September 15, 2026

AI Watch

Meta’s plans to replace workers with AI fell flat, report says – Computerworld– www.computerworld.com

pgnewser August 27, 2026 0

Meta’s plans to replace workers with AI fell flat, report says – Computerworld– www.computerworld.com
News Source
EXCERPT:

Earlier this year, Meta, one of the industry’s loudest AI advocates, was ready to slash up to 60% of the members of some teams and replace them with AI, as part of what it called Project OT (Organization Transformation), an initiative to make Meta “AI native.”

But it backed off at the last minute after internal data showed that the plan wasn’t working out, according to a Reuters investigation published Wednesday. For example, Reuters said, code changes made to the internal software platforms and infrastructure that employees used on the job were up 220% year-over-year, according to an early June post by Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth, yet changes that led to new or upgraded features reaching Meta users were only up 36%.

Meta executives also saw “’reliability warning signs’ caused by the AI coding surge,” according to an internal post, Reuters reported. “Another post, in April, said that unchecked AI agents were performing ‘large-scale, disruptive actions that humans are unlikely to execute.’ The result: Major technical and security incidents, such as service disruptions and possible data leaks, spiked 40% from the previous year, with the time staffers had to spend firefighting them up 70%.”

 

Here’s the Conservative Playbook for Winning the AI Data-Center Debate– townhall.com

pgnewser August 27, 2026 0

Here’s the Conservative Playbook for Winning the AI Data-Center Debate– townhall.com
News Source
EXCERPT:

Conservatives need a coherent approach to the increasingly contentious question of AI data-center development. At the moment, the Right is all over the map, with President Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance emphasizing the need to build the infrastructure required for American AI dominance, while Republican governors including Greg Abbott and Ron DeSantis have approached new data-center development with far greater skepticism, and, at times, open hostility.

Taylor Budowich, president of the Innovation Council, has laid out the organized approach conservatives should take. First and foremost, we must listen to people’s concerns and ensure we oppose data-center projects that could drain communities dry. But in most places, conservatives should also recognize that communities are practically begging for data-center construction because of the investment and economic benefits these projects can bring. Our policy approach should give people the freedom to decide for themselves whether they want a data center built in their community, not impose sweeping statewide or federal moratoria that deny every town that choice and control over their economic future.

“I think part of the problem is actually the premise, which is we’re thinking about it in political terms. I’m a believer of the Reaganism, good policy makes good politics. So the question should be what’s good policy here?” Budowich said. “I think good policy is not a single shovel should go in the ground, not a single slab of concrete should be laid, if there’s a data center that’s taking from the community. These data centers, this industry, shouldn’t be draining our communities, it should be feeding our communities.”

America Looks to Form No-China-AI Alliance

pgnewser August 26, 2026 0

The United States is looking to head China off at the AI resource path with a pending message to its allies. The U.S. is working on a draft letter that will let its allies know they cannot partner with China’s AI-led group and benefit from America’s AI power. The group, called the World AI Cooperation Organization, appears to be a vessel for China to secure AI resources for its country.

US Drafts Warning to Allies: Join China-Led AI Group and Risk Exclusion – bloomingbit– news.google.com
News Source
EXCERPT:

  • The US is preparing a draft letter telling allies to choose between the US and China in artificial intelligence (AI).
  • The US said countries that join the China-led World AI Cooperation Organization could be excluded from US-centered cooperation on AI, semiconductors and critical-mineral supply chains.
  • Pax Silica, which includes South Korea, Japan and Australia, is drawing attention alongside the move, and the US appears to be trying to block China from securing resources for advanced AI development.

Abbott’s data center pause taking several months in Texas– www.washingtonexaminer.com

pgnewser August 26, 2026 0

Abbott’s data center pause taking several months in Texas– www.washingtonexaminer.com
News Source
EXCERPT:

Around 300 proposed Texas data center projects are on hold for several months after Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) ordered an audit of new development, according to state regulators.

Between 250 and 300 projects, most of them data centers, are set to move through the audit queue, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas told the Public Utility Commission. The ERCOT is the state system that regulates the energy grid, which Abbott is aiming to boost through his order earlier this month, mandating certain reforms for data center developers looking to come to Texas.

Under standard procedure, proposed data centers undergo extensive evaluation by the ERCOT before being approved in the Lone Star State. Abbott’s order added some more standards to the process and will audit only “Batch Zero” projects, which are data center proposals that have already secured financing and land to build on, in the ERCOT’s queue.

It would take “several months” to audit the projects before greenlighting them to connect to the state grid, according to the ERCOT. Regulators are aiming to complete their study of the first batch of projects by April 2027, ERCOT Senior Vice President Chad Seely said. Regulators will send information requests to up to 300 large energy consumers to verify their eligibility for the study. They will also collect “community impact information.”

“Just from a holistic standpoint, having all that community impact information on how they’re handling water technology [and] power deliverability gives a better perspective to the state as we see these loads start to come onto the grid over the next several years,” Seely added.

Student Activists Arrested After ‘Occupying’ Entrance to DC Office for AI Lobbyists– legalinsurrection.com

pgnewser August 26, 2026 0

Student Activists Arrested After ‘Occupying’ Entrance to DC Office for AI Lobbyists– legalinsurrection.com
News Source
EXCERPT:

You might say these students were ‘colonizing’ the entrance to this office.

Breitbart News reports:

Police Arrest 13 After Student Activists Occupy OpenAI Office in D.C.

Student activists occupied the lobby of a Washington, DC building housing OpenAI’s public lobbying office on Monday afternoon, resulting in 13 arrests. Some students carried signs reading, “OpenAI bought my Senator.”

Futurism reports that more than 30 demonstrators gathered inside the Gallup Building, unfurling a large banner that read “Stop Stealing Our Future” alongside signs stating “OpenAI bought my Senator.” The occupation lasted roughly two hours before police entered the lobby and arrested 13 people.

Most GOP politicians now talk negatively about data centers, data shows– www.washingtonpost.com

pgnewser August 26, 2026 0

Most GOP politicians now talk negatively about data centers, data shows– www.washingtonpost.com
News Source
EXCERPT:

Sen. Jon Husted once promoted data centers as all upside for his state of Ohio. “Data centers are essential to our digital lives,” the Republican said in 2024, praising a planned Google project that he claimed would establish “central Ohio as an important tech hub in America.”

 

Mongolia positions itself as Asia’s next data centre hub– www.euronews.com

pgnewser August 26, 2026 0

Mongolia positions itself as Asia’s next data centre hub– www.euronews.com
News Source
EXCERPT:

Mongolia is positioning itself as a global data centre hub, signing agreements for 863 megawatts of data centre capacity on the sidelines of a United Nations conference on desertification that brought 197 delegations to Ulaanbaatar this month.

The move to attract data centre investment was the most concrete economic outcome of the 12-day COP17 conference of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification, where delegates are discussing how to restore land degraded by climate change.

According to Deputy Prime Minister Togmid Dorjkhand, Mongolia has three main competitive advantages: cheap renewable energy, a cold climate that reduces cooling costs, and a vast land area and stable legal framework.

“We have a lot of energy generation potential, above the ground and under the ground and we have all kinds of deposits, uranium and coal and other resources,” Togmid told Euronews.

“And yes, we are a very cold country, eight months a year are very cold. Cold weather is important for the data centres because they need a lot of cooling, so the colder the weather the more you save on cooling.”

SpaceXAI Unveils Grok Bot To Work Like A Team Of AI Agents– www.ndtv.com

pgnewser August 26, 2026 0

SpaceXAI Unveils Grok Bot To Work Like A Team Of AI Agents– www.ndtv.com
News Source
EXCERPT:

SpaceXAI is rolling out new artificial intelligence software that’s designed to act like a team of AI agents fielding assignments throughout the day, marking the latest bid by Elon Musk’s company to keep pace with Anthropic PBC and OpenAI.

The new product, called Grok Bot, is designed to seamlessly handle a wide range of professional work. The tool can sign into various apps and websites, retain information from prior tasks and enable bots to share details and context with each other, the company said Tuesday.

The product is part of Musk’s broader push to catch up in the AI race after slipping behind in the fast-growing market for AI agents. SpaceXAI, as Musk’s AI outfit is now known, released its first coding agent in May to compete with Anthropic’s offerings, followed by the new Grok 4.5 built with Cursor.

SpaceX reached a $60 billion agreement in June to acquire Cursor, an AI coding startup. Cursor emerged as a key player in tech’s so-called vibe coding era, as demand surged for tools that can write and debug software programming.

Teen allegedly used ChatGPT for ‘ideas’ about ‘killing his family.’ Now he’s charged with murdering mother, brother.– www.theblaze.com

pgnewser August 26, 2026 0

Teen allegedly used ChatGPT for ‘ideas’ about ‘killing his family.’ Now he’s charged with murdering mother, brother.– www.theblaze.com
News Source
EXCERPT:

A Massachusetts teenager used ChatGPT for “ideas” and “fantasies” about “killing his family” — and now the 17-year-old is charged with murdering his mother and brother, the Middlesex District Attorney’s Office said.

Arjun Aravind of Acton has been charged with two counts of murder, two counts of assault and battery on a household or family member, two counts of assault and battery, use of a vehicle without authority, and theft of a motor vehicle in connection with the deaths of his 14-year-old brother, Siddharth Aravind, and his 45-year-old mother, Sudha Venkatesan, according to Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan and Acton Police Chief Douglas Sturniolo.

‘At this time, based on the evidence that was found at the scene, it was apparent that blunt force trauma was used in some fashion on both individuals.’

Acton Police received a call shortly after 6:30 p.m. Tuesday from the suspect’s father, who had been unable to reach his family members and said a tutor who was expected at the family home on Martha Lane was unable to make contact with the residents upon arrival, officials said.

Kids outlearn AI—and we still don’t know why– www.technologyreview.com

pgnewser August 26, 2026 0

Kids outlearn AI—and we still don’t know why– www.technologyreview.com
News Source
EXCERPT:

“It’s just totally miraculous,” says Frank. “If you train GPT-2 on 30 million words, you get a nonsense generator; you don’t get a kid.”

Exactly how babies pull this off is a mystery. Researchers know a lot about what kids learn and how they use language at different stages in development, but there’s still a lot we don’t know. Perhaps the most enduring question is why babies can learn language at all. The syntax of human language—the rules for combining words into sentences—includes recursive, nested structures that allow us to express virtually infinite ideas with a finite lexicon of words and pieces of words. This seems like something that should be a problem for babies. They only splash about in the shallows of a fathomless ocean of language. And yet, somehow, that’s enough. From a drop, they infer the depths.

One solution, put forward in the 1950s by the MIT linguist Noam Chomsky, is that babies are born with hardwired knowledge of grammar. Chomsky was reacting to a rival view, championed by the psychologist B.F. Skinner, that language acquisition is entirely environmental. Skinner thought language was learned through conditioning and reinforcement, the way a dog figures out how to sit or shake for treats. Chomsky countered by citing the “poverty of the stimulus”—the idea that language, especially syntax, is too complex and children’s exposure to it too “impoverished” for them to learn entirely from experience. “His signature argument was, essentially, that language cannot be learned on the basis purely of statistics,” says Richard Futrell, a linguist and cognitive scientist at the University of California, Irvine. Instead, Chomsky posited that language is based on a set of logical rules and argued that children needed innate knowledge of those rules to deduce the grammar of their language from scraps of speech.

Most GOP politicians now talk negatively about data centers, data shows– www.washingtonpost.com

pgnewser August 26, 2026 0

Most GOP politicians now talk negatively about data centers, data shows– www.washingtonpost.com
News Source
EXCERPT:

Sen. Jon Husted once promoted data centers as all upside for his state of Ohio. “Data centers are essential to our digital lives,” the Republican said in 2024, praising a planned Google project that he claimed would establish “central Ohio as an important tech hub in America.”

 

Mongolia positions itself as Asia’s next data centre hub– www.euronews.com

pgnewser August 26, 2026 0

Mongolia positions itself as Asia’s next data centre hub– www.euronews.com
News Source
EXCERPT:

Mongolia is positioning itself as a global data centre hub, signing agreements for 863 megawatts of data centre capacity on the sidelines of a United Nations conference on desertification that brought 197 delegations to Ulaanbaatar this month.

The move to attract data centre investment was the most concrete economic outcome of the 12-day COP17 conference of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification, where delegates are discussing how to restore land degraded by climate change.

According to Deputy Prime Minister Togmid Dorjkhand, Mongolia has three main competitive advantages: cheap renewable energy, a cold climate that reduces cooling costs, and a vast land area and stable legal framework.

“We have a lot of energy generation potential, above the ground and under the ground and we have all kinds of deposits, uranium and coal and other resources,” Togmid told Euronews.

“And yes, we are a very cold country, eight months a year are very cold. Cold weather is important for the data centres because they need a lot of cooling, so the colder the weather the more you save on cooling.”

U.S. ban on foreign-made humanoid robots targets China over security risks– www.cbc.ca

pgnewser August 4, 2026 0

U.S. ban on foreign-made humanoid robots targets China over security risks– www.cbc.ca
News Source
EXCERPT:

The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology. Mispronunciations can occur. We are working with our partners to continually review and improve the results.

The U.S. Federal Communications Commission is banning imports of new foreign-made humanoid robots and power inverters, citing national security risks, in a move that targets China.

Beijing quickly accused the U.S. of protectionism.

The measures are likely to test relations with Beijing ahead of a planned U.S. visit by Chinese leader Xi Jinping to meet with U.S. President Donald Trump in September. China dominates the global market for humanoid robots with an estimated market share of roughly 85 per cent.

The FCC’s ban also includes new imports of quadruped robots, often referred to as four-legged robot dogs. The agency said imports of advanced robots pose cybersecurity and other national security risks. Offshore production of such equipment also leaves U.S. supply chains vulnerable to disruptions.

The ban on power inverters, which are used to convert direct current (DC) electricity into alternating current (AC) electricity and are used in renewable energy systems, data centres and household appliances, could have sweeping ramifications.