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Showing posts from March, 2026

Iran says it will start targeting US tech companies like Apple, Google, Meta, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Tesla in the Middle East from 8PM local time on April 1 (Julia Shapero/The Hill)

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Julia Shapero / The Hill : Iran says it will start targeting US tech companies like Apple, Google, Meta, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Tesla in the Middle East from 8PM local time on April 1   —  Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said Tuesday that it plans to target major U.S. technology companies across the Middle East … from Techmeme https://ift.tt/23uBlfN

DoorDash CEO Tony Xu says he likes getting 2,000-word emails from delivery workers. It helps him fix their issues.

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DoorDash CEO Tony Xu says he likes long emails from customers and delivery workers. Bloomberg/Getty Images DoorDash CEO Tony Xu said he likes getting 2,000-word emails from customers and delivery workers. The long messages typically provide details about needed improvements to the DoorDash app, he said. Sometimes, the CEO tries to debug the issue himself, Xu said on a podcast. If you're writing an email to Tony Xu about a DoorDash issue , be detailed. The CEO told podcaster David Senra in an interview posted on Sunday that he appreciates receiving long messages from customers and delivery workers, whom the company calls "Dashers," particularly when they explain a problem they had with the app. "I love the 2,000 word emails, especially from Dashers, who will give many use cases of why the logistics algorithm broke for them," Xu said on the podcast. Xu said that many of the short emails he gets don't contain helpful details. Longer ones, meanwhil...

Tel Aviv-based Sett, which builds AI agents to automate game marketing, raised a $30M Series B led by Greenfield Partners, bringing its total funding to $57M (Meir Orbach/CTech)

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Meir Orbach / CTech : Tel Aviv-based Sett, which builds AI agents to automate game marketing, raised a $30M Series B led by Greenfield Partners, bringing its total funding to $57M   —  The Israeli startup targets billions spent on user acquisition with agent-based automation.  —  Sett, which develops … from Techmeme https://ift.tt/dsk3JIB

From oil to food to markets: How a month of war on Iran has remade the world economy

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A plume of smoke rises after a strike on Tehran on March 3. The US and Israeli war on Iran has upended the global economy. ATTA KENARE / AFP The US and Israeli war on Iran is now a month old. In 30 days, the war, which shows few signs of slowing down, has upended the global economy. Everything from oil prices to inflation to air travel is hitting consumers everywhere. It's not easy being the world economy right now. One month into the US and Israeli war on Iran , the shock is upending everything from supply chains to air travel. As the price of a barrel of oil settles in at north of $100, up from $70 before the war, gas prices in the US are flirting with $4 a gallon, the highest since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022. And on the other side of the world, consumers in places like the Philippines and India are waiting hours in line for fuel as governments ration dwindling supplies. "No country will be immune to the effects of this crisis if it continues to go in this d...

Pro-AI group Innovation Council Action, praised by David Sacks, plans to spend $100M+ in the US midterms to drive deregulation and support Trump's AI agenda (Alex Isenstadt/Axios)

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Alex Isenstadt / Axios : Pro-AI group Innovation Council Action, praised by David Sacks, plans to spend $100M+ in the US midterms to drive deregulation and support Trump's AI agenda   —  A new pro-AI political operation is jumping into this year's midterms with a plan to spend more than $100 million … from Techmeme https://ift.tt/OBaedIm

A look at Coinbase One and other insurance-like plans for crypto users that typically exclude coverage for many kinds of account hacks, including phishing scams (Bloomberg)

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Bloomberg : A look at Coinbase One and other insurance-like plans for crypto users that typically exclude coverage for many kinds of account hacks, including phishing scams   —  When Matthew Allan realized nearly $100,000 in Bitcoin was missing from his Coinbase account, he wasn't too worried. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/q16JLD9

I love Disney with my kids — but going without them is even better in some ways

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The author and her husband got married in Disney World. Courtesy of Disney PhotoPass I was able to do a lot less planning and had more room for spontaneity on our kids-free Disney trip. Our priority was food, and our plans revolved around delicious bites and sips. GEO-82: Lounge and dinner at EPCOT's Takumi-Tei were kid-free experiences we would happily repeat. I love visiting Disney World with my kids — seeing that first Mickey hug, the hysterical photos from Tower of Terror, their amazement at the castle lit up by sparkling fireworks. But, I also love visiting kid-free — trips for work, solo trips, with friends, and as a multi-day date with my best friend. My husband and I bundled up for a late January visit and four days of experiences geared toward adults . The Swan Reserve was the perfect resort for cocktails, late nights, and strolls to the parks One of the newest hotels at Walt Disney World, the Swan Reserve is bright, airy, and very kid-friendly. The one-b...

I'm the oldest US Olympian ever to compete. I had to keep my full-time job, and worked over 40 hours while on the road.

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Rich Ruohonen became the oldest Team USA Olympian at 54. Courtesy of Team USA Fifty-four-year-old Rich Ruohonen is a personal injury attorney based in Bloomington, Minnesota. He was on Team USA's men's curling team and is the oldest athlete to compete at the Winter Olympics 2026. While he's not sure he'll compete in the Olympics again, he still competes in curling. This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Rich Ruohonen . It has been edited for length and clarity. I started curling when I was about 12 years old. My dad taught my brother and me. Curling was a demonstration sport back then. I played in college and in law school, but not at a level close to what I play now. I've been playing pretty competitively for the last 25 years. I made my first men's national championship team in 1998 and then again in 2001. I've been to the last 21 out of 23 national championships; I won two of them. I've also been in Olympic trials. But the 2...

Report analyzing payments of 28M US consumers shows Claude adding paid subs at a steadily increasing pace; Anthropic: paid subs have more than doubled this year (Julie Bort/TechCrunch)

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Julie Bort / TechCrunch : Report analyzing payments of 28M US consumers shows Claude adding paid subs at a steadily increasing pace; Anthropic: paid subs have more than doubled this year   —  Whatever the final outcome for Anthropic from its feud with the Department of Defense, the attention it has generated … from Techmeme https://ift.tt/x7l8nq2

TSA workers are getting paid again, but airport chaos isn't going anywhere

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Travelers at US airports are experiencing long wait times at TSA checkpoints. Bloomberg/Contributor/Getty Images President Donald Trump ordered Homeland Security to reinstate pay for TSA officers on Friday. It doesn't mean lines will get shorter — or tickets cheaper — anytime soon. Airlines are navigating a confluence of storms, like staffing shortages and rising jet fuel costs. Jetsetting has gotten less glamorous — and that's not expected to change even as President Donald Trump reinstates pay for Transportation Security Administration workers. Trump on Friday directed Homeland Security to start paying TSA workers after Congress failed to agree on a path to end the partial government shutdown and fund the Department of Homeland Security. The DHS said its agents could start seeing paychecks again as soon as Monday, but if you thought that would mean shorter airport security lines, you might want to pack a snack. The airline industry is facing an assembly of probl...

ShinyHunters says it stole 350GB+ of data in a cyberattack on the European Commission, detected on March 24; the EC says its internal systems were not affected (Pierluigi Paganini/Security Affairs)

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Pierluigi Paganini / Security Affairs : ShinyHunters says it stole 350GB+ of data in a cyberattack on the European Commission, detected on March 24; the EC says its internal systems were not affected   —  The European Commission has allegedly been breached by ShinyHunters, with reported data dumps including content from mail servers. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/x3Y28fr

The FBI confirms Iran-linked Handala breached Kash Patel's personal email but says the data accessed was "historical in nature" and involves no government info (TechCrunch)

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TechCrunch : The FBI confirms Iran-linked Handala breached Kash Patel's personal email but says the data accessed was “historical in nature” and involves no government info   —  Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai Zack Whittaker  —  A hacking group backed by the Iranian government dubbed “Handala” … from Techmeme https://ift.tt/HB42scl

China's broadening Manus review raises doubts about the "Singapore-washing" model; sources: Meta moved 100+ Manus employees to Singapore in early March (Anniek Bao/CNBC)

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Anniek Bao / CNBC : China's broadening Manus review raises doubts about the “Singapore-washing” model; sources: Meta moved 100+ Manus employees to Singapore in early March   —  Tech circles from Silicon Valley to Shenzhen buzzed when Meta acquired Manus, a Singaporean AI startup with Chinese roots, for $2 billion late last year. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/HFsXn8N

Goldman says the US could lose 10,000 jobs a month this year as the oil shock ripples through the economy

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Spencer Platt/Getty Images The effects of higher oil prices could cut slash 10,000 jobs a month, Goldman Sachs says. The bank said it expects the unemployment rate to rise to 4.6% by the end of the year. Higher oil prices can raise inflation and hurt consumer spending, which could worsen the hiring slowdown. The oil price shock could cost the US economy thousands of jobs a month, according to a new analysis from Goldman Sachs. In a note to clients on Thursday, a team of economists at the bank said they anticipate higher unemployment and slower job growth through the end of the year as the impact of higher oil prices ripples across the US economy. In the bank's baseline scenario, the oil price shock could shave off around 10,000 new jobs a month through the end of the year, even after accounting for expected job gains in the energy sector. While higher oil prices have historically led to new jobs in the energy sector, those gains could be more muted this time around, ...

Google expands Search Live, its AI conversational search feature previously limited to the US and India, to all languages and regions where AI Mode is available (Aisha Malik/TechCrunch)

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Aisha Malik / TechCrunch : Google expands Search Live, its AI conversational search feature previously limited to the US and India, to all languages and regions where AI Mode is available   —  Google announced on Thursday that it's expanding its AI-powered conversational search feature, Search Live … from Techmeme https://ift.tt/9TiW1K8

Reddit says it will label automated accounts that provide a service to users and will require accounts suspected of being bots to verify they are human (Sarah Perez/TechCrunch)

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Sarah Perez / TechCrunch : Reddit says it will label automated accounts that provide a service to users and will require accounts suspected of being bots to verify they are human   —  Would-be Reddit competitor Digg just shut down because it couldn't get a handle on the bots overrunning its site. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/pzVwF3o

Social media addiction trial: a Los Angeles jury finds Meta and YouTube were negligent and failed to warn users about the dangers of using their platforms (Jonathan Vanian/CNBC)

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Jonathan Vanian / CNBC : Social media addiction trial: a Los Angeles jury finds Meta and YouTube were negligent and failed to warn users about the dangers of using their platforms   —  A jury in Los Angeles determined on Wednesday that Meta and Google were negligent and failed to warn users of the dangers associated … from Techmeme https://ift.tt/q2Fl3E0

Apple releases iOS 26.4, with Playlist Playground, which generates Apple Music playlist from a prompt, 8 new emojis, improved keyboard accuracy, and more (Zac Hall/9to5Mac)

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Zac Hall / 9to5Mac : Apple releases iOS 26.4, with Playlist Playground, which generates Apple Music playlist from a prompt, 8 new emojis, improved keyboard accuracy, and more   —  Apple has released iOS 26.4, bringing 13 enhancements to your iPhone.  The new software update includes 8 new emoji characters … from Techmeme https://ift.tt/rA5qY0P

The US plans to create a voluntary consortium of countries to invest $4T to secure supply chains for chips, energy, and minerals; the US will contribute $250M (New York Times)

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New York Times : The US plans to create a voluntary consortium of countries to invest $4T to secure supply chains for chips, energy, and minerals; the US will contribute $250M   —  Trump officials said on Monday that the war in Iran had emphasized the need to reduce vulnerabilities for energy and technology. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/kMl8gjq

Q&A with Jensen Huang, who says "we've achieved AGI", on running Nvidia, AI scaling laws, OpenClaw, future of coding, data centers in space, China, and more (Lex Fridman)

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Lex Fridman : Q&A with Jensen Huang, who says “we've achieved AGI”, on running Nvidia, AI scaling laws, OpenClaw, future of coding, data centers in space, China, and more   —  - Watch the full YouTube version of the podcast  —  Table of Contents  —  Here are the loose “chapters” in the conversation. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/4WuiCED

This 16-year-old refused a $300,000 offer to drop out of high school and now runs his own AI company

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Rudrojas Kunvar built Evion, an AI farm tool, while in high school. Rudrojas Kunvar Rudrojas Kunvar, 16, built Evion, an AI tool that helps farmers analyze crop health. The tool collects aerial crop data from drone-captured images. Kunvar created Evion to make that data more accessible to small and midsize farms. While meeting with a venture capitalist last year, 16-year-old Rudrojas Kunvar received an offer that would excite even the most nonchalant teens: accept $300,000 to drop out of high school and run his AI startup full-time. "It was definitely a rough couple of weeks of contemplating," Kunvar, who lives in Germantown, Maryland, told Business Insider. "That's a lot of money." Kunvar had spent the summer before building Evion, a free AI crop-analysis tool that uses images taken by basic camera drones that farmers can purchase themselves. The AI model analyzes images and generates a crop health map that farmers can integrate into their existing...

AI tools like Claude Code have transformed coders' lives, and AI labs are now eyeing a bigger goal: automating everyone's lives and winning the non-coder market (Kate Clark/Wall Street Journal)

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Kate Clark / Wall Street Journal : AI tools like Claude Code have transformed coders' lives, and AI labs are now eyeing a bigger goal: automating everyone's lives and winning the non-coder market   —  The AI sprint is hurtling toward a world where anyone can build personal concierges to do everything from executive presentations to March Madness brackets from Techmeme https://ift.tt/Q2zNiT1

The largest federal workers union says 'untrained, armed' ICE agents should not replace TSA

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TSA agents are working without pay during the partial government shutdown. Adam Gray/Getty Images Trump said he will send ICE agents to replace TSA at US airports on Monday. The largest federal workers union said ICE agents aren't trained for aviation security. More than 400 TSA officers have quit since mid-February amid the partial government shutdown. America's largest federal employee union says ICE agents are unqualified to replace TSA officers at US airports . "ICE agents are not trained or certified in aviation security. TSA officers spend months learning to detect explosives, weapons, and threats specifically designed to evade detection at checkpoints — skills that require specialized instruction, hands-on practice, and ongoing recertification," Everett Kelley, president of American Federation of Government Employees, said on Sunday in a statement posted online. "You cannot improvise that. Putting untrained personnel at security checkpoints does...

Travelers describe airport chaos as unpaid TSA agents stop showing up: 'The line is coming from all directions'

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Passengers had to wait for as long as 75 minutes at JFK on Sunday morning. Courtesy of Jason Ursaner. Many TSA agents are working without pay during the partial government shutdown. Many others have stopped showing up for work. Over 400 have quit since mid-February. The result is long lines at airports. One traveler called their experience at JFK Airport a "complete disaster." One thing became clear to Jason Urasner as he waited over 90 minutes at a TSA checkpoint on Sunday: He was going to miss his flight. "It is actual chaos," Urasner, 40, told Business Insider. "I've never seen anything like it." Urasner had arrived at John F. Kennedy Airport in New York City that morning to board a JetBlue flight to Salt Lake City, but his plans were derailed by what he called a "complete disaster." "There is nobody directing anyone or managing the line. There are a few port authority officers standing around letting people in one by one ...