Tootfinder

Apple's stock dropped 5% on Thursday, its worst day since April, following FTC scrutiny of Apple News and reports about delays with Siri (Jennifer Elias/CNBC)
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/02/12/apple-stock-worst-day-ftc-siri.html

Apple has worst day since April as company faces FTC scrutiny, Siri delay reports
The iPhone-maker faces reported delays in its AI assistant and pressure from FTC chair Andrew Ferguson to look into possible political bias.

Say what you will but AI has the douchbag developer persona down pat.
https://crabby-rathbun.github.io/mjrathbun-website/blog/posts/2026-02-11-gatekeeping-in-open-source-the-scott-shambaugh-story.html…

Quick note: About how when tech bros apply the morale from SciFi stories in a way that we find wrong, it's not cause they didn't read the book. It's cause they identify with other characters than you are.
https://tante.cc/2026/02/12/but-they-did-read-it/

But they did read it
It’s fun to see tech bros naming thins after SciFi books, films or shows: “The Metaverse” was not a utopia but a reaction to a world where the political, economic and ecological systems have collapsed just to give one example among oh so many others. And we often keep making jokes about the tech bros […]

Goldman Sachs General Counsel Kathryn Ruemmler Resigns Over Epstein Ties - The New York Times
https://archive.ph/2026.02.13-013219/https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/12/business/goldman-lawyer-kathryn-ruemmler-resigns.html

Russian diplomat dies by apparent suicide in Cyprus a day after oligarch Vladislav Baumgertner disappears: https://benborges.xyz/2026/01/13/russian-diplomat-dies-by-apparent.html

Smart Glasses: Kreuzfahrtunternehmen schränkt Nutzung an Bord ein
Die Kreuzfahrtgesellschaft Royal Caribbean führt auf seiner US-Website smarte Brillen nun als Gegenstände auf, die nicht frei an Bord benutzt werden können.

Have you increased shareholder value today?

QuitGPT
https://www.technologyreview.com/2026/02/10/1132577/a-quitgpt-campaign-is-urging-people-to-cancel-chatgpt-subscriptions/amp/

Those Nest cameras keep videos for three hours on their backend servers even if you're not a subscriber.
How Google played a key role in recovering the video from Nancy Guthrie’s cameras
https://www.cnn.com/2026/02/10/tech/google-video-nancy-guthrie

How Google played a key role in recovering the video from Nancy Guthrie’s cameras
A major breakthrough in the Nancy Guthrie case largely came down to Google’s technical expertise, a person familiar with the investigation told CNN.

RE: https://social.openrightsgroup.org/@openrightsgroup/116052142635482882
Nice. Addy.io kannte ich noch nicht, aber das scheint sehr sympathisch. Mit dem Haken, dass es nur einen Developer gibt.

This particular athlete is more impressive than anything I saw at the Super Bowl or Olympics so far: #dogsofmastodon

On Feb. 11, NASA’s Neil Gehrels #Swift Observatory temporarily suspended most science operations in an effort to reduce atmospheric drag and slow the spacecraft’s orbital decay: https://science.nasa.gov/blogs/swift/2026/02/11/nasas-swift-mission-transitions-ops-to-prep-for-orbit-boost/ - halting these activities will enable controllers to keep the spacecraft in an orientation that minimizes drag effects, extending its time in orbit in anticipation of a reboost mission.

RE: https://hachyderm.io/@boztek/115885366031881432
It’s so good to sometimes read about people with a true moral compass that stand for what the believe in. It’s uplifting to see people do the right thing even when it’s difficult.

But no worries, the midterms will be great.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/12/us/politics/trump-kurt-olsen-election-denialism.html?unlocked_article_code=1.LlA.2GEc.5b33ugqAzM6…

Trump’s Director of Election Security Is an Election Denier
Even in a government full of conspiracists, Kurt Olsen stands out. He made a key referral in the Fulton County, Ga., election case.

More on why trusting AI to decide literally anything is a horrible idea.
https://www.randalolson.com/2026/02/07/the-are-you-sure-problem-why-your-ai-keeps-changing-its-mind/

Good grief.
https://cville.online/@Lyle/116057774606119492

The closing of El Paso airspace was a balloon from a children’s party that escaped.
Say no more, time to invade Cuba!

A Climate Success Story🎉 without a Happy End🙁?
This chart📉 shows something we would like to see more often: emissions are going down rapidly. Those are emissions of N₂O from the production of a chemical🧪—Caprolactam—used to make certain plastics&synthetic fibers.
N₂O is 273x as damaging as CO₂. However, N₂O emissions from chemical plants🏭 can be avoided with cheap🪙 technology. The curve is declining rapidly because Envalior(BE) and Fibrant(NL) have implemented N₂O abatement i…

From where I was sitting Wednesday, it looked like
the attorney general pretty much dared the House Democrats to impeach her.
Here’s how the New York Daily News put it, summarizing the AP’s coverage of her testimony before the House Judiciary Committee:
"Attorney General Pam Bondi launched into a passionate defense of President Donald Trump Wednesday
as she tried to turn the page from relentless criticism of the Justice Department’s handling of the Jeffrey Epste…

Pam Bondi is daring the Democrats to impeach her
The reasons for her contempt are secondary to the contempt itself.

Neben #startrek Starfleet Academy ging's in meinem Science-Fiction-Januar auch um diverse Weltraumsagas (von 1968 bis 2025) und um Ken Lius Thriller in einer AI-gesättigten Welt, All That We See or Seem.
https://

Science Fiction und Fantasy im Januar 2026
Ich fange mit dem Bildschirm an, das ist einfacher, weil in den letzten Wochen recht reduziert - zum einen deswegen, weil meine Kinder mehr Lust auf Gesellschaftsspiele als auf das gemeinsame Filmgucken hatten, zum anderen, weil ich meine freie Zeit neben Arbeit und Wahlkampf dann lieber in Lego ges

»Matrix messaging gaining ground in government IT:
One-to-one and group messaging, encrypted VoIP calls, video conferencing – the open protocol handles them all«
As I see, @… is used peatically and therefore more popular. When will this become more popular in companies and in general? Any criticism of any state should not prevent this.
💬

Matrix is quietly becoming the chat layer for governments chasing digital sovereignty
FOSDEM 2026: One-to-one and group messaging, encrypted VoIP calls, video conferencing – the open protocol handles them all

#ThursdayFiveList this week is #SlipSlidingAway.
For Love Not Lisa - Slip Slide Melting
https://youtu.be/ZGKTDY_CqMU…

The beautiful white village of Grazalema (Andalusia, Spain) had already been evacuated because of terrible amounts of rain. January had 1295 mm, an all-time high monthly total. But after today's 78 mm (and counting), February now already stands at 1373 mm, that's more than double in any February before!

Anna's Archive has quietly begun releasing millions of music files from its scrape of Spotify, despite an injunction against distribution of copyrighted works (Ernesto Van der Sar/TorrentFreak)
https://torrentfreak.com/annas-archive

Zu viel für nicht biologische Quelle: Auf Mars gefundene Stoffe weisen auf Leben
Vor einem Jahr hat die NASA erklärt, dass ihr Mars-Rover Curiosity lange organische Verbindungen entdeckt hat. Deren Menge weist auf eine biologische Herkunft.

We need to stop calling Ukrainians resilient: https://benborges.xyz/2026/02/11/we-need-to-stop-calling.html

Amazon's Ring cancels Flock partnership amid Super Bowl ad backlash
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/02/12/amazons-ring-cancels-flock-partnership-amid-super-bowl-ad-backlash.html

RE: https://infosec.exchange/@kcarruthers/116059008870036290
Almost afraid to share this given the climate but it’s important. Big emphasis is on *RARE* (as in 200 deaths in millions of lives saved). This is not some reason to not get vaccinated.

The creepiest avatar one can have the days is that of an AI-generated, conventionally attractive women in her 20ies.
Nothing good or even acceptable ever came from that.

Fun Fact: 35 year-olds do not actually exist

Putting on my business casual attire

Seen in a nearby chat window: “another reason to de-Google is that everything runs more slowly with their needing to push AI into it. In this case, google meet...”

Ein monatelanger Streik der Kieler Werftarbeiter*innen und der IG Metall hat 1956/57 die Lohnfortzahlung im Krankheitsfall für alle erkämpft.
Aktueller denn je, denn genau diese - scheinbaren - Selbstverständlichkeiten werden gerade von der CDU angegriffen. Lange Zeit unvorstellbar.
Der Film dazu bei @… , via @…

The launch of #Crew12 is planned for 10:15 UTC today: webcasts from NASA and ESA at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zCM-Kwq91cc and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_5RWX-GsQo from 8:15 UTC plus the ESA Launch Kit at https://esamultimedia.esa.int/docs/HRE/EPSILON_LaunchKit_EN.pdf and updates on https://www.nasa.gov/blogs/commercialcrew/ and the latest timelines at https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Human_and_Robotic_Exploration/Watch_live_Crew-12_launch_and_docking_updated and https://www.spacex.com/launches/crew12 and https://www.nasa.gov/news-release/nasa-sets-coverage-for-agencys-spacex-crew-12-launch-docking/

This was a lot of work, but this passes in SwiftTerm and we finally sorted out all those pesky emoji/asian rendering bugs.

Jay and Kristen Ruskey
—who pioneered California’s coffee-growing movement from their farm in the hills of western Goleta
—both died suddenly on Sunday due to what’s being described as a ‘tragic accident.’
On Tuesday, the San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Department confirmed that the Ruskeys died in Cambria.
There does not appear to be any crime or foul play involved, according to the department,
and autopsies will be performed this week. 
The co-founders …

Dutch payments company Adyen reports H2 2025 net revenue up 17% YoY to €1.27B and forecasts 2026 net revenue growth at 20%-22%, vs 22.8% est.; ADYEN falls 15% (Kai Nicol-Schwarz/CNBC)
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/02/12/adyen-stock-price-earnings.html

Adyen plummets as much as 20% after earnings report
The stock could have its biggest single-day drop since a 39% fall in August 2023.

Mit Social Media gut verdienen? Cool. Ohne Steuern? Eher schwierig. 😬
Zum Artikel: https://heise.de/-11172274?wt_mc=sm.red.ho.mastodon.mastodon.md_beitraege.md_beitraege&utm_source=mastodon

Macron pushes small-group European talks with Putin, rejects U.S. lead: https://benborges.xyz/2026/02/11/macron-pushes-smallgroup-european-talks.html

Court rebukes Trump administration for denying immigration detainees access to lawyers - POLITICO
https://www.politico.com/news/2026/02/12/court-trump-administration-denying-immigration-lawyers-00779762

@… Hey Lenz,
Is there a repository somewhere where I can report issues with Hetzner’s OpenAPI spec?
This is the issue, by the way, in case there isn’t and you can forward it to the correct folks:
***
As far as I can tell, the generateHetznerCloudClient(opts: PlatformaticClientOptions): Promise<HetznerCloud> function’s opts parameter is…

hetzner-cloud-openapi-client
Hetzner Cloud OpenAPI Client generated from the official specification using Massimo.

RE: https://infosec.exchange/@masek/116058459479865784
Totally normal. Small mistakes happen and all that.
If you looked at Microsoft's recent numbers it was very obvious how they cooked their books. That's just industry practice.

RE: https://meow.social/@toonie/116049792565190042
How to Voxel Model Your Cat

“…concentration camp regimes in their early stages often make use of large open infrastructure to convert into detention spaces. Dachau was converted from a shuttered factory into a concentration camp in 1933.”
https://degenerateart.beehiiv.com/p/building-the-camps

Seems like an important story: #climate

Analysis: China’s CO2 emissions have now been ‘flat or falling’ for 21 months - Carbon Brief
China’s carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions fell by 1% in the final quarter of 2025, likely securing a decline of 0.3% for the full year as a whole.

Sources: the Trump administration has shelved tech security measures against China, including data center equipment curbs, ahead of a Trump-Xi meeting in April (Alexandra Alper/Reuters)
https://www.reuters.com/business/media-tel

Gesundheitsministerin: „Elektronische Patientenakte bleibt zentrales Element“
Die „ePA für alle" gilt der Gesundheitsministerin zufolge als Herzstück der Digitalisierung. Deren Finanzierung und die TI-Stabilität bleiben eine Baustelle.

Ukraine says it crushed a Russian army near Pokrovsk, exhausting Russia’s offensive potential: https://benborges.xyz/2026/02/11/ukraine-says-it-crushed-a.html

“Rule 50.2 of the Olympic Charter states: ‘No kind of demonstration or political, religious or racial propaganda is permitted in any Olympic sites, venues or other areas.’”
https://www.bbc.com/sport/articles/c309pj8d8qqo

When "we cannot have serious conversations about AI" is just a shorthand for "I want critics to overlook that none of the criticism has been answered and I need them to accept that AI is without alternative and forever" the problem lies not with the critics.

Microsoft’s AI-Powered Copyright Bots Fucked Up And Got An Innocent Game Delisted From Steam | Techdirt
https://www.techdirt.com/2026/02/12/microsofts-ai-powered-copyright-bots-fucked-up-and-got-an-innocent-game-delisted-from-steam/

Would you like a spoonful of cocoa powder (unsweetened)?

Geometry study (shadows are weird).
Back story: In some parts of Vancouver, if you’re putting up a new building (typically condo/retail) you can get tax breaks or more square feet or some such bonus if you preserve the original facade. This place was torn down quite a while ago but the facade, propped up by the metal framework, remains. A policy misfire in this case because it was a really crappy brick frontage and would not be missed.

EssilorLuxottica says it sold over 7M Meta AI glasses in 2025, up from the 2M that the company sold in 2023 and 2024 combined (Samantha Subin/CNBC)
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/02/11/ray-ban-maker-essilorluxottica-triples-sales-of-meta-ai-gla…

Ray-Ban maker EssilorLuxottica says it more than tripled Meta AI glasses sales in 2025
The France-based eyewear brand has been working on smart glasses with the social media company since 2019.

Anna’s Archive veröffentlicht Millionen Spotify-Tracks
Die Schattenbibliothek Anna's Archive veröffentlicht Millionen Spotify-Tracks – trotz einer einstweiligen Verfügung. Weitere Dateien könnten folgen.
https:/…

Ukrainian commander ‘Perun’ confirms advances near Hulyaipole on the Zaporizhzhia front: https://benborges.xyz/2026/02/11/ukrainian-commander-perun-confirms-advances.html

RE: https://esq.social/@SuffolkLITLab/116054463472872585
For Big Tech, “deleted” means setting deleted = false to deleted = true.

I just realized that the Anthropic philosopher going through the headlines with her ... spicy takes about "AI" was married to effective altruist, longtermist and overall weird motherfucker William McAskill.
This makes a lot of sense.

Meridian, which uses AI to make financial modeling and spreadsheets more "predictable and auditable", exits stealth and raised a $17M seed at a $100M valuation (Russell Brandom/TechCrunch)
https://techcrunch.com/2026/02/11/meridian…

Meridian raises $17 million to remake the agentic spreadsheet | TechCrunch
A new company called Meridian.AI has emerged from stealth with an IDE-based approach to agentic financial modeling.

"Representative Nicole Malliotakis’s lawyers have asked the Supreme Court to weigh in on a lower-court ruling that found that her district lines were unconstitutional.Credit"
Republicans Ask Supreme Court to Intervene in N.Y. Redistricting Case - The New York Times
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/12/nyregion/redistricting-supreme-court-ny.html

I think the kitty likes the LEGO creation!

Zelensky won't announce elections on war anniversary amid talks of US-driven timeline, source says: https://benborges.xyz/2026/02/11/zelensky-wont-announce-elections-on.html

I would have expected so much more from the Olympics… they always seemed like such a moral bunch. @… https://mastodon.ie/@EugeneMcParland/116056944…

Social media addiction trial: Adam Mosseri says social media is not "clinically addictive" and that Meta was careful to test features used by young people (New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/11/technology/adam-mosseri-instagram…

Coal power in WA Legislature’s crosshairs after talk of Centralia plant’s revival • Washington State Standard
https://washingtonstatestandard.com/2026/02/12/coal-power-in-wa-legislatures-crosshairs-after-talk-of-centralia-plants-revival/

RE: https://tldr.nettime.org/@tante/116052331971306130
The EA pipeline that already provided ethically flexible people to crypto is totally intact and now supplies "AI" with a morally adaptive workforce.

Russia effectively dismisses US-Ukraine peace framework, says it contradicts 'real' American plan: https://benborges.xyz/2026/02/11/russia-effectively-dismisses-usukraine-peace.html

What Fabio said…
(If you see the antisemitic Zionist meme accounts Fabio is talking about – yes, they’re about as antisemitic as you can get as they conflate being Jewish with supporting Israel and the genocide of the Palestinian people – please report them for antisemitism. Good rule of thumb to remember: Zionism is – and always has been – antisemitic. Let’s make sure we implement a zero tolerance policy on the fediverse for genocide deniers and antisemitic Zionists.)

Fabio Manganiello (@fabio@manganiello.eu)
@hydra0179 https://factually.co/fact-checks/military/israel-thermal-weapons-gaza-evaporated-palestinians-mk-84-217fc9You abhorrent propaganda asset polluting the Web with dumb memes, don’t you feel...

The MPA urges ByteDance to curb its AI video model Seedance 2.0, saying the model engages in unauthorized use of US copyrighted material "on a massive scale" (Gene Maddaus/Variety)
https://variety.com/2026/film/news/motion-…

Motion Picture Association Denounces 'Massive' AI Infringement
The MPA denounced Bytedance's new AI video model, saying it had led to 'massive' copyright infringement like an AI Tom Cruise-Brad Pitt video.

Accidentally clicked the update thingy on the work laptop so now I have the MacOS version everyone hates.
In dark mode it's not as bad but it's weird how certain OS ui features feel very sluggish.
Didn't like MacOS before, this update did not improve that impression.

'Russian army is not preparing to stop' — 3 toddlers among 9 killed in attacks on Ukraine over past day: https://benborges.xyz/2026/02/11/russian-army-is-not-preparing.html

Vladimir Putin is trapped in a war he cannot win but dare not end - Atlantic Council
https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/vladimir-putin-is-trapped-in-a-war-he-cannot-win-but-dare-not-end/

Made a little logo for JSDB (JavaScript Database)
Better (six years) late than never? :)
#JavaScriptDatabase

Applied Materials reports Q1 revenue down 2% YoY to $7.01B, vs. $6.86B est., and forecasts Q2 revenue above estimates; AMAT jumps 12% after hours (Dina Bass/Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-02-12/appli…

Ukraine's ballooning debt, explained: https://benborges.xyz/2026/02/11/ukraines-ballooning-debt-explained.html

Appeals court requires Trump administration to resume funding for Gateway tunnel project
https://thehill.com/policy/transportation/5736384-appeals-court-gateway-tunnel-trump/

A profile of Applied Intuition, which makes self-driving simulation software and reported $800M in 2025 revenue and 80% gross margins, as it expands beyond cars (Iain Martin/Forbes)
https://www.forbes.com/sites/iainmartin/20…

These Billionaires Plan To Bring Self-Driving Tech To Everything That Moves
Applied Intuition’s cofounders are building software that can drive everything from planes to tanks to automobiles. But to expand beyond its $800 million business selling tech for cars, they will have to take on Tesla, Google, Nvidia and a host of other startups jostling for pole position in the autonomy race.

Another Ukrainian athlete says IOC barred helmet honoring 'Ukrainian bravery' at Olympics: https://benborges.xyz/2026/02/11/another-ukrainian-athlete-says-ioc.html

Scientific studies calculate climate change as health danger, while Trump calls it a 'scam' | The Independent
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/donald-trump-environmental-protection-agency-united-states-study-studies-b2919546.html

Amazon's Ring cancels its partnership with Flock that would have let law enforcement agencies request footage from Ring doorbell users, following backlash (Jennifer Pattison Tuohy/The Verge)
https://www.theverge.com/news/878447/ring-flock-partnership-canceled

Ring cancels its partnership with Flock Safety after surveillance backlash
Amazon-owned Ring has canceled its proposed integration with Flock

Russia aims to seize all of Donetsk region by April, with four scenarios for what comes next: https://benborges.xyz/2026/01/13/russia-aims-to-seize-all.html

The suspect believed to be behind the mass shooting in Tumbler Ridge, Canada made a Roblox game simulating a mall shooting; Roblox says it removed the account (404 Media)
https://www.404media.co/tumbler-ridge-shooter-created-mall-shooting-simulator-in…

Tumbler Ridge Shooter Created Mall Shooting Simulator in Roblox
Roblox said it’s “committed to fully supporting law enforcement in their investigation.”

Crypto transaction volume linked to suspected human trafficking, largely based in Southeast Asia, hit hundreds of millions of dollars in 2025, up 85% YoY (Chainalysis)
https://www.chainalysis.com/blog/crypto-human-trafficking-2026/

Crypto and Human Trafficking: 2026 Crypto Crime Report
Cryptocurrency flows to suspected human trafficking services surged 85% between 2024 and 2025, reaching a scale of hundreds of millions.

Waymo co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana expects the company to hit 1M paid weekly robotaxi rides in the US by the end of 2026, up from ~400K per week in six cities now (Edward Ludlow/Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/202…

xAI all-hands meeting: Elon Musk tells staff that xAI needs a factory on the moon to build AI satellites and a massive catapult to launch them into space (New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/10/technology/elon-musk-lunar-factory.html

Anthropic donates $20M to Public First, a super PAC pushing for AI guardrails and transparency in opposition to OpenAI-backed PACs, ahead of the US midterms (Theodore Schleifer/New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/12/technology/anthropic-super-pac-ope…

Meta's auditor Ernst & Young raised a red flag over the financial engineering Meta used to keep its $27B Hyperion data center project off its balance sheet (Jonathan Weil/Wall Street Journal)
https://www.

Internal messages: Amazon pushes in-house AI coding assistant Kiro for production code, prompting criticism and causing ~1,500 staff to push for Claude Code (Eugene Kim/Business Insider)
https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-engineer…

Amazon limits on Claude Code frustrate employees, including some who have to sell it to cloud customers
The tech giant's internal policy promotes an in-house tool called Kiro over Anthropic's Claude Code. Some Amazon engineers are unhappy about this.

Filing: San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan, set to run for California governor to succeed Newsom, gets donations from Sergey Brin, Roblox CEO David Baszucki, and others (Bloomberg)

Samsung says it sent the first commercial HBM4 shipments to customers, as it seeks to supply Nvidia and compete with memory rivals like SK Hynix and Micron (Yoolim Lee/Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/20

Simile, which uses AI to help companies predict human behavior, including guessing items customers might buy, raised $100M led by Index and emerges from stealth (Edward Ludlow/Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/20

Sources: Apple's Siri upgrade has run into snags recently, possibly pushing some personalized Siri and other features from iOS 26.4 to iOS 26.5, due in May (Mark Gurman/Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/20

KPMG citing PitchBook data: UK fintech investment totaled almost $11B in 2025 across 418 deals, down from ~$13.4B in 2024 across 527 deals; Revolut raised $4B (Aisha S Gani/Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/20…

Roku reports Q4 revenue up 16% YoY to $1.39B, vs. $1.35B est., and an $80.5M net income, vs. a $35.5M loss in Q4 2024; ROKU jumps 9% after hours (Lucas Manfredi/The Wrap)
https://www.thewrap.com/industry-news/business/roku-earnings-q4-2025/

Roku Shares Pop 13% After Swinging to $80.5 Million Profit in Q4
The streaming hardware maker forecasts 16% revenue growth in 2026

Google's TIG says Gemini has been inundated by "commercially motivated" actors who are trying to clone it, including one campaign that prompted it 100K times (Kevin Collier/NBC News)
https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/security/google…

Google: Gemini hit with 100,000+ prompts in cloning attempt
Google says its flagship AI chatbot, Gemini, has been inundated by “commercially motivated” actors who are trying to clone the chatbot.

Alibaba says Qwen generated 120M in orders from Chinese users over the past six days, ahead of the Lunar New Year; Alibaba is giving a ~$3.60 shopping voucher (Juro Osawa/The Information)
https://www.theinformation.com/briefings/al…

Alibaba’s Holiday AI Shopping Campaign Generates 120 Million Orders
Alibaba Group said its Qwen chatbot app’s AI e-commerce service has generated more than 120 million orders from Chinese consumers over the past six days, since the company last week started giving away free shopping vouchers to the app’s users. Alibaba, ByteDance and Tencent Holdings have all started offering giveaways and other incentives to promote their AI chatbot apps ahead of the Lunar

xAI all-hands: Nikita Bier says X hit $1B in ARR from selling $3 to $40 per month subscriptions, but offered no details on ad revenue or other xAI financials (Theo Wayt/The Information)
https://www.theinformation.com/briefings/x-subscriptio…

X Subscriptions Hit $1 Billion in Annualized Revenue, Exec Says
X recently hit $1 billion in annualized recurring revenue from selling subscriptions, head of product Nikita Bier said in an xAI all-hands meeting on Tuesday. The subscriptions X sells include Basic, Premium and Premium+ plans that range from $3 to $40 per month. The social media site, formerly known as Twitter, has ramped up efforts to sell subscriptions after Elon Musk’s acquisition of the

AI tools like Opus 4.6 actually do make engineers 10x more productive and are addictive, but the "AI Vampire" effect is causing widespread developer burnout (Steve Yegge)
https://steve-yegge.medium.com/the-ai-vampire-eda6e4f07163

The AI Vampire
This was an unusually hard post to write, because it flies in the face of everything else going on.

Q&A with Stratechery's Ben Thompson on aggregation theory, AI, TikTok, ByteDance, AI agentic commerce, SaaS stocks, running Stratechery, TSMC, Stripe, and more (John Collison/Cheeky Pint)
https://cheekypint.substack.com/p/ben-thompson-from-stratechery-on…

Ben Thompson from Stratechery on AI ads, the end of SaaS, and the future of media
Ben Thompson, the internet’s premier tech analyst, joins John for a wide-ranging conversation on the mechanics of the internet economy.