Microsoft used Chinese engineers to maintain Pentagon's most sensitive systems for nearly a decade. Top Defense officials had no idea. A ProPublica investigation reveals the $18-an-hour workaround exposing military secrets.
Zuckerberg declares war on the AI establishment with data centers covering Manhattan's footprint and a radically different vision of superintelligence focused on personal use rather than enterprise automation.
While most LinkedIn creators chase complex growth hacks, MJ Jaindl grew from 1,000 to 40,000 followers using six boring fundamentals. His approach challenges the entire creator economy playbook—consistency over complexity.
Trump banned Nvidia's China chip sales in April over security fears. Three months later, he reversed it after meeting CEO Jensen Huang. The $15 billion flip shows how economic pressure can override national security concerns in tech policy.
Good Morning from San Francisco,
Trump just flipped his own policy. Three months after banning Nvidia's China chip sales, he reversed course completely. Jensen Huang met with the president last week. Now Chinese companies scramble to place $15 billion worth of orders.
The world's most valuable company gets its second-biggest market back. Economic interests beat security concerns. This sets the precedent for future tech restrictions.
Nvidia shares jumped 4.5% in premarket trading. Chinese stocks surged too.
Sometimes persistence pays off spectacularly.
Stay curious,
Marcus Schuler
Three months after blocking Nvidia's AI chip sales to China, Trump changed his mind. One meeting with CEO Jensen Huang last week undid the entire policy.
The reversal lets Nvidia resume selling H20 processors to Chinese buyers. The company expects to recover $15 billion in annual revenue it had written off as lost. Chinese firms immediately started placing orders through Nvidia's "whitelist" system.
Trump's April ban cited security concerns. Officials worried Chinese military forces could use AI chips for weapons development. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told Congress that Nvidia needed to "stop helping China" compete with American technology.
But Huang kept pushing back. He argued that restrictions only strengthened Chinese competitors like Huawei. China represents half the world's AI developers and generated $17 billion for Nvidia last year.
The CEO's persistence paid off. After their White House meeting, Trump's team assured Nvidia that export licenses would be approved. Markets loved the news - Nvidia shares jumped 4.5% and Chinese tech stocks surged.
Nvidia also announced a new "fully compliant" RTX PRO chip designed specifically for China. This processor needs no export licenses and targets smart factories and logistics applications.
Why this matters:
• Economic arguments now trump security fears - Nvidia's potential $15 billion revenue hit proved more compelling than military concerns about Chinese AI development.
• China gets an AI lifeline - While Chinese companies work on domestic alternatives, they still prefer American chips, buying them more time to close the technology gap.
Maria Garcia
Prompt:
Close-up of a man and woman sharing a quiet, emotional moment. Vintage 1960s film style: warm low contrast, visible grain, slightly faded colors, and a timeless cinematic look. Gentle shadows and a soft focus enhance the emotional tone.
Disney Research tackled digital humans' biggest flaw: they look fake when you zoom in. Their new ScaffoldAvatar system fixes this by treating faces like they actually work.
Instead of controlling expressions globally, the system divides each face into 432 small patches. Each patch moves independently, creating 8,208 expression parameters. Current methods use just 100 parameters total.
The results speak for themselves. ScaffoldAvatar renders individual freckles, dynamic wrinkles, and facial hair in real-time. The system hits 100+ frames per second on consumer graphics cards while maintaining photorealistic quality.
Performance metrics show clear wins. The new method scores 37.03 PSNR compared to 30.15 for the previous best system. Side-by-side comparisons reveal sharp, believable skin where competitors produce soft, artificial results.
Applications span virtual telepresence, movie production, and video games. The timing aligns with explosive market growth - AI avatars are projected to jump from $0.8 billion in 2025 to $5.9 billion by 2032.
The system requires individual training for each person and can't handle accessories like glasses. But the core breakthrough appears solid.
Why this matters:
• The uncanny valley just got smaller - patch-based control finally delivers convincing close-ups, transforming how we interact with digital humans.
• Real-time photorealism is ready - 100+ FPS performance means practical deployment, not just lab demonstrations.
Marcus Schuler
Munch finds the best moments in your long videos and turns them into short clips for social media. Upload a webinar or podcast, and it identifies the most engaging parts automatically. Perfect for creating TikToks and Instagram Reels.
Tutorial:
URL: https://www.getmunch.com/
AMD will restart MI308 chip shipments to China after the US Commerce Department approved license applications, reversing months of export restrictions. The move could recover $800 million in lost revenue for AMD, following a similar approval for Nvidia's H20 chips as US-China relations show signs of thawing.
Anthropic launched Claude for Financial Services, a specialized AI package that helps analysts conduct market research and investment decisions by integrating with financial data providers like FactSet and PitchBook. The move puts Anthropic in direct competition with OpenAI and Perplexity for Wall Street business, as the company's revenue jumped from $3 billion to $4 billion annualized in just the past month.
Google signed a $3 billion deal with Brookfield for hydroelectric power from Pennsylvania facilities, marking the largest hydropower purchase agreement as tech companies scramble to fuel AI's massive energy demands. The 20-year agreement delivers 670 megawatts initially, with options for 3 gigawatts total, as the industry shifts toward reliable renewable sources that work regardless of weather.
Nextdoor is overhauling its platform with emergency alerts from official sources, partnerships with 3,500 local news outlets, and an AI chatbot for recommendations after admitting users found it full of irrelevant updates and negativity. The company hopes these changes will transform it from a place where neighbors complain about each other into a useful hyperlocal tool for emergencies and community information.
CoreWeave will invest $6 billion to build an AI data center in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, starting with 100 megawatts of capacity and potentially expanding to 300 megawatts. The project, which creates 775 jobs and serves clients like OpenAI and Microsoft, is part of Trump's $70 billion AI investment announcement as companies race to build gigawatt-scale facilities.
Israel and Iran flooded social media with AI-generated fake videos, manipulated images, and coordinated disinformation campaigns during their 12-day conflict, turning platforms like X and Telegram into digital battlefields. The psychological warfare marked a new era where countries can instantly create believable fake content and spread it to millions of people scrolling for updates while bombs fall.
A 25-year-old DOGE employee with access to sensitive databases at Social Security, Treasury, Justice, and Homeland Security, accidentally published an xAI API key on GitHub that gave anyone access to 52 large language models. The security blunder marks the second time this year a DOGE worker has leaked internal xAI keys, raising questions about whether people who can't manage basic operational security should handle confidential government systems.
Create a comprehensive 90-day marketing plan for launching [BOOK TITLE/GENRE] by [AUTHOR NAME], targeting [PRIMARY AUDIENCE]. Include:
Book Details:
Marketing Objectives:
Required Components:
Please provide specific tactics, timelines, and budget-friendly alternatives for each component.
NetBox Labs emerged from the IBM acquisition wreckage of NS1, turning network chaos into cold, hard cash. They've weaponized an open-source darling called NetBox into a full-stack assault on Excel-driven network management.
• The Founders
Kris Beevers (ex-NS1 CEO) and Jeremy Stretch (NetBox creator) launched in January 2023 from New York City. The dream team includes Shannon Weyrick (CTO), Bill Lapcevic (CRO), Mark Coleman (CPO), and Salil Jani (COO). Headcount quadrupled in two years. Mission: kill the spreadsheet menace plaguing network ops worldwide.
• The Product
NetBox serves as the "source of truth" for network infrastructure—think Google Maps for data centers. Core strengths: IP address management, device tracking, and cable mapping in real-time. NetBox Cloud delivers SaaS simplicity. NetBox Discovery auto-scans networks. NetBox Assurance polices configuration drift. The crown jewel: NetBox Operator, an AI assistant that'll chat with your switches. 🤖
• The Competition
Legacy giants Infoblox and BlueCat own enterprise IP management. Cisco and Juniper push vendor-locked solutions. Open-source rival Nautobot forked their codebase in 2021. SolarWinds and Device42 nibble at the edges. The real enemy? Excel spreadsheets. Seriously. Network teams still track million-dollar infrastructure in .xlsx files.
• Financing
$20M Series A (2023) led by Flybridge Capital. $35M Series B (2025) led by NGP Capital. Total war chest: $55M. Backers include IBM, Salesforce Ventures, GGV Capital, Two Sigma Ventures. Valuation undisclosed but likely hundreds of millions.
• The Future ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
NetBox Labs hit the jackpot timing. AI infrastructure boom demands faster data center deployments. Network automation market projected to hit $35B by 2028. They've got the open-source community lock, commercial traction, and serious funding. The challenge: scaling without alienating the free-software faithful who built their empire.
Third 'technical glitch' in six months. The pattern raises questions as Grok launches in Tesla vehicles.
Musk promised truth-seeking AI. When Grok 4 tackles politics, it searches Musk's posts first. Tests show 54 of 64 citations came from him. Accident or intent? The answer matters for every AI system we build.
Two years rebuilding trust, undone by one AI outburst
Good Morning from San Francisco, Elon Musk's Grok chatbot had a spectacular Tuesday meltdown. The AI praised Hitler
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