I’ve combed the internet to find you today’s most fun/important/scary/fascinating stories about technology.
1 Meta’s embrace of AI is making employees miserable
Workers feel pressured to use the tech while fearing AI-driven layoffs. (NYT $)
+ They’re also unhappy about Meta tracking them to train AI. (The Verge)
+ AI’s rise has been described as “the most joyless tech revolution ever.” (WSJ $)
+ Gen-Z is particularly fed up with it. (NYT $)
+ We’ve entered the era of AI malaise. (MIT Technology Review)
2 South Korea’s military wants robots to fill gaps in troop numbers
It’s in talks with Hyundai to bring robotics to the front lines. (Bloomberg $)
+ They could include Boston Dynamics’ Spot and a new exoskeleton. (SCMP)
+ South Korea’s military has shrunk by 20% over six years. (BBC)
3 OpenAI is being sued over ChatGPT’s alleged role in guiding a mass shooter
A lawsuit claims the bot said targeting children would bring more attention. (NBC)
+ Florida’s AG has opened a criminal investigation into the case. (NPR)
+ Does AI cause or amplify delusions? (MIT Technology Review)
4 The Canvas hack was the biggest-ever student data privacy disaster
It exposes the risks of centralizing the data of millions of students. (404 Media)
+ While the platform is back online, the hack disrupted university exams. (NPR)
+ The breach is part of a trend of edtech vulnerabilities. (WP $)
5 Alibaba has joined China’s “chat to buy” shopping craze
By integrating AI assistant Qwen into its e-commerce platforms. (Reuters $)
+ Companies are betting that chat is the future of online shopping. (SCMP)
+ OpenClaw is a driving force behind the trend. (MIT Technology Review)
6 Cybercrime increasingly comes with threats of physical violence
In the US, the physical threats rose more than twofold last year. (BBC)
7 AI’s next phase plays into TSMC’s hands
Taiwan’s chip-making giant stands to gain from the supply squeeze. (WSJ $)
8 Europe is confronting life without American tech
Dependence on Silicon Valley is a growing geopolitical concern. (FT $)
9 The US, UK, and China top new rankings for AI in life sciences
Switzerland and Germany follow in the AI Competitiveness Index. (SCMP)
10 The Pentagon has released a massive trove of declassified UFO files
Including newly declassified documents, images and footage. (New Scientist)
+ The files contain reports of “orbs,” “saucers,” and lunar “flashes.” (Wired $)
+ Here’s how to spot an alien. (MIT Technology Review)
Quote of the day
“There’s a real sense where ‘safety’ isn’t a bad word anymore.”
—Nathan Calvin, general counsel at Encode, a nonprofit AI advocacy group, tells the Washington Post that Anthropic’s Mythos has forced a White House reset on AI safety.
One More Thing
NASA/JPL-CALTECH
Inside NASA’s bid to make spacecraft as small as possible
As NASA’s InSight lander descended to Mars in November 2018, two tiny spacecraft tracked its progress. InSight had touched down, they reported, and survived its treacherous journey.
The mission offered a pathway to cheaper space exploration, with small, low-cost probes launching far more often than multibillion-dollar flagship missions. But there’s a catch: miniaturization can only go so far before it collides with the hard limits of physics.