3 – Breaking News & Latest Updates 2026
Skip to main content

Archive

Archives for September 2026

Sean Hollister
Sean Hollister
Valve has open-sourced Lepton, its tool to bring Android games to Steam.

“Lepton is intended to help game developers bring their VR Android games to the Steam Frame,” Valve writes. “Lepton is not designed for general Android use, instead opting to keep the bare minimum functionality required to launch into games.”

Developers have already used it to port Meta Quest games to the Steam Frame. But could it do more?

Richard Lawler
Richard Lawler
A Microsoft exec called AI scraping ‘theft of unprecedented proportions.’

In court documents unredacted Thursday, lawyers for the NYT in its copyright infringement case against Microsoft and OpenAI cited Microsoft’s Director of Applied Science, Brent Hecht, saying that “millions of people around the world will soon consider large models ‘hoovering up’ all their work to be an astonishing theft of unprecedented proportions… almost no one intended for content they created to be used in this fashion, nor are they compensated for its use.”

The Orlando Sentinel, which is also part of the suit, reports a Microsoft filing “framed Hecht as someone on the payroll to play a contrarian.”

Jay Peters
Jay Peters
Google’s new emoji site is great.

On the Noto Emoji site, you can search for emoji, download 2D and 3D files of the (open source) emoji in different formats, and even see the original proposals that helped things get turned into emoji in the first place. (In 2019, I wrote about that proposal process for my submissions of the waffle and yawning face emoji.)

I also recommend Google’s post about designing its Noto 3D emoji, it’s good stuff.

A screenshot of Google’s Noto Emoji site.
Image: Google
Jay Peters
Jay Peters
Anthropic proposes three rules for measuring AI progress.

Anthropic’s proposals, laid out in a big website, are:

The extent to which AI is building the next version of itself, as opposed to being built by humans

Our ability to oversee and intervene in actions that AI agents take on Anthropic’s systems

The resources that power the development of more capable models

The company also includes a “snapshot” of the metrics inside the company.

Antonio G. Di Benedetto
Antonio G. Di Benedetto
What should we test on Apple’s ridiculous $12,299 Mac Studio?

That’s not a typo. The M5 Ultra Mac Studio Apple sent us for review is a doozie. It’s got a 36-core CPU and 80-core GPU, 256GB of RAM, and 4TB of storage, making it mind-bogglingly expensive.

Our regular benchmarks aren’t much of a challenge. So what would you like to see us throw at it?

The review configuration of the M5 Ultra Mac Studio, priced out on Apple’s site.
The review configuration of the M5 Ultra Mac Studio, priced out on Apple’s site.
Stevie Bonifield
Stevie Bonifield
Google’s revamping its ‘CC’ AI as an organizing agent for families.

It says the new version of CC can help families manage household tasks like sorting through emails, keeping track of everyone’s schedules, filling out permission slips, and creating shopping lists. Up to six users can manage and interact with the same CC agent and choose what to share with it.

A screenshot of a daily briefing from Google’s CC AI agent
Image: Google
Stevie Bonifield
Stevie Bonifield
King Charles says AI needs “sufficient means of control before it is all too late.”

He joined growing calls for more safety measures around AI at a gathering of AI leaders on Thursday, including Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, Google’s Demis Hassabis, OpenAI’s Sarah Friar, and Anthropic’s Tino Cuéllar.

Jay Peters
Jay Peters
Mark Zuckerberg, Jensen Huang, and Elon Musk reportedly have Trump’s ear on AI.

The three CEOs have apparently have been encouraging him to be hands-off with his approach to AI and “successfully stalled” a plan for an industry-funded AI regulator pitched by Google DeepMind’s Demis Hassabis, according to The Wall Street Journal. Trump also likes to call Huang while he’s onstage.

TC Sottek
TC Sottek
Are we getting direct tax filing after all?

Don’t hold your breath, but the government may effectively reverse course on killing a Biden-admin program that helped people file their taxes for free without having to use infamous third parties like TurboTax. (Democrats have wanted to bring it back, which could make this a little awkward for Trump.)

The Washington Sun reports this could be part of a broader “America.gov” effort that may also let people renew passports and conduct business through an AI agent. It sounds good until you learn that a bunch of former DOGE folks are working on it. Yes, that includes “Big Balls.”

Travis Larchuk
Travis Larchuk
Today’s Vergecast: Apple’s new iPhones and Watches are better than the last ones.

Senior reviewers Allison Johnson and Victoria Song trade host and guest duties in a Vergecasting ouroboros that’s never been attempted before and will probably never be attempted again. Allison talks about the iPhone 18 Pro’s new camera, Victoria talks about the Watch 12 and Ultra 4’s new sensors, and they both give their verdicts on who should upgrade.

Jay Peters
Jay Peters
The international rollout of Alex Gibney’s Elon Musk movie was in doubt, but now it might happen.

Universal Pictures, which has the rights for Musk outside of North America, hasn’t put a release date on the film yet and sources told The Hollywood Reporter that they believed Universal would be dropping it. In a later report, though, THR said that its initial article led to meetings at Universal, and Universal’s head of comms said in a statement that that “The studio remains committed to releasing it in theaters internationally.”

My colleague Andrew Webster reviewed Musk this week.

Update: Added second THR report.

Jay Peters
Jay Peters
A jury was shown this video of a Huawei employee allegedly stealing T-Mobile robot parts.

The video, posted by Inner City Press, was shown during the DOJ’s trial against Huawei, which kicked off last week and follows the 2018 arrest of Huawei’s CFO and an indictment in 2020.

Sean Hollister
Sean Hollister
The 1872 book that predicted an AI backlash — and was cited by Alan Turing.

You’ve heard of the Turing Test to see if a machine can pass as human, right? Maybe you’ve even heard Alan Turing’s warning that machines could “take control”? If you read his actual lecture notes, he cites the 1872 book Erewhon, which you can also read for free. It’s incredible to look back on both at our present moment: