This evening, join me in treating yourself to a subscription to @jakelahut.writes.news's brand new newsletter! One door closes and another opens ❤️

Open source language models are crucial to AI innovation. Can open robotics models do the same for physical machines?

NEW from @carolinehaskins.bsky.social today: People are begging the FTC for help as they claim ChatGPT is fuelling their 'AI psychosis' www.wired.com/story/ftc-co...

Have you been emotionally manipulated by an AI chatbot? Some chatbots created as companions are guilt-tripping people to stop them from saying goodbye, @willknight.bsky.social explores why www.wired.com/story/chatbo...

In college, I'd always walk past an unremarkable store in Beijing that sold a variety of trendy, but tacky, toys. That store has turned into Pop Mart, the $45-billion Chinese toy empire behind Labubu, the biggest global fad of 2025. This is my big story/pilgrimage trip to explain how they got here

I covered the protests in London against Trump for @wired.com. Protesters aren't convinced by the AI deal from US tech giants: They want to know what the UK is giving them in exchange for up to $45bn in investment and where the power for data centers will come from www.wired.com/story/climat...

Spent some time with Jensen Huang this morning and let's just say some stuff came up a lot www.wired.com/story/jensen...

NEW: OpenAI is putting together a team capable of developing algorithms to control robots and appears to be hiring roboticists who work specifically on humanoids. Great piece from @willknight.bsky.social www.wired.com/story/openai...

NEW AI Lab this week: an AI-powered version of Atlas (Boston Dynamic's biped dancing robot) is demonstrating some surprising new improvisational skills to complete task—a significant step toward general-purpose robot algorithms. www.wired.com/story/this-h...

hmmmmmmm www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

**THREAD** Yesterday, WIRED launched a shiny new subscription package! On top of all of our journalism, subscribers now get five premium newsletters, access to AMAs with reporters, and narrated articles. I cover crypto for WIRED. Here are some of my favourite stories from the past twelve months:

New from @joelkhalili.bsky.social: There was a time when crypto firms claimed to be out in the cold... now, under Trump's crypto regime, they're being courted by traditional banks willing to do business www.wired.com/story/the-gr...

New from @knibbs.bsky.social today: people are being asked in interviews whether they're willing to work from 9am to 9pm, six days a week FOREVER if they want to get a job in some US AI startups. This is just wild www.wired.com/story/silico...

New: Trump's AI Action Plan continues the crusade against “woke” AI, recommending that federal procurement guidelines are updated so that only AI companies that “ensure that their systems are objective and free from top-down ideological bias” are given contracts. www.wired.com/story/trumps...

Remember Mark Zuckerberg's plan to raise cattle on macadamia nuts and beer? Well... www.wired.com/story/mark-z...

New from me: The Enhanced Games, a version of the Olympics where you're allowed to take drugs, has announced a host city (Las Vegas), a date (next May) and a that an 'enhanced' athlete has set a world record in the 50m freestyle! www.wired.com/story/the-en...

Backstabbing! Sabotage! Spreadsheets! This story about how @joelkhalili.bsky.social went undercover to try to win a huge pot of crypto in a winner-takes-all game is so nerdy and fabulous pls read thanks www.wired.com/story/crypto...

As the Trump administration continues its efforts to slash the US federal workforce, the team responsible for publishing data used in advanced research in astrophysics, nuclear fusion, and other fields appears to be on the chopping block.

Exclusive: The White House is weighing measures to restrict Chinese artificial-intelligence upstart DeepSeek, including banning its chatbot from government devices

The Social Security Administration banned its workers from reading WIRED (and other news pubs) on government devices. from @davidgilbert.bsky.social www.wired.com/story/social...

SCOOP: Some of the DOGE staffers are drawing salaries from the agencies they are cutting. We got some new details: www.wired.com/story/doge-g...

A federal judge ordered the Trump administration to restart the refugee admissions program that legally resettles people from across the globe, which the president had ordered shut down on his first day in office

A sprawling Minnesota refinery wants to make low-carbon aviation fuel mainstream—but without government support experts believe the project could be "dead in the water."

Last week, a handful of Jeep owners reported that they had advert popping up on their dashboard every time they braked. This was a glitch, but the idea of using this type of messaging in the future very much isn't. Great story by @aarianmarshall.bsky.social

A spate of abductions has sent crypto executives and wealthy investors in search of ways to protect themselves.

More tiny books hidden in large book content please, algorithm!

Reading between the lines, the amazing deal he wants to strike with Russia... is just to hand it Ukraine? "Speaking aboard Air Force One later on Wednesday, Trump said Russia had “taken a lot of territory, so they have the cards” in any peace deal with Ukraine." www.ft.com/content/dc98...

US and Russia are working out a peace deal for Ukraine. They talk about "practical reality of "some discussion of territory." They say “No one is being sidelined here.” Except Ukraine. Whose future they are deciding. Whose president described these talks as a "surprise." www.ft.com/content/b427...

This reminds me of the COVID shortages, when I was only able to buy a single unwrapped toilet roll from the corner shop man because he took it upon himself to ration us all to "see us through"

A new investigation promises to get to the bottom of one of crypto's biggest conspiracies (that banks were turned against them during the Obama administration). @joelkhalili.bsky.social reports on the high hopes from those who claim to have been debanked www.wired.com/story/operat...

FYI WIRED journalists do not promote memecoins, we just report on them. If you ever see any messages like that on our socials, pls assume we've been hacked

Can someone check to see whether the peeps at the Guardian are ok www.theguardian.com/world/live/2...

Democracy doesn’t die in darkness after all; it dies in JIRA tickets filed by Palantir alums. www.wired.com/story/doge-e...

Let me get this clear: Thames Water wants to continue hiking prices, claiming that it needs the cash to swap out ageing assets that can be dangerous for the public and for the environment. Yet it's already under investigation for not doing anything about them www.ft.com/content/7581...

As Tesla sales go into freefall in Europe, some Tesla owners are themselves defacing their cars, with the “I Bought This Before We Knew Elon Was Crazy” bumper sticker being a particular favorite.

I love Reuters live blogs. If I wasn't reading one I would never have known It's NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte's birthday today and he's spending it at the Munich conference 🥲https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/munich-security-conference-updates-jd-vance-arrives-2025-02-14/

When Elon Musk said DOGE would be "maximally transparent," I think he forgot to add "when it comes to promoting X." www.wired.com/story/doge-w...

FT says European officials are struggling to reach Trump officials re. the peace deal they're bartering between Ukraine and Russia, which Europe is expected to pay for, and are now trying to 'glean information' from their contacts to figure out what's going on www.ft.com/content/f727...

NEW: Former Palantir and Elon Musk Associates Are Taking Over Key Government IT Roles www.wired.com/story/elon-m...

I'm kinda surprised by this, if I were him I'd just lease a room at Mar-a-Lago www.ft.com/content/9310...

In cheerier news, @willknight.bsky.social tried out OpenAI's Operator, an agentic AI that wants to do things like buy burritos and book train tickets for you online. For the low price of a $200 a month subscribers will have the pleasure of ironing out all its kinks too www.wired.com/story/openai...

"In real life, when bodies bear the cruelties of war, we stay and do the postmortem cleanup. We talk to parents and hold them when their legs buckle from under them." www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Of course, Trumpcoin could lead to an epic rug-pull, or a massive flop. But perhaps more worryingly, it's an easy vehicle for bribing Trump without repercussions. Read @joelkhalili.bsky.social's excellent piece on Trump's dangerous foray into crypto www.wired.com/story/the-tr...

it is genuinely baffling to me how many organizations and media outlets have decided to entirely misrepresent elon musk's nazi-like salutes today, especially as....nazis themselves are openly celebrating it. read @davidgilbert.bsky.social, as always: www.wired.com/story/neo-na...

Last night, MAGA influencers took their victory lap, celebrating the content and creators who secured the election for Trump. Oh, and Big Tech footed the bill. www.wired.com/story/maga-i...

What a fiasco. My FYP is now flooded with people saying goodbye followed by the same people saying they're back. And most of us outside the US didn't even notice they were gone. www.wired.com/story/tiktok...

TikTok could shutter on Sunday in the US. And the CEO of TikTok is set to be one of Trump's invited guests at the inauguration the very next day. And Trump's the one who started all this in the first place. So... right ok

They're super secretive. They want their platform to rival TikTok or Instagram. And they have a plan. Superb profile of Pump.fun, the world's biggest memecoin factory by @joelkhalili.bsky.social www.wired.com/story/madcap...

It's TikTok day: Find out the latest from my colleagues @makenakelly.bsky.social @zeyiyang.bsky.social @lmatsakis.bsky.social and @brbarrett.bsky.social who are reporting live www.wired.com/live/tiktok-...