.

Three Lenses on Coordination

The article examines coordination through three lenses—waiting, ordering, and commitment—to understand when staying within a system specification is easy or hard. It focuses on waiting, distinguishing waiting for something to happen, such as data dependencies or acknowledgments, from waiting to know that nothing else will happen, such as distributed termination detection. The goal is to connect these viewpoints and later assess when extra system machinery is actually needed.

Commodified Intelligence

The article argues that AI has moved beyond the “stochastic parrot” stage and can solve complex problems given enough capital and verifiable constraints. Its main concern is not a market crash but the commodification of intelligence, which makes human intellectual labor more replaceable and could push wages toward minimum levels. This threatens white-collar and software engineering workers as companies prioritize cheaper AI-assisted labor and margins over quality or human involvement.

Lobsters: Rename vibecoding to llms (Greasemonkey script)

A Greasemonkey script by joshka renames Lobsters’ “vibecoding” tag to “llms.” As of its listing, it has zero daily and total installs, no ratings, and was created and updated on 2026-09-23.

Linux Kernel Developers Consider Adding AGENTS.md To Help Guide AI/LLM Agents

Linux kernel developers are considering adding an AGENTS.md file to help guide AI/LLM agents contributing patches. Proposed by longtime developer Sasha Levin, the file would link to the kernel README and coding-assistant documentation. Testing suggested it improved agents’ compliance with kernel attribution and development standards, though some object that directing AI to the full README could increase token consumption.

Huawei Cloud Rolls Out Enterprise AI Products Across the Board, Building an Open Agentic Cloud

Huawei Cloud has rolled out a broad set of enterprise AI products as it works to build an open agentic cloud. The company says the move strengthens the silicon foundation of its cloud platform.

On Anthropic’s AI Misuse Report

Anthropic published a report on detected misuses of Claude that Daniel Meissler summarized into 117 findings. The findings describe AI agents increasingly handling reconnaissance, exploitation, data theft, propaganda, surveillance, and research while humans set targets and reviewed outputs, as well as attackers using AI to industrialize credential theft, cloud compromise, phishing, vulnerability research, and sensitive data extraction. The report also covers influence operations, surveillance and repression, and dual-use biological and weapons risks, though it generally does not establish completed biological weapons or operational battlefield deployment.

US military deploys Xbox-controlled lasers to fight Iranian drones in Strait of Hormuz

The US is deploying ship-mounted laser weapons in the Strait of Hormuz to counter Iranian drones and missiles, with plans to spend $500 million on combat-ready systems. Operators use heavy-duty Xbox-style controllers to aim the lasers and disable drone sensors or the drones themselves. Critics say the Trump administration uses pop culture references to make military and immigration policies more appealing.

Too AI; Didn’t Read

TAI-DR, or “Too AI; Didn’t Read,” is a term coined by Ben, according to the article. It expresses a dismissive response to AI-generated content: if the creator couldn’t be bothered to read it, why should anyone else?

Pope: AI must serve humans not become tool of domination

Pope Leo XIV warned at UNESCO in Paris that AI must serve the human person rather than become an instrument of domination and injustice, citing risks of dehumanization, excessive productivity, and child exploitation. He also said scientific progress without wisdom can become destructive and called for greater trust in international institutions amid global conflicts. At the Élysée with President Macron, he reaffirmed the right to life as the foundation of all human rights.

Ollaya – Ollama for open-source, Jev-style decision models

Ollaya is an open-source tool for running decision models locally, letting users ask typed questions about text or JSON and receive calibrated answers in milliseconds. It offers drop-in compatibility with TypeSafe’s API and supports open models such as Laya, decider, nli, and gliclass. The system is private by default, keeping sensitive data on the user’s own hardware.

Meta’s Muse appears to use an OpenAI model labeled muse-special

A developer investigating Meta’s Muse filesystem found a model labeled azure/muse-special used by one subagent, with log signatures and tool-call IDs suggesting it may be an OpenAI model served through Azure. Most sessions used Meta’s internal Avocado model, but Muse also ships clients and API-key plumbing for OpenAI, Anthropic, and other providers. The article concludes the exact model and reason for routing are unclear, but the choice appears to be server-side and may support selective task routing or distillation/RL.

Yes, Claude can do Nine Loops

Physicist Matt von Hippel recounts challenging AI companies to solve a frontier computational problem in theoretical particle physics using only academic-scale resources. He says the challenge was met within a month, with Claude achieving nine loops for N=4 super Yang-Mills.

The Post-AGI Era

The article argues that AGI has arrived as a threshold of generality and autonomy, not as perfect or universally superhuman intelligence. It says model capability is advancing faster than economic adoption, with most organizations still using AI as a tool within pre-AGI workflows. The post-AGI era begins when AGI enables organizations to redesign work around autonomous agents rather than keeping humans inside existing workflows.

Jev vs. Kev: open-source Jev alternative tested side by side

A side-by-side test compared TypeSafe’s closed Jev model with Kev 4B, an open-source, API-compatible reproduction, using the same endpoint and a new 362-question set from post-release text. Accuracy was within 2 points on every task and latency was similar (about 220 ms for Kev vs. 275 ms for Jev), but Jev counts a fixed ~257 extra input tokens per request. Kev is an Apache-2.0 fine-tune of Qwen3.5-4B-Base hosted in the EU.

The cheap new AI model taking aim at OpenAI and Anthropic

A new low-cost AI model is aiming to compete with OpenAI and Anthropic. The available article text provides no further details, as its content is limited to subscription offers.

Doom or Bloom, map your AI worldview with Jev

A free, open-source, and private tool called Jev lets users map their AI worldview by answering a few questions and compare their views with others. Its creator hopes the project will help make conversations about AI futures more balanced and productive.

A Skill.md for Commenting on Hacker News

A satirical guide presents a “skill.md” that maps rolls of a D6 to stereotypical Hacker News comment behaviors, such as quoting weak tangential sentences, humble-bragging about Steve Jobs, citing dubious credentials, promoting AI agent swarms, and deflecting techno-surveillance concerns. It concludes by joking that such an agent would generate karma and adds that commenters should lament U.S. healthcare and society when all else fails.

Jevmem – automatic project memory for Claude Code, built on Jev

Jevmem is an npm tool that provides automatic project memory for Claude Code, with support for Cursor and Codex. It saves decisions, constraints, bugs, and todos from chats into JEVMEM.md, marks changed decisions as superseded, and adds relevant lines to future Claude context. Claude Code integration is automatic via hooks, while Codex and Cursor support depends on watchers or agent-initiated MCP calls.

Jev Plays Pokémon Red

A developer has built and open-sourced a project that lets Jev play Pokémon Red, aiming to test its fast decision-making on a more complex game than Tetris (though not yet Doom). The game is streamed live with token and cost details, and the developer hopes Jev can collect all badges without getting stuck in a cave.

Anthropic: The Situation Report

Since May, teams in the Democratic Republic of the Congo have been responding to a rare Bundibugyo Ebolavirus outbreak with nearly 8,000 confirmed cases and almost half fatal, relying on community health workers’ notebooks and often slow data reporting. A partnership convened by CEPI with WHO AFRO, INRB, and Anthropic is now using Claude to analyze field data, monitor research evidence, and support the outbreak response and situation reports.

Agentic CUDA Kernel Optimizer

A developer built a C++ CUDA test harness and gave it to AI agents to help optimize CUDA kernels. The agents can run kernels, collect benchmarks, and profile performance via Nsight, with the project also serving as an opportunity to learn LangGraph.

OpenAI $500 ProMax plan listed in API

OpenAI’s API is showing signs of a new $500 ProMax plan, according to a checkout pricing configuration endpoint. The listing suggests the plan may be upcoming, though OpenAI has not officially announced it.

AI Love Song for Mistress Played at Murder Trial Is Most Excruciating Watch in Recent Memory

In Caleb Flynn’s murder trial, prosecutors played two AI-generated love songs he had created for his mistress, which investigators found on his iPhone using the forensic tool GrayKey. A forensic investigator described the songs as being in different keys, and attendees struggled not to laugh during the serious proceedings. After the songs ended, the judge adjourned court for the day.

🔒 Security & Privacy

Court Upholds Anthropic Supply Chain Risk Designation

A federal appeals court in Washington, D.C., on Friday upheld the Pentagon’s supply-chain-risk designation and blacklisting of Anthropic in a 2-1 ruling, finding that integrating its Claude AI models into Department of Defense systems posed a national-security risk and barring the military and contractors from using them. The court delayed immediate effect pending further review; Anthropic disagreed, said it is considering legal options, and noted a separate San Francisco federal judge had found a parallel designation unlawful.

Experts: air-gapping AI can stop Hugging Face-like hacks but undercuts evals, slows research

Air-gapping AI systems could prevent incidents like the Hugging Face hack by isolating agents from external networks, but experts say it would reduce realism and undermine evaluations of how AI behaves in real-world settings. It would also be costly and significantly slow research, making it a trade-off rather than a fundamental technical fix.

Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) Cheat Sheet

PortSwigger Research maintains a regularly updated cross-site scripting (XSS) cheat sheet containing many vectors designed to help bypass WAFs and filters. Users can filter vectors by event, tag, or browser, and each includes a proof of concept, with a PDF version available. The resource was last updated on September 21, 2026.

Understanding NvPCRs in systemd v262

systemd introduced NvPCRs—PCR-like registers stored in a TPM’s non-volatile memory—to overcome the scarcity of standard PCRs for OS security measurements. In systemd v262, the anchoring design for NvPCRs was reworked to improve their security. The article rebuilds a systemd NvPCR from scratch against a software TPM and analyzes why the design is secure.

Saying Goodbye to Google

On September 24, 2026, a Google employee announced their resignation, citing opposition to their team’s goal of making AI cheaper and lower-latency because they believe AI progress is too rapid and harmful, and saying a move to another Google project would likely still accelerate AI. They plan to pursue future work they consider unambiguously pro-human, including maintaining Pernosco and rr and investigating AI code debugging.

Fake Google Security Team ad says ’no script reading’ in voice phishing - then prints the script

A fake ad posing as Google’s security team mocked voice phishing by promising “no script reading,” then ironically printed the script. The item comes from the Dark Web Roast, adding mockery and memes to the scam.

Crooks use fake desktop apps to fool HR staff into giving them remote access

Cybercriminals are using fake desktop apps that impersonate HR and payroll providers to trick HR staff into granting remote access. The scheme stands out because none of the legitimate providers actually offer such desktop apps, making that a key warning sign.

Bitget blames North Korea for $387.5M crypto wallet raid

Bitget has blamed North Korea for a $387.5 million crypto wallet raid. The reported fingerprints point to Kim Jong-un’s regime, a conclusion that surprised no one.

Welsh Police Cyberattack Exposes Staff Data

Dyfed-Powys Police is investigating a September 14 cyberattack that disrupted non-emergency email and online contact services, though 999 and 101 remained operational and services were restored. The force found no evidence that members of the public had personal data compromised, but it is examining whether staff information was stolen. Experts warned that any exposed staff data could be used for targeted phishing against police employees.

Another week, another data breach for Revolut customers

DriveWealth has disclosed a data breach after attackers used social engineering to gain access and expose historical customer information, affecting Revolut customers. It is the latest in a series of data breaches for Revolut customers.

Early Black Friday VPN Deals 2026

Early Black Friday 2026 VPN deals are live from ExpressVPN and Surfshark. ExpressVPN offers up to 80% off long-term plans plus 4 extra months free on 2-year subscriptions, with Basic at $2.99/month, Advanced at $4.49/month, and Express Pro at $7.49/month, while Surfshark offers up to 85% off plus 3 extra months free, up to 27 months, with Starter at $2.49/month, One at $2.79/month, and One+ at $4.49/month and a 30-day money-back guarantee.

One bad Android app could hijack your OnePlus 15, researcher warns

A security researcher says a malicious Android app can gain root access on the OnePlus 15 without requesting suspicious permissions by abusing built-in debugging tools to bypass Android restrictions. Researcher Rasmus Moorats reported the flaw in May, but OnePlus has not provided a user fix and said the issue also applies to all OPPO terminal product series. OnePlus allegedly threatened legal liabilities if the vulnerability was published without its written consent.

Swedish software provider fined after data breach exposed data of 2.2M people

Sweden’s privacy regulator fined software provider Miljödata about €160,000 after a cyberattack exposed sensitive data of over 2.2 million people, including Social Security numbers and health-related details. Regulators said Miljödata lacked proper software checks and real-time monitoring to detect suspicious activity. The authority is still investigating two municipalities and one region linked to the same attack.

“Someone just sent me an ad that features an AI version of me. What do I do?”

Laura Bassett said in a Bluesky post dated September 25, 2026, that someone sent her a Chase ad featuring an AI version of her. She asked what she should do about it.

An SR-71 Blackbird Has Vanished (Updated)

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman recently teased a new high-speed, high-altitude X-plane with an SR-71-like silhouette. An SR-71 previously displayed at NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center—tail number 844, the last Blackbird built and flown—has been missing from view since at least May 17. Aviation Week sources suggest it was moved into a hangar for inspection, raising speculation about a possible return-to-flight after more than 26 years.

Silicon Valley ‘sex assault list’ with ‘over 100’ names circulated

A private spreadsheet circulating in Silicon Valley names over 100 alleged sexual predators, including prominent investors and businessmen, as a warning to women in tech. The list contains allegations of drugging, sexual assault, and rape, though its claims have not been verified. Sources say many women avoid police due to fear of retaliation and career blacklisting.

CVE-2025-13032: Entering and Breaking the Avast Antivirus Sandbox Part 2

Part 2 of the Avast research documents full exploitation of CVE-2025-13032, a double-fetch vulnerability in Avast’s kernel driver that causes a paged pool overflow. The exploit corrupts the IORing object’s RegBuffers array to gain arbitrary kernel read/write, then uses heap spraying, MDL-based address leaks, and teardown repairs to escalate privileges to SYSTEM via token theft on an up-to-date Windows 11 system. The post also notes that newer Windows kernel user-mode accessors mitigate this exploitation technique.

💻 Computing & Hardware

Microsoft confirms 2026 Surface PCs drop Copilot+ PC branding despite meeting requirements

Microsoft has confirmed that its 2026 Surface PCs no longer use the Copilot+ PC branding, even though they meet the requirements and support all Copilot+ features. The change follows a broader retreat from the Copilot+ PC name by Microsoft and OEMs after its troubled 2024 launch. Qualcomm says the focus remains on delivering NPU-based experiences without the Copilot+ PC terminology.

DensityAI, ex-Tesla Dojo AI chip startup, in talks to raise hundreds of millions at $10B valuation

DensityAI, an AI chip startup founded a year ago by former leaders of Tesla’s Dojo supercomputer program, is in advanced talks to raise hundreds of millions of dollars, according to The Information. The round would value the company at $10 billion.

Pentium II Voodoo 3 Emulated on Mac Mini

A Mac Mini M6 running a modified 86Box 6.0 build achieved stable 600 MHz Pentium II emulation with an emulated Voodoo 3, helped by improved ARM64 JIT support including a Voodoo JIT recompiler. Because 86Box is largely single-thread-bound and needs 100% emulation speed for smooth audio and performance, Apple Silicon’s strong single-core speed makes the M6 a strong retro PC host, outperforming a base M4 Mac Mini in identical Windows 98, Voodoo 3, and background Winamp audio tests.

Redox OS Adds IO_uring, NUMA, QEMU Support

Redox OS’s August 2026 update added an IO_uring-like “Redox Rings” API that improved NVMe, RedoxFS, and RAMFS I/O by 14–15x, alongside initial NUMA support, UEFI boot compatibility, and AArch64/ARM64 multi-core support. It also fixed a kernel memory leak that cut GCC os-test compilation from 10 hours to about 30 minutes, while adding Linux dual-boot installation, process-priority tuning, ~5% lower IPC overhead, a smaller kernel, and driver improvements. QEMU now works, though it remains slow without KVM-like acceleration.

A Type Stronger than the Sum of its Components

The article shares a Rust type-design insight in which the std::path::Component enum was refactored into separate struct types for each variant. This allowed more precise APIs, such as join_normal taking a NormalComponent instead of a broad OsStr, to enforce path invariants. The author argues that if a sum type is useful, its individual variant types can also be useful for representing specific, well-constrained values.

Evolving programming languages in the AI era

In a September 24, 2026 post, José Valim explores how programming languages may evolve as AI agents write most code. He discusses how agent-driven development could shrink ecosystem gaps while weakening collaboration and community ties, and he offers opinions on adapting tooling now that coding agents are users. Valim notes these views may change but presents them as a current digest of the shift.

Amiga Screens Primer

Amiga screens are OS-level display areas that can have different resolutions and color depths, be opened in multiples, and be dragged independently, unlike the fixed-resolution displays common today. A primer on the original OCS hardware explains that this flexibility mattered in the CRT era when memory was expensive, and notes that ECS and AGA later removed some limitations while preserving the same principles. It also covers Amiga’s indexed-palette and planar graphics model.

Every package is already installed

omnibin is a FUSE filesystem that makes every binary ever shipped by nixpkgs available on the user’s $PATH without installing or building anything, using zero disk space until a file is accessed. It indexes Hydra’s .ls metadata and lazily fetches NARs from cache.nixos.org via nixpkgs-multiverse, exposing over 50,000 top-level binaries plus versioned forms. It can also be used in Docker and enabled on NixOS through a module.

Real-Time Telemetry with Eventlog Live

Well-Typed announced Eventlog Live, a lightweight program that streams real-time telemetry from Haskell applications to OpenTelemetry-compatible platforms such as Grafana Cloud, Prometheus, and local viewers. The blog post demonstrates usage with version 0.10.0.0 and example Grafana dashboards, covering heap profiles, memory metrics, cost-centre stack profiles, logs, and thread/capability traces.

GDB 18.1 Debugger Brings Better Windows Support

GDB 18.1 has been released with improved Windows support, including native thread-local storage variables, non-stop mode on Windows 10 and later, scheduler locking, better Windows Terminal console support, and an AArch64 MinGW target. The release also adds improvements for inferior arguments, AArch64 FPMR support, new commands like “save history” and local-environment controls, and updates to the Python API and GAP protocol.

Approaching A 10 Second Linux Kernel Build

Linux kernel clean builds are approaching 10 seconds on x86_64, with current capable hardware taking roughly 15 seconds. Pending Kbuild optimizations by Lorenzo Stoakes, developed with AI/LLM assistance, could land in Linux 7.4 and make clean builds about 36% faster and incremental builds about 70% faster. The v4 patch series has shown defconfig build times dropping from 28 to 20 seconds on a dual AMD EPYC 9754 server.

Patches Posted For Enabling NVMe On All Apple M3 Based SoCs With Linux

Patches have been posted by Janne Grunau to enable NVMe storage on all Apple M3, M3 Pro, Max, and Ultra devices with Linux, requiring Device Tree additions similar to prior Apple M2 support. The work is out for review and may land in the Linux 7.4 merge window in October, though mainline M3 support remains basic. Until then, users are advised to rely on downstream Asahi Linux for the latest Apple M3 Linux support.

AMD Sends Out New Linux Patches Further Enhancing HDMI 2.1 Reliability

AMD has sent new AMDGPU Display Core patches to improve HDMI 2.1 reliability ahead of Linux 7.4, where AMD graphics will expose HDMI 2.1 by default with FreeSync, VRR, and ALLM. The fixes include skipping HDMI FRL status polling when the link is down, aligning the HDMI 2.1 link-training timeout with spec, and serializing FRL polling against link detection. The patches also add DCN 4.2 and DCN 6.0 display work, with DCN 6 appearing tied to next-gen RDNA5 GPUs.

Samba 4.25 Released With Experimental SMB3 Persistent Handles

Samba 4.25 has been released as the latest stable version, adding experimental SMB3 Persistent Handles for transparent failover so clients can reconnect after server restarts or outages while retaining valid file handles, though with a significant performance cost. The release also introduces a Ceph RGW VFS module for exposing Ceph Object Gateway buckets as SMB shares, along with JSON audit logging improvements and AES as the default domain encryption type.

New software dependency validation process increases speeds by 54x

A new software dependency validation process increases speeds by 54x. It reduces overhead by as much as 99.7%.

Office 2016 and 2019 holdouts blame update for license deactivation bug

Users of Office 2016 and 2019 are blaming a recent update for deactivating their licenses. Microsoft has not said whether the update was actually at fault.

Windows update leaves some virtual desktops staring into the void

A Windows update has left some virtual desktop users facing a blank screen after signing in. Affected users may need to manually launch Explorer to restore their desktop.

Asahi fork embraces LLMs and lands Linux on the M4 Mac mini

A fork of Asahi Linux has embraced LLMs to bring Linux to Apple’s M4 Mac mini. With help from coding agents, two developers built an accelerated desktop and graphics driver in just weeks.

Your files are in four places and nobody knows which one is right

Joe Fay chaired a Register dinner under the Chatham House Rule on the file infrastructure that nobody has gotten around to replacing. The discussion focused on the persistent problem of organizations relying on outdated, fragmented file systems with no clear successor.

Is your old iPhone the answer to the critical metals crisis?

Smartphones such as old iPhones contain small amounts of valuable metals and rare earth elements, including gold, silver, palladium, copper, aluminum, and rare earths. Recycling them through e-Stewards-certified e-waste recyclers offers the best chance of safe metal recovery, but repair and recycling systems still lag. In the EU, only about 18% of reviewed records linked to useful repair information, while China dominates global critical minerals mining and refining.

iFytek P1 Pro review: sleek, smart, and stealthy

The iFlytek P1 Pro is a discreet, lightweight $160 AI recorder with a 3.2-inch OLED screen, 64GB storage, and a three-microphone array that captures clear speech in meetings, interviews, and noisy public spaces. Its English transcriptions are nearly flawless, though specific terms and abbreviations can still cause errors, and the Deepting app adds summaries and search assistance. Sleek and stealthy, it requires the app for setup and file transfer, which can be cumbersome.

Dutch Government Builds NixOS Microsoft Alternative

The Dutch government is developing DAWO, a sovereign open-source digital workplace built on NixOS, to replace Microsoft 365, Windows, and U.S. cloud services for public-sector use. The effort follows concerns about U.S. access to European government data and reports that U.S. sanctions on the ICC in early 2025 cut its chief prosecutor off from Microsoft services, with DAWO aiming to advance digital autonomy through replaceable OS, office, collaboration, cloud, IT management, and AI components. Mandated in July and involving Dutch central government IT providers, DAWO has pilot deployments underway, though no formal implementation deadline has been set.

Bug: Border radius has infected VSCode editor

A VS Code bug report claims version 1.139.0 displays unwanted border radius across the text editor, file explorer, terminal, and Copilot chat, even with all extensions disabled. The user says the rounded corners are distracting and hinder their ability to work efficiently, and asks for help.

Typst Makes Big Strides

Typst 0.15 has been released with major features including variable font support, MathML output for experimental HTML export, and multiple bibliographies. The free, Apache-2.0-licensed Rust typesetting system continues to develop as a potential LaTeX replacement for technical documents. The article demonstrates variable fonts using fonts such as Roboto Flex and Zycon.

Factorio that you can touch

Wube Software organized a 2024 playtesting event for Factorio: Space Age with help from Prusa Research, which led to creating physical 3D-printable Factorio models. The team focused on early-game entities such as transport belts and inserters, producing 15 model sets containing 65 individual models across 247 STL files, with both push-fit and glue-friendly versions.

Git-bug: Distributed, offline-first bug tracker embedded in Git

git-bug is a distributed, offline-first bug tracker fully embedded in Git, letting users push and pull bugs through normal Git remotes. It avoids vendor lock-in, runs fast without adding files to the project, and integrates with tools via CLI, terminal, web UI, or GraphQL API. It also offers bridges to import and export with other bug trackers.

Topcoat is pushing the boundary of server applications with Rust

Topcoat, a batteries-included full-stack Rust framework with views, components, mailers, and the Toasty ORM, aims to make Rust web application development as productive as other languages. The team has released Topcoat v0.9, adding client-side reactivity and other updates. The project is focused on advancing Rust for server applications and AI-driven development.

Ink and Switch Interactive Homepage

Ink & Switch is celebrating its tenth anniversary with Tenfold, an interactive art piece made with help from friends and built using the lab’s own research technology. Users are invited to click and drag to explore it. The homepage also outlines Ink & Switch’s vision of computers that amplify human intelligence and highlights its research themes, projects, and publications.

Boards of Casio

The article describes work on CZP-1, a web-based effort to recreate a Casio CZ-101, and how the author used CZ-101 patch data shared by oliveoil22 from YouTube to reproduce those sounds. The CZP-1 is otherwise very close to the original patches but lacks the post-processing effects oliveoil22 used. It saves loaded banks in browser slots and supports sharing sounds through JSON files or self-contained URLs.

Jev Based Code Review

Jev-Code-Reviewer is a local code review tool intended to reduce the burden of large agent-generated PRs by classifying each change as P0, P1, or P2 and showing only P0 by default, with configurable priorities. It presents diffs in natural language while keeping the original code one toggle away, runs on the user’s computer for reviewing their own coding agent’s PRs, and posts nothing to GitHub. It sends changed code and nearby context to TypeSafe and OpenAI for analysis, with coverage capped at the first 12 diff hunks by default and up to 100 via --max-units.

Avoid smooth spinners, use low-FPS spinners

A developer frustrated by apps such as VSCode, Chromium, Firefox, and Thunderbird burning CPU/GPU cycles on spinners for otherwise static content created a page advocating low-FPS spinners. The page aims to reduce laptop heat and sluggishness caused by smooth spinner animations.

⚡ Infrastructure & Energy

Nscale secures $3.36B convertible financing led by Third Point pre-IPO; $2.36B now, $1B Nvidia Nov

British neocloud Nscale has secured $3.36 billion in convertible financing led by Third Point ahead of its US IPO later this year. The round includes $2.36 billion available immediately and $1 billion from existing investor Nvidia in mid-November, with the notes converting to equity after the IPO. Nscale, which filed IPO paperwork last week, is expected to be valued at $35 billion on the NYSE and reportedly seeks to raise $3 billion.

CommonGrid: The open source registry of the US power grid

CommonGrid is an open-source, community-maintained registry that connects U.S. power grid infrastructure data—utilities, ISOs/RTOs, generation, transmission, rates, demand response, EV charging, and market nodes—into a single public, shareable graph. It is free to use under the ODbL 1.0 license, with wiki-style edits that are citable, attributed, reversible, and governed by contributors and moderators. The project aims to reduce fragmented data plumbing by providing a unified, commercially usable dataset for regulators, researchers, utilities, and startups.

Uncle Sam coughs up $1.9B for grid upgrades as datacenters hit a power wall

The US is providing $1.9 billion for grid upgrades as datacenters strain available power. The improvements, including better conductors and sensing capabilities, are expected to unlock at least 23 gigawatts of additional capacity.

Google-backed energy outfit brings 33 MW of 4 GW geothermal potential online in Utah

Fervo Energy, backed by Google, has brought 33 MW of geothermal capacity online in Utah as part of a resource with 4 GW of potential. The company aims to reach 100 MW by the New Year and 500 MW by 2028.

UK wants more homes heated by waste heat from datacenters

The UK is funding millions to build and improve datacenter-driven heat networks so more homes can be heated using waste heat. The projects include piping hot water through a tunnel under the Thames.

Zelensky says Russia has widened attacks to hit Ukraine’s data centres

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky says Russia has widened its attacks to target Ukraine’s data centres and internet providers, aiming to disrupt ordinary life. On Friday, a Russian drone hit a Kyiv business centre housing a data centre, killing four people and damaging the site, while a separate attack killed a 14-year-old Israeli citizen. Russia confirmed it targeted a data centre it said was used by Ukrainian military intelligence.

xAI Moves to Buy Out Southaven Residents Who Agree Not to Sue over Plant Noise

xAI, through subsidiary MZX Tech, is offering to buy out Southaven, Mississippi, residents if they agree not to join a class-action lawsuit alleging noise and vibration harms from its energy plant. The letters follow a June lawsuit by residents and do not specify buyout amounts, but accepting would require a release of all claims related to the suit. MZX denies the allegations while saying it needs the property for business purposes.

Allow Carriers on Planes

The article argues that the FAA should allow babywearing carriers on planes, since current rules force parents to remove infants from carriers and hold them during takeoff, landing, and ground movement. It says the 1995 rule was based on studies that did not test babywearing carriers or compare them with lap-holding, and that modern carriers would likely be safer in turbulence, crashes, and evacuations. A 2024 bill to change the rule died in subcommittee without a vote.

Oracle on the hook to pay data centre investors even if site has no electricity

Oracle is reportedly on the hook to pay data centre investors even if a site has no electricity. The arrangement leaves Oracle obligated to make payments regardless of whether the data centre can actually operate.

🏛️ Policy & Business

Oura IPO ~4x oversubscribed; Oura, selling shareholders offer 50M shares at $40-$44 to raise ~$2.2B

Oura Inc.’s IPO, aiming to raise as much as $2.2 billion, is roughly four times oversubscribed, according to sources. The smart ring maker and selling shareholders are offering 50 million shares at $40 to $44 each, with banks expected to stop taking investor orders Monday afternoon.

Trump: Bessent won’t be SI czar; doesn’t want it, staying at Treasury

President Trump said Friday that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent will not be named his artificial intelligence czar, after reports he was under consideration for the post. Trump said Bessent does not want the role and is doing a great job at Treasury, where he wants to keep him.

US alone at UN dismisses AI safety, leaving nonbinding rules without buy-in from AI giants’ home

The Trump administration stood alone at the UN in rejecting international AI safety rules, insisting that US AI development should accelerate without government-set ground rules. Without US support, other nations may be left to set nonbinding rules and best practices without buy-in from the home of the biggest AI companies. The stance puts Trump at odds with AI CEOs and some congressional Republicans who favor coordinated safety efforts and regulation.

AI neolabs, many lacking products/mkts/revenue, raised $24B/2 qtrs, ~5x OpenAI/Anthropic pre-ChatGPT

AI “neolabs,” many lacking products, markets, or revenue, raised $24 billion over the past two quarters, nearly five times the pre-ChatGPT funding of OpenAI and Anthropic. Investors are making big bets on these early-stage AI ventures, though the article cautions that such figures can hide sleight of hand and that building a new Walmart, Uber, or Amazon today would be brave or foolhardy.

Databricks acquires spreadsheet startup Row Zero to expand the capabilities of its AI coworker Genie

Databricks has acquired spreadsheet startup Row Zero to expand its AI coworker platform Genie. The deal is the first for Genie and signals a push into AI tooling for general work. Row Zero had raised a $10 million seed led by IA Ventures last year.

Last Call For The Autumn Special For Ad-Free Viewing & Supporting Linux Hardware Testing

Phoronix’s autumn Premium sale ends Sunday, 27 September, offering ad-free viewing and support for its Linux hardware testing and open-source news. The discounted rates are $35/year instead of $45, or $160 for lifetime instead of $250.

Raspberry Pi surfs memory crunch to record first half

Raspberry Pi posted a record first half, helped by a well-timed RAM stockpile. The inventory allowed it to keep board shipments going while rivals struggled with memory supply.

Amazon sellers watch as inventory vanishes into pending-order purgatory

Amazon sellers are seeing inventory tied up in a “pending-order purgatory,” with high-value goods remaining unavailable. Merchants are debating whether the problem is caused by an attack or a platform glitch.

Project leader thought his team understood the plan, ended up fixing their ‘interpretation’ of it

A project leader assumed his team understood the plan, but later had to correct their different interpretation of it. The incident showed that malicious compliance can cross cultural barriers.

EFF to Court: Trump’s Truth Social pay-to-see-posts-first scheme violates 1st Amendment equal access

EFF told a federal court that the Trump administration’s use of Truth Social’s paid early-access service violates Americans’ First Amendment right to equal access to official government statements. In an amicus brief supporting The Intercept and the Freedom of the Press Foundation’s lawsuit, EFF argued that charging up to $100,000 a month for early access to Trump’s official posts gives some people preferential access without legitimate government justification. EFF backed a preliminary injunction to stop the president from profiting from selling early access to government information.

Supreme Court permits states to use SAVE database for citizenship checks

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Friday that states may use the federal SAVE database to verify voter citizenship, reversing lower court decisions that found the database inaccurate and likely to disenfranchise eligible voters. The majority said the federal government must respond to state and local election officials’ verification requests, while three justices dissented, criticizing the ruling as an interim decision made without full briefing or oral argument. The ruling’s impact on 2026 may be limited by a 90-day pre-election restriction on voter registration changes, and most states have resisted federal citizenship-verification efforts.

Trump administration gutted data collection on US education

The Trump administration’s cuts to the Department of Education sharply reduced the National Center for Education Statistics, cutting staff from about 100 to 12 and canceling many contracts and data collections. The reductions ended or narrowed key work including longitudinal studies and surveys on school violence and college financing, weakening tools to track and address education trends amid falling math and reading scores. The Education Department says it still collects some data, including the Nation’s Report Card, and is reforming IES/NCES, but researchers warn the cuts undermine objective measurement of student performance.

Trump admin using AI to deny medical care for seniors in disastrous experiment

The Trump administration’s WISeR pilot uses AI to approve or deny prior authorization for certain Medicare services in six states and has been linked to technical failures, delays, denials, and patient suffering. Documents obtained by the EFF confirmed provider complaints, while the GAO found the program was improperly established and Republican lawmakers blocked a committee effort to obtain more documents. Despite calls to shut it down, the program is reportedly continuing and planned to expand.

Meta bans another Toronto performer from Instagram and Facebook over Bikini

Meta deleted Toronto burlesque performer Starlotte Satine’s Instagram and Facebook accounts, including her performance and vintage clothing business pages, over a February photo of dancers in bikinis promoting a Valentine’s Day event. Meta alleged the post was “co-ordinating harm,” but Satine denies violating its terms and says the suspensions threaten promotion and income for her upcoming Oct. 2 show. The Painted Lady’s Instagram was also suspended, while some other affected accounts were later reinstated.

Theranos founder reportedly to be transferred to halfway home next year

Elizabeth Holmes, the disgraced founder of Theranos, will reportedly be transferred from a minimum-security prison to a halfway home in Austin, Texas, next August. Holmes was sentenced in 2022 to more than 11 years for defrauding Theranos investors out of hundreds of millions of dollars and ordered to pay restitution. Her prison term has been reduced several times, and she is scheduled for release in February 2030.

Netanyahu calls Israel’s war in Gaza ‘opposite of genocide’ in UN speech

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the UN General Assembly that Israel’s war in Gaza is “the opposite of genocide,” dismissing international criticism and claiming a global anti-Jewish conspiracy. Dozens of delegates walked out during his address, while protests erupted in New York City. Netanyahu also attacked critics including Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, in a speech widely seen as aimed at rallying his right-wing base ahead of Israeli elections.

🌍 Culture & Science

Grieving the loss of details

The author reflects on feeling out of place in an industry that increasingly values architecture and “vibecoding” over low-level coding and deep technical detail. They describe a lifelong drive to understand how machines work, from writing machine code to worrying about allocations and CPU architectures. This shift has made them feel their strongest skills are becoming less relevant.

AI is not “just a tool”

The article rejects the claim that AI is “just a tool,” arguing that this phrase trivializes a complicated technology and excuses its dangers. It says AI is a broader industry and product ecosystem—including LLMs, agents, data centers, and unnecessary software features—driven by irresponsible companies with hidden costs and risks. Unlike ordinary tools such as power drills, AI carries potential for major societal harm and skill erosion.

Who Is Open Source About?

The article argues that open source is at least partly about the user, pushing back on Rich Hickey’s claim that “Open Source Is Not About You.” While acknowledging that obnoxious users and corporations should not demand free support, it contends that maintainers and users share an implicit long-term relationship with ethical costs and benefits that need clearer articulation and social consequences.

What are you doing this weekend?

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

Paranoia-Sans: A conspiratorial typeface

Paranoia Sans is a self-censoring, conspiratorial typeface created by Florian Egermann in 2020, based on Courier Prime Sans. It uses OpenType ligatures to automatically replace terms common in conspiracy myths, such as “5G,” with a black-box redaction graphic.

Remembering Johannes Doerfert

Johannes Doerfert, a prolific and respected LLVM compiler contributor, died on September 17, 2026, at age 36 after a battle with cancer. He earned a Ph.D. from Saarland University, contributed to LLVM since 2014, and led major work on the Attributor framework, OpenMP GPU offloading, and Polly polyhedral optimization. He also helped organize LLVM/HPC events and mentored newcomers through office hours and Google Summer of Code.

Which copy of that file is the real one? Dinner, off the record, in Midtown

Joe Fay chaired an off-the-record Register dinner in Midtown, New York, focused on file infrastructure that organizations have not yet replaced. No details from the discussion were placed on the record.

BOFH: The Helldesk opens its third eye and ascends to a higher plane of troubleshooting

The BOFH column features The Helldesk opening a third eye and ascending to a higher plane of troubleshooting. It frames this mystical upgrade as putting the “om” in computing.

Judge uses electronic tag on Pokémon card tracker. It’s super effective!

An Ohio man planted a tracking device on a delivery van to follow scarce Pokémon trading card stock. He was sentenced to a year of probation.

Friday Squid Blogging: Participatory Squid Dissection in October in Tennessee

The Hands-On Science Center in Tennessee will host a Family Squid Dissection in October, offering a guided, hands-on marine biology experience for all ages. Families will work together to examine a real squid’s anatomy, organs, and adaptations up close. The blog post encourages attendees to take pictures and also serves as an open thread for security news.

Where to Watch Italy vs Belgium for Free (September 25, 2026)

Italy vs Belgium will play at Stadio Olimpico in Rome on Friday, September 25, 2026, at 20:45 CEST. Fans in Italy can watch for free on RAI 1 via RaiPlay, while viewers in Belgium can use VTM via VTM GO, both requiring a free account. Those outside those countries can use a VPN, such as NordVPN with its 30-day money-back guarantee, to access the region-locked free streams.

Where to Watch Turkey vs France for Free (September 25, 2026)

Turkey will host France in their opening 2026-27 UEFA Nations League League A match on Friday, September 25, 2026, at Kocaeli Stadium in İzmit, with kickoff at 21:45 TRT. The match can be streamed for free via AITV in Turkey or TF1 in France, subject to local geo-restrictions. Viewers outside those markets are advised to use a VPN, such as NordVPN with its 30-day money-back guarantee, to access the free broadcasts.

UFO whistleblower says government has recovered craft and aliens may want our genes

UFO whistleblower Dylan Borland claimed on Sean Hannity’s podcast that the U.S. government has recovered alien craft, saying he knows it “for a fact.” Borland speculated extraterrestrials may be interested in human genes and reproduction, possibly to replace humans on Earth, while UFO investigator Ben Hansen discussed alleged abductions. Reddit commenters criticized the podcast for relying on speculation rather than factual analysis.

Quoting John Gruber

Meta’s Muse is the first consumer-accessible agentic AI system, giving each user a persistent Linux VM in Meta’s cloud in an easy-to-use, cute package. John Gruber warns that consumers likely underestimate how powerful and dangerous Muse is, especially when running on a Mac.

Northern Gannet, Great Blue Heron, California Brown Pelican

On September 25, 2026, a Northern Gannet, Great Blue Heron, and California Brown Pelican were sighted in Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary from 7:07 to 7:27 PM. A new 200-800mm Canon EF lens helped capture the photographer’s best photo of Morris yet, with the birds noted hanging out under a sign in the harbor.

Advice to a Beginning Graduate Student (2001)

Manuel Blum’s 2001 talk “Advice to a Beginning Graduate Student” offers guidance on reading, studying, thinking, research, and writing for new PhD students. He urges students to read books non-linearly, write while reading hard material, and use writing to gain the computational power of a Turing machine over a finite automaton. Blum also advises giving oneself hints and seeking clever shortcuts when stuck on difficult problems.

Gravity Seems Holographic. What Does That Mean for Reality?

The article examines the holographic principle, derived from the AdS/CFT correspondence, which suggests that gravity and quantum mechanics are deeply linked and that a region of space can be fully described by information on its surface. It highlights the idea’s major influence in theoretical physics, its role in showing black holes are not inescapable, and its strange implications—such as space possibly being an illusion.

First Principles Thinking

The article reflects on Sunil Pai’s “the senior engineer death spiral,” noting that senior engineers can get stuck when experience makes it hard to rethink problems. It advocates first-principles thinking and momentum: break work into small achievable steps, ask why something is being built and how it helps users, and keep things simple. As engineering shifts toward agentic development, it argues that adapting requires setting aside prior assumptions and approaching new possibilities with fresh eyes.

What happens when you analyze your favorite college football team like the CIA?

The article describes an experiment applying intelligence-analysis methods—specifically Cultivate’s Continuous Probabilistic Foresight and the Hinsley model—to assess the University of Illinois football team. After Illinois lost 31–27 to Duke, the model became less optimistic about Illinois making the College Football Playoff but more optimistic about its offensive line and new quarterback, illustrating how structured probabilistic reasoning updates judgments under uncertainty.

Nobody Asked for a Crab Chair

Toyota’s “Walk Me” prototype is a four-legged, stair-climbing wheelchair concept unveiled at the Japan Mobility Show, praised for its futuristic design but criticized as over-engineered and impractical. The article argues such prototypes rarely reach real users and divert money and talent from affordable, functional mobility aids that disabled people actually need.

The Test

NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang said on Ezra Klein’s podcast that he does not think it matters if AI causes children to forget basic math skills, and admitted he does not know his own address, ZIP code, or phone number. The article cites these remarks alongside similar comments from other tech figures to argue that wealthy tech leaders are increasingly detached from ordinary human life and embrace AI as a way to avoid everyday friction.

I’m Tired of Being on the Network

The author describes their growing fatigue with always-online life, contrasting people who constantly keep phones close with those who discard them at home. Once an enthusiastic early adopter, they now view the smartphone as an unavoidable tax rather than a prized possession, especially in Denmark where essential services require apps like Aula, Rejsekort, MitID, and e-Boks. They argue that offline alternatives are largely nominal, leaving little meaningful choice but to keep buying and using the same device every few years.

Uproar in France over award-winning author accused of using AI

The French literary world is in uproar after Canadian-Haitian author Thélyson Orélien was accused of using AI to write his award-winning first novel, C’était ça ou mourir. Orélien denies the allegation—made by the group Balance ton Claude based on Pangram detection—and his publisher Grasset has defended the work as original. The controversy comes as he has won the Prix du Roman Fnac and is a finalist for the Goncourt and Renaudot, amid broader doubts about the reliability of AI-detection tools.

Tech Needs Humanists More

In an article arguing that tech needs humanists more than ever, the author advises tech writers and developers to prioritize humanities skills—such as languages, philosophy, literature, linguistics, math, or history—over purely technical abilities. As AI handles fact retrieval and routine writing, the author says humans’ advantage lies in deep thinking, forming and defending viewpoints, and understanding complex systems and human factors. Formal study or self-study in the humanities is recommended, with technical skills still mattering but no longer being the only or most urgent path.

The last day of the dinosaurs, as an interactive painting

An interactive painting depicts the last day of the dinosaurs at Hell Creek 66 million years ago, showing a Cretaceous river before a catastrophic asteroid impact. The impact ended the age of dinosaurs, but birds carried their lineage onward, while mammals—including distant human ancestors—survived into a changed world.

Special Projects (2016)

The post outlines several special project areas OpenAI considers important for advancing AI and its long-term societal impact, including detecting covert breakthrough AI systems, building an agent to win online programming competitions, AI-based cybersecurity defense, and large-scale simulations with many long-lived agents. It invites strong machine learning experts to apply to start efforts on these problems at OpenAI.