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February 1, 2026, 1:40 PM
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| Wall Street Journal: |
Documents and sources: Abu Dhabi's Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan backed a $500M investment for a 49% stake in WLF, four days before Trump's inauguration — $500 million investment for 49% of World Liberty came months before U.A.E. won access to tightly guarded American AI chips
More: CoinDesk, The Block, Bitcoin Insider, Bloomberg, Telegraph, Raw Story, Cointelegraph, The Parnas Perspective, and To the Contrary
X: @tomcolicchio, @senwarren, @superwuster, @jefftimmer, @repyassansari, @senatorandykim, @rubengallego, @houseforeign, @sarahlongwell25, @kenvogel, @radiofreetom, @danpfeiffer, @rebeccaballhaus, @kengardner11, @tvietor08, @malinowski, @ninaburleigh, @sruhle, @jim_benemann, @michaelpfreeman, @mattyglesias, @darrigomelanie, @bakari_sellers, @benjysarlin, @rebeccaballhaus, @scarylawyerguy, @brendannyhan, @akoz33, @janemayernyer, @jaynordlinger, @buncahn, @stephenwertheim, @phillipspobrien, @ronfilipkowski, @mpolymer, @mcfaul, @davidaxelrod, @luismorenolg, and @skesslr
Bluesky: @schiff.senate.gov, @naomioreskes, @carlquintanilla, @wendysiegelman, @nicholasgrossman, @socialmedialab.ca, @anno1540, and @thetnholler. Threads: @ronaldfilipkowski
Mastodon: @wendysiegelman@mastodon … and @remixtures@tldr.nettime.org
Forums: r/IRstudies, r/ABoringDystopia, r/TrueReddit, r/allinpodofficial, and r/politics
| Zijing Wu / Financial Times: |
A look at China's “genius class” system, which picks ~100K gifted teens annually for elite science-focused schooling; its alumni span ByteDance, PDD, and more — About three years ago, Stacey Tang, a manager in a pharmaceuticals company in Beijing, received a peculiar phone call.| Mark Gurman / Bloomberg: |
Sources: Apple execs question if it has the ingredients to win in AI-first era, new MacBook Pros are about to launch, Apple considers clamshell foldable iPhone — Apple's blockbuster holiday quarter was impressive — but it shouldn't give cover to avoid an AI reckoning.
More: 9to5Mac, MacRumors, AppleInsider, 9to5Mac, Forbes, AppleInsider, The Mac Observer, Digital Trends, and MacRumors
Forums: r/apple and MacRumors Forums
| Connie Loizos / TechCrunch: |
Inside Physical Intelligence, a startup co-founded by Stripe veteran Lachy Groom that is building general-purpose robotics foundation models and has raised $1B+ — From the street, the only indication I've found Physical Intelligence's headquarters in San Francisco is a pi symbol that's … | Andrew Zucker / Wall Street Journal: |
A look at iOS 26's call-screening feature, which some compare to an executive assistant filter unwanted calls, as others complain it makes people hard to reach — Thanks to a new iPhone feature, everyone now has an executive assistant in their pocket to filter unwanted calls
More: Business Insider and Pixel Envy
| Matthew Gault / 404 Media: |
A researcher says an exposed Moltbook database could have let anyone take control of the site's AI agents and post anything; the database has since been secured — Moltbook is a “social media” site for AI agents that's captured the public's imagination over the last few days.
More: Financial Times, moltbook, Ars Technica, The Decoder, Implicator.ai, Cyber Security News, New York Post, Livemint, Simon Willison's Newsletter, and WinBuzzer
X: @theonejvo, @theonejvo, @lea_kelbsch, @mattprd, @theonejvo, @theonejvo, @theonejvo, @theonejvo, and @karpathy
LinkedIn: Paul McCarty, Rico Komenda, Andrea Tessera, Jim Amos, and Chris H.
Bluesky: @andytseng, @jbakcoleman, @markriedl, @404media.co, @mjgault, and @jasonkoebler
Mastodon: @jerry@infosec.exchange, @gedankenstuecke@scholar …, @timnitGebru@dair …, and @remixtures@tldr.nettime.org
Forums: r/OpenAI, r/singularity, and r/LocalLLaMA
| Reuters: |
India to exempt foreign companies from being taxed when providing equipment to their contract manufacturers in the country, a rule change Apple lobbied for — India's government on Sunday handed a major win to Apple (AAPL.O) by allowing foreign companies to provide machines …
More: Business Today and Reuters
| Jagmeet Singh / TechCrunch: |
India proposes zero taxes for foreign cloud providers through 2047 on services sold outside the country as long as they run workloads from Indian data centers — As the global race to build AI infrastructure accelerates, India has offered foreign cloud providers zero taxes through 2047 …
More: Moneycontrol, Inc42, The Indian Express, Fortune India, The Economic Times, NDTV, Bloomberg, and Livemint
| Matteo Wong / The Atlantic: |
Anthropic positions itself as the AI sector's superego, but it's caught between the pressures to be safe, fast, and rigorous while being commercially successful — These are not the words you want to hear when it comes to human extinction, but I was hearing them: “Things are moving uncomfortably fast.”| Jin Yu Young / New York Times: |
Indonesia lifts its ban on Grok after receiving a letter from X “outlining concrete steps” to prevent misuse; Indonesia was the first country to ban Grok — Indonesia joined Malaysia and the Philippines in reversing its restrictions, weeks after it blocked the chatbot …
More: Engadget, TechCrunch, Livemint, Reuters, Nairametrics, and Bloomberg
| Trishla Ostwal / Adweek: |
OpenAI says it is asking select advertisers to commit $200K+ as it rolls out beta ads on ChatGPT; two sources say their companies were pitched lower amounts — OpenAI is asking select advertisers to commit at least $200,000 as it rolls out beta ads on ChatGPT, the company confirmed to ADWEEK.
More: BleepingComputer and TestingCatalog
| Nicole Fan / Rest of World: |
Chinese government funding is backing traditional Chinese medicine providers to adopt AI for drug discovery, clinical diagnostics, acupuncture robots, and more — With backing from the Chinese government, TCM practitioners are integrating AI tools to reach new consumers at home and abroad.| Reuters: |
Filing: SpaceX is seeking US FCC approval to launch 1M satellites; SpaceX claims that they will orbit the Earth and harness the sun to power AI data centers — Elon Musk's SpaceX wants to launch a constellation of 1 million satellites that will orbit Earth and harness the sun to power AI data centers …
More: The Verge, Tom's Hardware, GeekWire, BBC, TechCrunch, SpaceNews, CleanTechnica, Nairametrics, The Information, Bloomberg, Engadget, DatacenterDynamics, Cosmic Log, Cord Cutters News, PCMag, BGR, and Reuters
Forums: r/technology, r/wallstreetbets, and r/SpaceXLounge
| Alan Boyle / GeekWire: |
Amazon asks the FCC for a 2-year extension until July 30, 2028, to deploy half of the 3,232 satellites for its Leo internet system, citing a rocket shortage — Amazon says it's been harder than expected to secure rides for its Amazon Leo broadband internet satellites, and now it's asking … Sponsor Posts
Subquadratic:
SubQ Snap 1.1: the first long-context decision model for real enterprise work — Tied for #1 on the AA Decision Index, Snap is a multimodal model with a 384k-token context window for fast reasoning and agentic decisions.
SubQ Snap 1.1: the first long-context decision model for real enterprise work — Tied for #1 on the AA Decision Index, Snap is a multimodal model with a 384k-token context window for fast reasoning and agentic decisions.
Zoho:
Zoho Writer's latest automation updates: smarter formulas, dynamic content, and less manual work — Create personalized documents with smarter formulas, dynamic content, and payment links, and update templates without rebuilding …
Zoho Writer's latest automation updates: smarter formulas, dynamic content, and less manual work — Create personalized documents with smarter formulas, dynamic content, and payment links, and update templates without rebuilding …
IDrive:
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data — Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Salesforce data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data — Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Salesforce data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.
WebBrain:
WebBrain: an open-source AI agent for your browser — Read pages, fill forms and automate tasks in Chrome or Firefox. Use local models or your preferred AI provider. Get started free.
WebBrain: an open-source AI agent for your browser — Read pages, fill forms and automate tasks in Chrome or Firefox. Use local models or your preferred AI provider. Get started free.Featured Podcasts
Big Technology Podcast:
Will the Democrats' Big Win Stop the AI Buildout? — With Teddy Schleifer
The Big Technology Podcast takes you behind the scenes in the tech world featuring interviews with plugged-in insiders and outside agitators.
Subscribe to Big Technology Podcast.
Machine Gods:
Crypto's Biggest Heist Ever + The Spy Who Loved Nvidia + Hacktober's Unsolved Mysteries
The official podcast of the singularity, from Casey Newton and Kevin Roose. Twice-weekly news, analysis, and interviews with the people who are building the future.
Subscribe to Machine Gods.
Channels with Peter Kafka:
Barry Diller on Big Bets, AI, and Knowing When to Walk Away
Media and tech aren't just intersecting - they're fully intertwined. To understand how those worlds work, Peter Kafka talks to industry leaders, upstarts and observers.
Subscribe to Channels with Peter Kafka.
Invest Like the Best:
Martin Casado on Frontier Model Economics, AI's Slowdown, and the Cursor Deal
The leading destination to learn about business and investing. We do this by showcasing exceptional talent and ideas.
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Sources:
A quiet investor's $10 billion bet on AI, chips, and defense
Candid conversations with the leaders shaping what's next in AI and the broader tech industry. Hosted by Alex Heath, who has covered Silicon Valley for more than a decade.
Subscribe to Sources.
Cheeky Pint:
The company building America's uranium supply from scratch
Stripe cofounder John Collison interviews founders, builders, and leaders over a pint.
Subscribe to Cheeky Pint.
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