📺 Hotel TVs that don’t suck: Next time you book a stay, ask if they have LG TVs. They’re the first to support Google Cast and Apple AirPlay in hotels. No logins — just scan a QR code to play your shows and music. The connection cuts when you check out. LG didn’t say which hotels got the update, but here are rooms where AirPlay works.
8 million
Views on a fake tweet about Elon Musk. It claims an Immigration and Customs Enforcement hotline got shut down because 90% of calls were about him. Musk is an immigrant from South Africa who became a U.S. citizen. Don’t share if it pops up on your feed.
Teenagers have no faith in Big Tech: This is reassuring. In a new study of 1,000 American teens, 64% don’t trust Google, Meta, Apple or TikTok to care about their mental health, and 62% think Big Tech’s profits matter more than their safety. AI isn’t helping, since they know it’s feeding them fake images, inaccurate info and chatbots pretending to be real people.
📚 Spot the bot: Books written by actual humans are getting a special certification. The Authors Guild came up with a way for writers to prove their work isn’t AI-generated. Bonus: You’ll be able to search a public database so you know before you buy.
In security, we trust: DeepSeek’s cybersecurity team left a database wide open, exposing chat histories, API keys, backend details — you name it. And don’t forget their servers are based in China, meaning the communist government is peeking in. Here are my tips to use it safely, if you must.
💰 Silicon Valley’s unicorns fly: The venture capitalists are upset. Communist China’s DeepSeek AI is 30 times cheaper to run than its American counterparts. In an interview, DeepSeek’s founder said he didn’t mean to start a price war; AI should simply be affordable for everyone. Oh, and he thinks AGI (that’s “artificial general intelligence,” when AI becomes smarter than humans and makes its own decisions) is two years away. Sleep well.
$100,000
To build a single Apollo spacesuit. They were made by bra company Playtex, whose engineers know all about stretchy fabric. The result? Some 21 layers of fabric and clever “bellows” joints that let Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin bend their arms and legs. That’s stellar support.
🍜 Is this pho real? Some idiot tried to steal an $18,000 robotic server from a San Jose Thai restaurant. The guy walked in, asked to use the restroom, then dragged the bot to his car when he thought no one was looking. Employees stopped him, but it almost would’ve been funnier if they didn’t … The robot’s software only works inside the restaurant, so it would’ve been useless.
Out-of-this-world upgrade: Apple’s iOS 18.3 update lets certain T-Mobile customers send texts from anywhere. It’s part of SpaceX and T-Mobile’s direct-to-cell satellite service. If you signed up for the beta in December and got lucky, you should see a toggle in your cellular data settings to enable it. It’s text-only for now, but voice and data connectivity are coming in the future.
Apple-lutely amazing: Most orchards still do things the old-fashioned way, but that’s changing fast. Startups are testing robotic pollinators in places where bees can’t get the job done, saving fertilizer by pinpointing trees that need it the most and using 12-foot robotic arms for harvesting. This is great, because what’s worse than finding a worm in your apple? Finding half a worm.
There’s an app for that: The next time you need shampoo, you might not have to wait around for someone to unlock the case. CVS is updating its app to let you unlock antitheft shelves on your own after connecting to the store’s Wi-Fi. It’s being tested in NYC locations, with plans to expand to more stores, mostly on the West Coast.
Mystery (not) explained: Two months later, the White House says all those drones spotted over New Jersey weren’t foreign enemies or aliens. They were authorized by the FAA for research and “various other reasons.” Uh, what kind of research? No details. And the “various other reasons?” Insert conspiracy theories here.
New chips mean new risks: A serious flaw in Apple gear lets hackers snag data while you’re logged into Gmail in one tab and iCloud in another. The two vulnerabilities, named “FLOP” and “SLAP,” impact Mac laptops made in 2022 or later; Mac desktops from 2023 or later; iPad Pro, Air and Mini models from September 2021 and later; and iPhone 13, 14, 15 and 16 models, plus the iPhone SE (3rd-gen). There’s no fix yet. Be extra careful and log out of your email account when you’re not using it.
I warned you about this months ago: If you get a text from E-ZPass or SunPass about unpaid tolls, fines or legal trouble, delete it. Chinese cybercriminals are behind a campaign sending fake messages across America. Click the link and you’ll land on a copycat site of a real toll services company, ready to steal your payment info. Never follow a link to pay a bill; go to the official site yourself.
🤖 Finders keepers: OpenAI says DeepSeek, the impressive AI model out of China, just copied its work. The company is pointing to a technique called distillation, where developers extract data from larger, more advanced models to train their own, saving hundreds of millions of dollars in dev costs. The big ol’ irony? OpenAI built its model by scraping the entire internet without consent. Pot, meet kettle.
844 mph
Speed Boom’s Supersonic XB-1 jet reached in tests. It’s the first civilian aircraft to break the sound barrier, aka Mach 1.1. The company has raised $700 million to build a plane that’ll carry 64 passengers at 1,300 mph (Mach 1.7) by 2030. At that speed, you could fly from LA to NYC in about two hours.
17
Solution the French-governed AI chatbot gave to 5(3+2). (The answer is 25.) The bot, Lucie, also said, “Cow’s eggs, also known as chicken’s eggs, are edible eggs produced by cows.” The bot is offline now. So, to recap, we need to worry about China in the AI race and definitely not France. Noted.
👨👩👧👦 Chosen family: This number surprised me: About 27% of folks are estranged from their families. So sad. Enter the 11,000-member Facebook group Surrogate Grandparents USA. Donna Skora, a retired paralegal in Florida, started it in 2015. Folks can post ads or respond to others’ requests for surrogate grandparents. It’s helped people like Karen Tautges Malinak, a goat farmer in Minnesota who’s lost touch with her daughters.
Swatting spree: You’re sitting at home when the SWAT team rushes in, convinced someone inside just committed murder and has explosives set up. A 23-year-old in Wisconsin, along with another guy, hacked into the family’s Ring camera and called the cops with that story. Once police arrived, they livestreamed it all. One of them is already serving 17 years in prison. If you have a Ring camera, turn on 2FA.