Category: Uncategorized

Paul Sawers / TechCrunch: UK-based Zen Educate, a marketplace that algorithmically matches schools with the best available teachers, raised a $21M Series A extension to fuel US expansion  —  Zen Educate, an online marketplace that algorithmically matches schools with the best available teachers, has raised £19.3 million …

Harley-Davidson’s second all-electric motorcycle seduced WIRED’s editor in chief—but sadly can’t go the distance.

Meir Orbach / CTech: Alphawave IP acquires Banias Labs, an Israel-based optical digital signal processing chip developer for data centers, for $240M  —  The Israeli startup, co-founded by veteran entrepreneur Avigdor Willenz, develops coherent optical DSP semiconductor technology for data centers

Susan Su thought she was discovering a new café. She was in Beijing for the second half of her gap year, working with a biomedical engineering group at Tsinghua University. But the lab was relatively new, and she was filling her time by exploring the city. She soon realized she had instead stumbled into the […]

Plus: Hackers hit the Mormon Church, Signal plans to ditch SMS for Android, and a Fat Bear election erupts in scandal.

We found lots of math-filled and science-rich toys for tiny nerds to disassemble, set on fire, and then rebuild.

Plus: iPhones are calling the cops from roller coasters, Polestar has a new electric SUV, and Meta makes another big bet on VR.

Sam Reynolds / CoinDesk: Binance’s mining service Binance Pool launches a $500M fund to provide 18-to-24-month loans for private and publicly listed Bitcoin miners  —  The entity is the latest to join the growing ranks of alternative lenders looking to provide capital to the distressed mining industry.

Osato Avan-Nomayo / The Block: Hacker behind the Mango Markets exploit keeps $47M and returns $67M to the DeFi platform after a Mango community vote; he claims his actions were legal  —  – Eisenberg called the exploit a “profitable trading strategy” and said his actions were legal.  — The Mango exploiter said the deal …

Ashley Capoot / CNBC: Elon Musk claims SpaceX will continue subsidizing Starlink in Ukraine “for free” even though the service is still losing money; SpaceX receives government funds  —  – Elon Musk said in a tweet Saturday that his company SpaceX would continue to fund Starlink satellite internet terminals …

There are many ways to make your internet faster, but the specifics depend on what you’re willing to spend right now.

Here’s a guide to all the models—plus case recommendations and hidden software tricks to try.

City residents have long resorted to low-cost, do-it-yourself remedies that may be harmful to human health.

Tim Keary / VentureBeat: New York City-based IronVest, which uses biometric authentication and AI to verify the identity of users online, raised a $23M seed led by Accomplice  —  The challenge of assuring identity is becoming more and more difficult.  According to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) …

Tim Bradshaw / Financial Times: Fewer than half of the US and European rapid delivery startups launched in the pandemic are still operating; they face huge losses, a funding drought, and more  —  As nervous consumers avoided supermarkets during the Covid-19 pandemic, tech entrepreneurs spied a once-in-a-generation opportunity to reinvent the humble grocery run.

Simon Owens / Simon Owens’s Media Newsletter: A look at Spotify’s podcast exclusivity strategy, which led to 75% audience drops for some Gimlet shows and caused others, like the Obamas, not to renew deals  —  The open podcast ecosystem isn’t dead yet.  —  Welcome!  I’m Simon Owens and this is my media newsletter.

This video game lets you work as a salvager in low Earth orbit. Essentially, it is like building a Lego set in reverse, and, like Lego, it is a very satisfying experience, finds Jacob Aron

George Simister / UKTN: Manchester-based Connex One, which provides customer engagement tools to contact centers, raised a £93M Series C  —  Manchester-based customer engagement platform Connex One has secured £93m in a Series C funding round.  —  Connex One’s software, used by the likes of O2 and Gousto …

This easy-going little electric bike has a step-through frame so low that anyone can cruise it out.

Plus: How Mark Zuckerberg fell in love with VR, the fake future of documentaries, and Armageddon.

Social media provides a lot of discourse, but sometimes, a minor revolt over a coffee chain’s loyalty program is the best use of its tools.

Drew Harwell / Washington Post: A look at TikTok’s rise, as US viewers spend longer in the video app than Facebook and Instagram combined, and ongoing issues with its Chinese ownership  —  The world’s most popular app has pioneered a new age of instant attention.  Can we trust it?  —  On the night Shelby Renae […]

The Information: Doc: a shareholders’ agreement from Elon Musk for Twitter investors gives him “sole discretion” on an IPO decision, “exclusive authority” on board changes, more  —  Elon Musk may be relying on outside investors to help finance his $44 billion purchase of Twitter.

As more data centres are being built to meet growing demand, their water use is coming under scrutiny – particularly in regions of the US affected by the ongoing megadrought

SpaceX founder Elon Musk said the company can no longer pay for the Starlink satellites providing internet for Ukraine’s government and military. What you need to know

Thomas W. Eagar, professor of materials engineering and engineering systems, post-tenure, in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering (DMSE) and an internationally recognized expert in welding, died Oct. 9 at his home in Belmont, Massachusetts. He was 72. An outspoken scholar and admired teacher, Eagar had a reputation for saying, as he put it, […]

A brain decoder can extract words and sentences from the brain recordings of people listening to stories or watching silent films

Sponsor content from Imperium Group.

Daniel J. Riccio, an advisory board member for the School of Engineering’s Undergraduate Engineering Leadership Program, has made a gift of $10 million to expand MIT’s Graduate Engineering Leadership Program, which will be renamed in recognition of the support. The gift will allow the program to grow and sustain its operations for years to come […]

Insurers can take three steps to retain the benefits of copayments and avoid their downside.

Research shows that agendas often create the appearance of effective meetings — without actually improving how they’re run.

The ambient music pioneer is back with ForeverAndEverNoMore, an album that wants to get you in touch with your climate emergency feelings.

Physicists just reconstructed a 19th-century paradox that seems to violate the second law of thermodynamics (but really doesn’t).

Financial Times: Chinese internet censors suspend thousands of WeChat accounts and remove posts after a rare protest in central Beijing against “dictator and traitor Xi Jinping”  —  Banners hung from bridge call for leader’s removal ahead of Communist party congress

Coco Liu / Bloomberg: Study: Chinese netizens are permitted to air environmental concerns and criticize polluters on social media, resulting in lower emissions from some factories  —  In spite of China’s intensifying crackdown on political dissent, residents still have plenty of leeway to air their environmental concerns …

Angus Loten / Wall Street Journal: IT teams are hiring more freelancers and slowing recruiting full-time staff; Freelancer.com says software developer job postings rose 54.7% YoY in Q3 2022  —  New wave of IT freelancers prefer to tackle digital projects, then move on, recruiters say  —  Facing economic headwinds …

These phones remain unbeatable when it comes to sheer value.

In an independent test, cathode components Redwood Materials made from reused metals matched the performance of those made from raw ones.

The company pushed up the launch of its $6-per-month ad-supported tier, edging out competition from Disney+.

Tom Giles / Bloomberg: Filing: Twitter says Elon Musk is under a federal investigation related to his bid to acquire the company and asks for access to documents he gave authorities  —  Billionaire Elon Musk is being investigated by federal authorities related to his attempted acquisition of Twitter Inc. …

Chris Baraniuk / BBC: How cosmic rays can alter computers’ memory, a phenomenon understood since at least the 1970s, and why it is hard to tie specific errors to ionizing radiation  —  The Earth is subjected to a hail of subatomic particles from the Sun and beyond our solar system which could be the cause […]

Ashley Gold / Axios: Meta files to dismiss the FTC’s attempt to block its acquisition of Within, arguing the FTC’s claims rely on “pure speculation of a hypothetical future state”  —  Meta filed to dismiss the Federal Trade Commission’s attempt to block its acquisition of virtual reality fitness startup Within …

Double-whammy approach uses chemical catalysts to break down mixed plastic waste so bacteria can convert what’s left into desirable compounds

Apps that create images based on text can deliver amazing results, but there are problems with the data sets some are trained on and the lack of compensation for artists, says Annalee Newitz

Leon Villegas SM ’08, MBA ’08, a graduate of the MIT Leaders for Global Operations program, works on the cutting edge of autonomous aviation. At Wisk Aero, an advanced air mobility company dedicated to delivering safe, everyday flight for everyone, Villegas is responsible for the production of aircraft for a new market just coming into […]

Professor Michel DeGraff of MIT Linguistics has been elected as a fellow of the Linguistics Society of America (LSA), the highest academic honor within the field of linguistics, in recognition of his dynamic and impactful scholarship in Creole studies with a focus on Haitian Creole (or “Kreyòl,” as it’s called in Haiti). DeGraff’s scholarship into […]

“My job is basically flooding Cambridge,” says Katerina “Katya” Boukin, a graduate student in civil and environmental engineering at MIT and the MIT Concrete Sustainability Hub’s resident expert on flood simulations.  You can often find her fine-tuning high-resolution flood risk models for the City of Cambridge, Massachusetts, or talking about hurricanes with fellow researcher Ipek […]

Sponsor content from Siemens Healthineers.

A roundtable conversation takes stock of Clayton Christensen’s influential theory.

A look at the opportunities, risks, and mitigation strategies.