Anthropic’s $2 trillion IPO puts powerful external trustees in spotlight

In recent years, there has been a broader trend in Silicon Valley of tech companies diverging from conventional governance norms, making it harder for shareholders and the public to hold them to account. Anthropic and OpenAI, the two major AI labs, have both designed unusual company structures, with self-appointed “guardians” of their mission rather than … Read more

Content creators drop the ball

During Naomi Osaka’s match against Anastasia Zakharova at this year’s US Open earlier this week, a gaggle of ring light-wielding influencers who were packed in a luxury suite became enough of a distraction that the umpire paused the match and repeatedly asked them to quiet down. Elsewhere in the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis … Read more

The weird and wonderful headphones of CanJam 2026

I’ve been reviewing headphones for a long time, and I’ve listened to everything from the barely serviceable to multi-thousand-dollar open-back headphones. But recently I’ve been uninspired by the state of mainstream options. Most are perfectly good — great, even — but they lack a distinct character. Something to remind me why I fell in love … Read more

Second complete map of a fruit fly brain completed

All that processing is dictated by which neurons have connections to others. For example, the visual system does some basic recognition of its own before passing the results to the brain’s visual processing centers. If those centers detect something like text, they can use connections to the language centers to interpret it, and so on. … Read more

Robotaxis enter their villain era 

It’s Bullitt meets Christine meets Waymo. A new short film imagines a San Francisco car chase where the other driver isn’t human — and the car may be trying to kill you. That a robotaxi can now be cast as the villain with almost no explanation says something about the present moment. Autonomous cars have … Read more

OpenAI admits to German wiki ‘incident’

Regarding the “‘wiki incident,’ where our agents wrote to several internet sites,” OpenAI wrote in a post on X on Saturday morning, “it’s past time for us to define standards for when and how we share misalignment incidents, not just misalignment properties of our models.” OpenAI said it has typically treated cases of AI agents … Read more

A ratings board wouldn’t let Valve release a trailer. It “leaked” it instead.

Back in 2009, Ars wrote about what was being reported as a leaked trailer for the then-upcoming Left 4 Dead 2, saying the footage “looks like it’s straight from a high-gloss action movie.” Today, we need to offer an important update to this crucial, 17-year-old story: The trailer “leak” was orchestrated by Valve itself. That … Read more

Pentagon rescinds new testosterone screening policy without explanation

Potentially harmful guidance In Hegseth’s July announcement, he claimed that the testing and potential treatment was for “restoring and optimizing” capabilities of military members, protecting their “longevity,” and “ensuring [they] have the biological foundation required to sustain the fight.” Health experts have criticized the screening as being potentially harmful. Neither the Endocrine Society nor the … Read more