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February 20, 2026, 10:05 AM
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| Rafe Rosner-Uddin / Financial Times: |
Sources: Amazon's AI tools have caused at least two AWS outages, including a 13-hour disruption in December after Kiro AI deleted and recreated an environment — Tech giant blames ‘user error, not AI error’ for incident in December involving its Kiro tool — Amazon's cloud unit has suffered …
More: Reuters, MarketWatch, Tom's Guide, Beyond Search, The Decoder, TechRadar, Sherwood News, Proactive, Economic news, Capacity, Tech in Asia, and The Information
X: @edzitron. LinkedIn: Chris Redmond. Bluesky: @somewhattolerable.com, @joshuafoust.com, @robbowley.net, @joeydantoni.com, @davidgerard.co.uk, @techviews, @impemboganecue, @jennifercobbe, @crusaderproject, @theecatservant, @edzitron.com, @doubleohkevin, @derek.space, @runakog, @gregpak.net, @measuredandslow, @parismarx.com, @segatape, @brunodias, @maxvonthun, @taryndevere, @malwarejake, and @fack. Mastodon: @acdha@code4lib.social
Forums: r/programming, r/webdev, and Slashdot
| Robert Burnson / Bloomberg: |
A US grand jury indicted two former Google engineers and one of their husbands for allegedly stealing trade secrets relating to the Tensor chip for Pixel phones — Two former Google engineers and one of their husbands were indicted for allegedly stealing trade secrets relating to the company's Tensor processor for Pixel phones.| Alex Heath / Sources: |
Scott Myers, the SVP of Snap's AR glasses unit Specs, leaves after six years; sources say Myers left after a “blow-up” with Evan Spiegel over Snap's strategy — My chat with CEO Dylan Field ahead of today's earnings call. Also: Snap loses its head of Specs right before the big launch … | Abner Li / 9to5Google: |
Google rolls out Gemini 3.1 Pro, which it says is “a step forward in core reasoning”, for all users in the Gemini app; the .1 increment is a first for Google — In November, Google introduced Gemini 3 Pro in preview, with Gemini 3 Flash following a month later.
More: The Keyword, VentureBeat, Google DeepMind, Implicator.ai, Ghacks, Ars Technica, TechRadar, The Register, Android Headlines, Phandroid, Tom's Guide, Notebookcheck, Business Standard, Moneycontrol, The Rundown AI, Digit, Ukrainian National News, Livemint, Verdict, ANI News, TechCrunch, The Deep View, CNET, SiliconANGLE, Rohan's Bytes, WinBuzzer, InfoWorld, Android Authority, Chrome Unboxed, The GitHub Blog, GSMArena.com, Simon Willison's Weblog, MarkTechPost, Digital Trends, The New Stack, eWeek, iClarified, Techgenyz, Wion, Mashable, ZDNET, The Decoder, iPhone in Canada, Neowin, The Economic Times, Thurrott, Crypto Briefing, Constellation Research, and TestingCatalog
X: @artificialanlys, @brendanfoody, @jeffdean, @sundarpichai, @yuchenj_uw, @simonw, @kat_kampf, @triswarkentin, @misilo_jakub, @jmsvid, @srkdan, @priyaaryav, @arcprize, @kimmonismus, @shresbm, @_mohansolo, @advaitonline, @noamshazeer, @demishassabis, @oriolvinyalsml, @google, @google, @scaling01, @officiallogank, @koraykv, @scaling01, @ai_for_success, @mweinbach, @harrisonfjobe, @geminiapp, @officiallogank, @geminiapp, @googledeepmind, @_philschmid, @joshwoodward, and @scaling01
LinkedIn: Carlos Udina Martin, Maor Shlomo, and Philipp Schmid
Forums: r/Bard, r/GeminiAI, r/singularity, and Slashdot
| Maxwell Zeff / Wired: |
Perplexity's retreat from ads signals a strategic shift as it recognizes its product is not for a mass audience and expects growth to come from enterprise sales — The AI search startup once predicted advertising would be a massive business. Now it's betting on a smaller, more valuable audience.| Financial Times: |
Sources: Nvidia is close to finalizing an up to $30B investment into OpenAI, replacing 2025's long-term $100B commitment; the deal could be closed this weekend — Chipmaker swaps last year's complex framework with AI start-up in favour of equity cheque — Nvidia is close to finalising …
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| Nikkei Asia: |
Sources: SoftBank plans to form a consortium to build a $33B power plant in Ohio, set to produce 9.2 GW for AI data centers, as part of the US-Japan trade deal — TOKYO — SoftBank Group will form a consortium to carry out a $33 billion gas-fired power plant project in the U.S. …
More: Bloomberg and TechCrunch
| Sarah Perez / TechCrunch: |
Google rejected 1.75M policy-violating Android apps and blocked 80K+ developer accounts from Google Play in 2025, down from 2.36M apps and 158K accounts in 2024 — Fewer bad actors are targeting Google Play with malicious apps, the company says, a shift that the tech giant credits … | James O'Donnell / MIT Technology Review: |
Microsoft's AI safety team proposed technical standards for detecting AI-generated content, but its CSO declined to commit to using them across its platforms — AI-enabled deception now permeates our online lives. There are the high-profile cases you may easily spot …
More: The Decoder, NextBigWhat, Microsoft Research, Microsoft, and Microsoft Research
| Jay Peters / The Verge: |
Meta says it is “explicitly separating” Quest VR from its Worlds platform, making Worlds “almost exclusively mobile” to better compete with Roblox and Fortnite — Horizon Worlds is now going to be a platform that's ‘almost exclusively mobile.’
More: Meta, PocketGamer.biz, UploadVR, GamesBeat, Business Insider, Engadget, Digital Trends, and Kotaku
| Chris Metinko / Axios: |
Pepper, which provides a digital storefront for independent food distributors, raised a $50M Series C led by Lead Edge, bringing its total funding to $100M — Pepper, a business platform developer for independent food distributors, raised a $50 million Series C led by Lead Edge Capital, CEO Bowie Cheung tells Axios Pro exclusively.| Jason Schreier / Bloomberg: |
Sony shuts down Bluepoint Games, the PlayStation subsidiary behind remakes of older games like Demon's Souls and Uncharted; ~70 employees will lose their jobs — The PlayStation subsidiary previously made remakes of games like 'Demon's Souls' — Sony Group Corp. is shutting down Bluepoint Games …
More: Forbes, Windows Central, TheGamer, Kotaku, Push Square, The Shortcut, TechRadar, Video Games Chronicle, GamesRadar, Engadget, Neowin, Tech4Gamers, Screen Rant, Gameranx, GamingBolt, Gizchina, Aftermath, 80 Level, Notebookcheck, iPhone in Canada, PlayStation LifeStyle, GamesBeat, Dexerto, Game Informer, Comic Book, Destructoid, TechRaptor, GamesIndustry.biz, DayOne, PC Gamer, KitGuru, The Verge, and Game Developer
X: @nuhre_, @stealth40k, @okami13_, @domsplaying, @shpeshal_nick, @pirat_nation, @modernvintageg, @zuby_tech, @neogamespark, @tomwarren, and @realradec
LinkedIn: Rich Vogel and Jason Schreier
Bluesky: @stealth40k and @peteskerritt.com
Forums: r/digitalfoundry, r/bloodborne, r/pcgaming, and r/TeamIco
| Jagmeet Singh / TechCrunch: |
General Catalyst plans to invest $5B in India over five years, an increase from the $500M to $1B previously announced, after merging with a local VC in 2024 — General Catalyst, a Silicon Valley-based venture firm with more than $43 billion in assets under management, has announced it plans …
More: The Economic Times, Entrackr, Tech in Asia, Moneycontrol, Inc42, and VCCircle
| Hannah Murphy / Financial Times: |
Sources: Meta cuts its annual distribution of stock options by ~5% for most of its staff, equating to tens of thousands of employees, after a ~10% cut in 2025 — Most employees will receive 5% less in equity rewards as Mark Zuckerberg slashes costs to fund huge AI spending
More: Tom's Hardware, Reuters, The Information, Economic news, Ukrainian National News, Tech in Asia, and Benzinga. Forums: r/technology
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