Saturday, January 3, 2026

Q&A with Kara Swisher on the economics of the AI boom, the upcoming IPOs of SpaceX and OpenAI, Elon Musk, the tech industry's Trump pivot, robotics, and more (Mishal Husain/Bloomberg)

Mishal Husain / Bloomberg:
Q&A with Kara Swisher on the economics of the AI boom, the upcoming IPOs of SpaceX and OpenAI, Elon Musk, the tech industry's Trump pivot, robotics, and more  —  After a year of dominating mega-deals and driving stock-market gains, the tech industry is poised for a pivotal 2026 …



Dating apps are pivoting to Asia as swipe-right fatigue hits the West; India, China, and Indonesia ranked among the top five markets by downloads in 2025 (Financial Times)

Financial Times:
Dating apps are pivoting to Asia as swipe-right fatigue hits the West; India, China, and Indonesia ranked among the top five markets by downloads in 2025  —  Rising numbers of ‘goal-orientated’ women are using the apps as stigma over online dating fades  —  Online dating companies are pivoting …



The Groq deal shows the challenges Nvidia faces as options to deploy its cash flood narrow; its annual free cash flow has risen from $4.2B in 2020 to $80B+ now (Dan Gallagher/Wall Street Journal)

Dan Gallagher / Wall Street Journal:
The Groq deal shows the challenges Nvidia faces as options to deploy its cash flood narrow; its annual free cash flow has risen from $4.2B in 2020 to $80B+ now  —  Blowout AI spending fills chip maker's coffers, but Groq deal shows that company needs to think creatively



A deep dive into co-packaged optics, long promised to transform data center connectivity, covering benefits, challenges, architecture, key companies, and more (Dylan Patel/SemiAnalysis)

Dylan Patel / SemiAnalysis:
A deep dive into co-packaged optics, long promised to transform data center connectivity, covering benefits, challenges, architecture, key companies, and more  —  Scale-out and Scale-up CPO, CPO TCO and Power Budgets, DSP Transceivers vs LPO vs NPO vs CPO, TSMC COUPE, MZM vs MRM vs EAM Modulator Deep Dive …



Friday, January 2, 2026

xAI's Grok says "lapses in safeguards" led it to create sexualized images of minors in response to user prompts on X; the images have been taken down (Bloomberg)

Bloomberg:
xAI's Grok says “lapses in safeguards” led it to create sexualized images of minors in response to user prompts on X; the images have been taken down  —  Elon Musk's artificial intelligence chatbot Grok created sexualized images of minors in response to user prompts in recent days …



Yann LeCun says Llama 4's "results were fudged a little bit", and that the team used different models for different benchmarks to give better results (Melissa Heikkilä/Financial Times)

Melissa Heikkilä / Financial Times:
Yann LeCun says Llama 4's “results were fudged a little bit”, and that the team used different models for different benchmarks to give better results  —  The AI pioneer on stepping down from Meta, the limits of large language models — and the launch of his new start-up



Tech analyst Dan Wang reflects on the Chinese Communist Party vs. Silicon Valley, AI and manufacturing, and how China and the US are building the future (Dan Wang)

Dan Wang:
Tech analyst Dan Wang reflects on the Chinese Communist Party vs. Silicon Valley, AI and manufacturing, and how China and the US are building the future  —  One way that Silicon Valley and the Communist Party resemble each other is that both are serious, self-serious, and indeed, completely humorless.



UK crypto buyers are required to share their account details with tax officials starting January 1 or face penalties, as the UK seeks to collect unpaid taxes (Rachel Clun/BBC)

Rachel Clun / BBC:
UK crypto buyers are required to share their account details with tax officials starting January 1 or face penalties, as the UK seeks to collect unpaid taxes  —  People buying cryptocurrency in the UK now need to share their account details or face penalties, in changes that came into effect on 1 January.



Thursday, January 1, 2026

Sources: OpenAI ramped up efforts to improve its audio AI models, in preparation for its AI-powered personal device, which is expected to be largely audio-based (Stephanie Palazzolo/The Information)

Stephanie Palazzolo / The Information:
Sources: OpenAI ramped up efforts to improve its audio AI models, in preparation for its AI-powered personal device, which is expected to be largely audio-based  —  OpenAI is taking steps to improve its audio AI models, in preparation for its eventual release of an AI-powered personal device, said a person with knowledge of the effort.



Tech startups have started to offer nicotine pouches as a free perk to employees, as some claim the products help them focus despite health hazards (Angel Au-Yeung/Wall Street Journal)

Angel Au-Yeung / Wall Street Journal:
Tech startups have started to offer nicotine pouches as a free perk to employees, as some claim the products help them focus despite health hazards  —  A nicotine replacement for smokers has started popping up in offices in the tech industry, despite health hazards



A look at the rise of AI companion apps; a researcher counts 206 such apps on the App Store and 253 on Google Play, with 220M+ total downloads as of July 2025 (Financial Times)

Financial Times:
A look at the rise of AI companion apps; a researcher counts 206 such apps on the App Store and 253 on Google Play, with 220M+ total downloads as of July 2025  —  The technology is changing the way many people meet and form relationships but some experts believe it may do more harm than good



Hundreds of megawatts of new data center capacity are being planned in Vernon, a city near LA, which is a key US-Asia cable-linking hub and is becoming crowded (Nilesh Christopher/Los Angeles Times)

Nilesh Christopher / Los Angeles Times:
Hundreds of megawatts of new data center capacity are being planned in Vernon, a city near LA, which is a key US-Asia cable-linking hub and is becoming crowded  —  - 6 min Click here to listen to this article  — Vernon, an industrial town with just a little more than 200 residents …



Sources: after five Thinking Machines staff left, investors are rattled, potentially impacting fundraising; two researchers quit via Slack during an all-hands (The Information)

The Information : Sources: after five Thinking Machines staff left, investors are rattled, potentially impacting fundraising; two researc...