How the US is preparing for a potential bird flu pandemic
I first covered the virus in an article published on January 7, 2020, titled "Doctors scramble to identify mysterious disease emerging in China." For that article, and many others to follow, I spoke with people who are experts in viruses, infectious diseases, and epidemiology. Often, the answer to my questions about the virus, how it spreads, and the...
Download: Pandemic risk rises, and ask anything on Reddit
I've been combing the internet to find the most fun/important/scary/interesting stories about technology. 1 Meta's new speech policy allows denigration of trans people The revised guidelines now allow insults and accusations that were previously prohibited. (Platformer $)+ The change made Meta employees feel ashamed and embarrassed. (404 Media)+ Axed fact-checkers hold emergency meeting after Meta says it no...
Anthropic’s chief scientist on 5 ways agents will be better in 2025
2 / The agent will understand the context "Claude needs to learn enough about the specific situation and the obstacles you face to be useful. Things like the specific role you play, what writing style or what you need and your organization. ANTHROPIC "I think we will see improvements where Claude will be able to browse documents, Slack,...
How to delete Facebook, Instagram, and Threads
After Meta's decision to remove its third-party fact-checking system and release its content moderation policy, Google's search for how to remove Facebook, Instagram, and Threads has intensified. Those angered by the decision blamed Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg for displeasing the incoming Trump administration at the expense of making the company's social media platform more open to misinformation and polarized...
Nvidia’s AI empire: See the top startup investments
No company has harnessed the AI revolution more dramatically than Nvidia. Revenue, profits, and cash reserves have grown since ChatGPT's introduction more than two years ago - and many competitive generative AI services have launched. And the share price has increased by more than eightfold. During this period, the world's high-performance GPU manufacturers have used their ballooning fortunes to...
Apple’s board opposed the proposal to eliminate the DEI program
Apple's board of directors has opposed a proposal to end the company's Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) program. In a proxy filing, the company said the National Center for Public Policy Research (a conservative think tank) submitted a proposal for Apple to "consider eliminating Inclusion & Diversity programs, policies, departments and goals." The think tank's proposal argued that DEI...
Matt Mullenweg disabled the WordPress account of a contributor he said planned to create the project
Automattic CEO and WordPress co-creator Matt Mullenweg has disabled the accounts of several members of the WordPress.org community, both of whom suggested plans to spearhead the push to create a new fork of the open source WordPress project. While public criticism of WordPress governance is not new, the latest brouhaha began in September when Mullenweg publicly condemned WP Engine,...
Researchers open source Sky-T1, a ‘reasonable’ AI model that can be trained for less than $450
So-called reasoning AI models are becoming easier – and cheaper – to develop. On Friday, NovaSky, a team of researchers from UC Berkeley's Sky Computing Lab, released Sky-T1-32B-Preview, a reasoning model that is competitive with the previous version of OpenAI's o1 in several key benchmarks. Sky-T1 appears to be the first open-source reasoning model in the sense that it...
Everything you missed at CES 2025
Welcome to the Week in Review. I miss you! This week, we dive into all the gadgets and announcements coming out of this year's CES, Meta's decision to bring back its fact-checking program, TikTok's response to employees affected by the California wildfires, and more! Let's do this. CES 2025 came and went this week. The event features keynotes from...
What’s behind the balloon video game budget?
Why do some companies need hundreds of millions of dollars to develop popular video games? A few weeks ago, The New York Times blamed the endless effort to deliver photo-realistic graphics - and suggested that the industry was beginning to see diminishing returns, leading to layoffs and studio closures. However, Bloomberg's Jason Schreier said this analysis was "a little...
